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Monster Tornado Storm Ripped Through American Farmbelt
2 March 2012
A monster storm of high winds and tornadoes ripped through the multi-state region of Kansas to Tennessee Feb. 29, leaving at least 13 dead and hundreds injured. Towns, farmsteads, pastures, and cropland were all hit. A new storm is now gathering force which will hit the mid-Mississippi River Basin tomorrow, extending perhaps to northern Alabama; but fortunately, the National Weather Service has grounds to expect that it will be more moderate.
These Midwest grainbelt events dramatize the point that the Earth is in a period of weather extremes, in association with conditions in the larger solar and galactic systems, and the consequences, besides deadly to the immediate population, can be devastating to the food supply. Yet no contingency defenses are in motion, under the reigning imperial London/Wall Street/Obama policies and excuses. It may also not be insignificant, that this week’s storms — raging through "Tornado Alley" — are coincident with the seismically active New Madrid earthquake zone, in the Mississippi River Valley. Yesterday’s fierce storm front, with winds up to 170 mph, produced tornadoes and damage in Kansas, across Missouri, southern Illinois, and into far eastern Tennessee, beginning at dawn. The 13-person death toll includes 1 fatality in Kansas, 3 in southern Missouri, 6 in southern Illinois, all in the town of Harrisburg, and 3 in Tennessee. Much of Harrisburg (9,000 population) was devastated, including an apartment complex, shopping center, Catholic church, and half the hospital. An E4- rating twister hit Harrisburg, whose Mayor, Eric Gregg, said, cut a swath through his town as wide as two to three football fields’ length. (E4 is the 2nd-most-powerful tornado rating). Farm operations in dozens of counties were hit by damage to equipment, barns, other buildings, crop storage, and livestock. Debris is strewn all over thousands of acres of farm fields, which are to be planted next month. Illinois itself is one of the world’s leading corn and soy production regions, and both crops are in very short supply right now, long before the next North American harvest comes this Fall. Yet on Feb. 23, the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Chief Economist, Dr. Joseph Glauber, said that, although U.S. and world corn stocks are very "tight," there is nothing to worry about in the food supply chain, because farmers will be induced by "market" conditions, to plant a big acreage of corn this Spring, and corn yields will likely be high. Why? Because of "probablistic" reasons! The USDA and Wall Streeters assert that corn yields will probably go back up to (rising) "trend" this year, because it is improbable that yields would be lower than trend for the third year in a row. In other words, too bad, so sad, if crop damage and failures occur. In reality, there is a high likelihood for a very active tornado season in 2012 in the U.S., according to Accuweather and the National Weather Service. They are using relatively limited considerations, but the signs are clear, such as the warm waters in the Gulf of Mexico and other factors. Last year was the fourth-most-deadly tornado season on record in the U.S., with 1,700 twisters, and 550 deaths — the largest death toll in 75 years. |
