I grew up in St. Louis, Mo. One of my first vivid memories is of a peach tree uprooted during a storm pretty much covering our backyard. I suspect it was the same 1959 storm that killed a number of people and took out the ABC affiliates television tower. I am consequently very nervous about unseasonably warm early spring days. Those were days that often resulted in severe thunderstorms as well as tornadoes.

Another wind-related issue are the tornadoes spawned by hurricanes that come into the Gulf of Mexico and travel up the Mississippi River. One of those took out a neighbor’s fence in a blaze of splintered wood .