 | Bob Crager of Lewis Street Glass is a 26 year veteran in the glass business. Lewis Street Glass is a leading Wichita Glass company, serving the entire Wichita/Sedgwick County area since 1919. They do anything and everything having to do with glass, both residential and commercial. They also do Auto glass. They are located at 743 South Market, facing Kellogg on the South, and you can reach them by phone at (316) 263-8259. You can email Bob Crager at bcrager@lewisstreetglass.com |
Glass
2009-05-01 11:45:00
Wichita’s tornado season and the effects
Question: My office is located in downtown Wichita, in a pretty tall building…with lots of glass windows and doors. How can I protect myself from broken glass if a tornado hits downtown Wichita?
Answer: First things first…there is an old Indian “myth” that the 2 rivers, the big and little Arkansas Rivers, that are located in Wichita will prevent a tornado from hitting the downtown area of Wichita. Do not, and I will repeat, do not, use that as your guide, because if you do, you’re going to be putting your life at risk at some point, and I don’t think proving or disproving a “myth” is a good choice. If there is a warning that a tornado is on its way to your location, don’t wait for its arrival to learn that you should have made your getaway much sooner. And let me just tell you that there is no glass window or door that I am aware of that can stand up to a powerful tornado’s wind! Most well constructed buildings that are considered low risk for high wind cannot stand up to a tornado. So, it stands to reason that if the integrity of the building itself is at risk, the windows and doors are certainly at risk as well. The damage caused by an Oklahoma/Kansas tornado can be devastating, as evidenced by the storms that have hit the Wichita and surrounding area numerous times in the last 5 or 6 decades. Haysville, Andover, and McConnell AFB have all been bulls eye targets of some pretty powerful tornadoes in recent times, with people being killed and injured seriously in all of those storms.
Broken glass shards and other flying debris that is being thrown through the air at speeds up to and above 200 mph are deadly to anything living that is in the path of these windstorms. Cattle, domestic animals, horses, and people are killed just about every time a tornado strikes a town or city, and even as it makes its way across what appears to be open countryside, or pastures out on the farms. All of these things happened recently in the Greensburg tornado that totally and completely wiped out that town and the surrounding rural areas. Evacuation in advance of the approaching tornado is the best option. If you elect to stay in your office building, you are taking unnecessary chances with your life, and the lives of those in your care. A great video of the tornado from the upper floors of your office building isn’t worth your life, so don’t do that!
There are lots of relatively recent innovations that are designed to help the glass windows and doors resist the high winds of hurricanes and/or tornadoes that are somewhat effective to prevent flying glass shards. A process of “layering” helps hold window glass together during these events. Powerful inter layers, laminated between two pieces of glass under heat and pressure give a resulting piece of glass that looks and functions like a single piece, or ordinary glass, but is stronger and tougher than even standard laminated glass. It’s a convenient and cost-effective application for architects and building owners who demand the highest level of protection from very high windstorms.
A tough building standard known as ASTM E 1996 Level E was designed to protect buildings and the people inside them down in Florida when evacuation, in advance of a Hurricane, is not an option. The standard requires a glazing system to withstand impact by a nine-pound 2x4 fired at 80 feet per second, which is a step up from what’s called “standard large missile”, or Level D, which requires material to resist a 9-pound 2x4 fired at 50 feet per second.
Having said this, if you are located anywhere in “Tornado Alley”, the best idea is for you to run, don’t walk, away from your office building, to an actual tornado shelter that can save your life, when the first hint of a tornado heading your way is broadcast. Lives are lost every year by people not taking these storms seriously enough, soon enough. No matter how strong any man-made structure is, there have been lots of examples that nature and her wrathful storms can completely destroy anything we can build. Winds, either twisting or the straight line variety, water, hail, any and all of these weather components can devastate nearly anything in the path that they’re traveling. Due to the unknown predictability of some weather elements, such as the direction of high winds relative to their approach to a particular structure, any building can be destroyed to some degree by the storms that pass through the area. Since a house or a single building will normally be blown apart in even an indirect hit from a tornado, the winds upon approaching that structure will have much the same appearance of a straight line wind, as opposed to a “twisting” effect. If you’ve ever had the experience of living through a tornado personally, you’ll know that you never want to be inside one of those again...they’re scary enough at a distance.
We’re coming into the new tornado season in Kansas, so get armed with the information that can save your life now...and don’t fail to get yourself and your loved ones into an adequate shelter when those storms are approaching...if concrete, wood, and steel will be destroyed, glass windows and doors will too! More next month...
