I follow a lot of storm chasers (And read a lot about tornadoes and have seen a few myself...)
One thing that was mentioned by a few seasoned storm chasers was that there is a possibility they have reached the limit of prediction of tornadoes. Meaning that they have studied and studied all of the variables. They have launched instruments into tornadoes. They have studied weather maps and patterns. They have studied humidity levels and wind speeds at the surface during a tornado before, during and after...and still, they can see few patterns that predict which cumulonimbus cloud will turn into a tornadic supercell, where a tornado will touch down or how strong a tornado will be. There is a possibility that, like gene selection during conception, tornadoes form at random. Of course the 'ingredients' have to be there, but whether or not a tornado happens is random. There have been several examples of strong tornadoes happening where they weren't supposed to (even without mesocyclones - which are usually associated with weak tornadoes) and of course, of tornadoes NOT happening when they were supposed to (all the ingredients in place, but not much happened). They have gotten better - average warning time has gone up significantly but from what I understand, a lot of the 'lead time' has to do almost entirely with Doppler radar and storm spotters in the field, not because of any predictions of when/where a tornado will form.
I personally think money is better spent on building design to protect people. A lot of lead time doesn't matter to people in a trailer park with no shelter. You could have 3 hours of warning time, but if people have no where safe to go, they are sitting ducks.
A tornado hit where I live when I was a kid - an F4 (arguably F5 - long story) - and while it destroyed neighborhoods, no one who had a basement died. The most casualties were from people caught on the highway, people in industrial areas and people in trailer parks. The trailer park that was hit soon after built a shelter for residents to go to when there are tornado warnings. Now, I'm in an area where tornadoes are relatively rare. The F4 in 1987 hasn't been repeated in the province since then (that has been documented anyway). And yet, people here plan for it - for the day another one rumbles through - which it probably won't in my lifetime. It's really incredulous to everyone I know who lives HERE that people who live in an area where this is a yearly event aren't interested in spending money to design buildings to protect people.
We know that safe rooms built out of a double wall of reinforced concrete are your next safest bet next to an underground shelter - why not make it a new building code? Grandfather it in...new builds HAVE to have these rooms. Make it law that older neighborhoods have to install community shelters. THIS is where money should be spent. Figure out the most cost effective manner to protect people, to build shelters....The science of tornadoes is reaching it's peak right now, and I think it makes more sense to figure out ways to protect people - because it'll be 100 years at LEAST (if ever) before we can predict exactly where a tornado path will be and how strong a tornado's wind speeds will be. People in vulnerable areas can't wait for the science to catch up.
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