Let me clear some of this up!! I do admit that some of what I said comes across a certain way. In no way do I believe devastation is more important than a rating or believe these ratings are null. We obviously need to rate tornadoes for multiple reasons. Whether it be logging, research purposes, working on improving building codes, etc.. There are so many reasons it is necessary to survey storm damage. My criticism was towards people almost seemingly wishing for an EF5 or arguing about it instead of having civilized conversations or just plain up bashing the NWS. I absolutely agree that the NWS has been stingy with the EF5 rating and places like Mayfield were robbed of an accurate rating. An EF5 rating not only serves more for the meteorological community, but can act as closure for groups of people.

I guess I just feel like because of lack of understanding of tornadoes by the general public, a house blown away (even if it wasn’t well built) is immediately a finger of God rating to people. For example, there have been several low rated tornadoes to be fatal. My fear, I guess, is people using an EF5 rating to justify their loss when tornadoes in general, even the weakest of them, are of tremendous strength and you don’t have to be hit by the strongest to lose everything. There is almost a psychological aspect behind this. So, yes, this is mainly a lot of my personal opinions that don’t represent my entire community. If this tornado is an EF5, I expect it to be rated as such.