Tornado outbreak sequence of May 21–26, 2011
The tornado outbreak sequence of May 21–26, 2011 was one of the largest tornado outbreaks on record which affected the Midwestern and Southern regions of the United States. Most of the tornadoes developed in a corridor from Lake Superior southwest to central Texas; isolated tornadoes occurred in other areas. An especially destructive tornado destroyed one-third of Joplin, Missouri, resulting in 158 deaths and over 1,000 injuries. The Joplin tornado is the deadliest in the U.S. since April 9, 1947, when an intense tornado killed 181 in the Woodward, Oklahoma area. Tornado-related deaths also occurred in Arkansas, Kansas, Minnesota, and Oklahoma. Overall, the tornado outbreak resulted in 184 deaths, 6 of those non-tornadic, making it second only to the 2011 Super Outbreak as the deadliest since 1974, and the second costliest tornado outbreak in U.S. history behind that same April 2011 outbreak, with insured damage estimated at $4–7 billion.
2013 Moore tornado
On the morning of May 21, the medical examiner's office incorrectly stated that 91 bodies of tornado victims had been received. This number was up from the earlier report of 51 bodies that were incorrectly stated as having been received. Upon the office's discovery that some victims were mistakenly counted twice due to communication errors made by Moore rescue response units that the bodies were admitted to area funeral homes (nearly all of the deceased were actually transported to the examiner's office in Oklahoma City), the actual number was revised downward and later confirmed at 24 tornado victims and two indirect victims. The first two deaths occurred in a house east of Briarwood Elementary School; one occurred near Santa Fe Avenue; seven occurred following a wall collapse at Plaza Towers Elementary; nine occurred within the neighborhoods mainly south of Plaza Towers Elementary; one occurred just east of Interstate 35; and one occurred in a home between Eastern Avenue and Bryant Avenue. A 90-year-old woman who suffered a fractured skull during the tornado later suffered a pair of strokes and died on August 5. On May 6, 2018, nearly five years after the tornado, a 14-year-old survivor who suffered posttraumatic stress disorder after losing seven of his friends at Plaza Towers Elementary School committed suicide. The 2013 Moore tornado was the deadliest tornado recorded in the U.S. since the Joplin, Missouri tornado that killed 158 people in May 2011.