Tornado climatology
Tornadoes have been recorded on all continents except Antarctica and are most common in the middle latitudes where conditions are often favorable for convective storm development. The United States has the most tornadoes of any country, as well as the strongest and most violent tornadoes. A large portion of these tornadoes form in an area of the central United States popularly known as Tornado Alley. Other areas of the world that have frequent tornadoes include significant portions of Europe, South Africa, Philippines, Bangladesh, parts of Argentina, Uruguay, and southern and southeast Brazil, northern Mexico, New Zealand, and far eastern Asia.
Tornado climatology
Since 1900, deadly tornadoes have occurred in Austria, Belgium, Cyprus, Finland, France, Germany, Italy (such as the F5/T10 of Udine-Treviso on 24 July 1930, which killed 23 people,), Malta, Poland, Ukraine, Portugal (such as the F3/T7 of Castelo Branco on 6 November 1954, which killed 5 and injured 220), Romania, Russia and the United Kingdom. The 1984 Ivanovo–Yaroslavl outbreak, with more than 400 fatalities and 213 injured, was the century's deadliest tornado or outbreak in Europe. It included at least one F5 and one F4. Europe's perhaps deadliest tornado ever (and probably one of the World's deadliest tornadoes) hit Malta in 1551 (or 1556) and killed about 600.