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Through Tornado, Bangladesh and East India

2015 ended the very quiet trend of the 2012, 2013 and 2014 seasons, and it was the most active in four years.

Synopsis

Throughout much of the first half of 2015, tornado activity was near record low mostly due to a continuous pattern of a trough in the east, bringing colder than average temperatures there. A ridge in the west brought warmer than average temperatures in the west. The pattern changed in late March and early April to allow for a few tornado outbreaks. One particular tornado outbreak spawned a deadly EF4 tornado near Rochelle, Illinois, on April 9.

During May, a few large tornado outbreaks occurred in a time span from May 5 to May 26, leading it to be the most active tornado month since April 2011 and the most active May since 2008. Average to above average tornado outbreak continued to occur in June and July, decreasing slightly between August - October.

Due to a significant El Niño event, November and December were extremely active months, with over 20 fatalities in December alone, the majority of which came from 2 EF4 tornadoes in Mississippi (December 23) and Texas (December 26), days apart from each other. 93 tornadoes were reported in December, well above average for that month, mainly from 2 significant tornado outbreaks days before and immediately after Christmas. Furthermore, 2015 was the first year since 2011 to see a total of more than 1,000 tornadoes across the United States.

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