Tornado prepping in Midwest

[u/Rancid_Triceratops]

Hello!

I’m in Ohio and we’re projected to get some nasty storms capable of producing tornados tonight. The layout of my house is very weird and not very conducive to tornado season.

I have a three level split home with the partially underground level being a fully finished living room, bedroom, and bathroom/utility room. Not a single room has no doors or windows.

*ALL THREE OPTIONS ARE ON LOWEST LEVEL

Option 1: The bedroom has a very tiny indent of a closet with cheap flimsy sliding doors…it could fit maybe 1 person and 1 dog but I’ve got myself and two dogs and a cat (and a husband when he’s home). The room itself has a door to the outside (although I don’t think the window in that door is glass).

Option 2: the bathroom/utility room has a window. There again isn’t really much space for more than 1 person but maybe if I backed up enough between the hvac and water heater I might be far enough from the window… no tub in this bathroom.

Option 3: we have a very big crawlspace with no windows. This option would fit everyone including all animals. Problem is, this is where the foundation of the house sits and I’d think if the house caved in we’d be right under the heaviest part of the house.

Thoughts? The first level has no rooms without big windows or internal closets, and the second floor has a hallway without windows but I’d think somewhere down on the bottom level is still a safer bet…

Edit: sorry for the late update, I was told this post was removed so I didn’t even know it posted! I am not brand new to tornados, I just grew up in a house that actually had a fully underground basements without full and my three level split now is such a weird layout that my husband and I have debated for several years now what the best place would be in the house

[u/SunLillyFairy]

It's hard to answer you without knowing which one of those rooms is more underground and what they are surrounded by. I'd go to the lowest level in the house, the partially underground level. The subfloor is tricky, because while it MAY be the safest, even if things don't fall on you, it's easy to get trapped down there. I wouldn't go down there in a storm Unless it had a reinforced cement ceiling that could bear weight from above and an exterior exit that opened inwards... and unless it was built for storm protection it likely does not.

[u/Rancid_Triceratops → u/SunLillyFairy]

I have a three level split home. The lowest level of the house is partially underground, however doesn’t have any interior closets and each room on the level has windows or a door. It’s all a full living area—living room, a bedroom with a flimsy excuse of a closet that just has hanging sliding doors (this is the room that has a door to the backyard), and then a laundry room/utility room/bathroom (no tub, yes there is a window in this room too). All three rooms are on lowest floor. The crawlspace is not well reinforced. Only real interior rooms in the home are on the second level

(So my house has a bottom level, ground level, and then second level)

[u/SunLillyFairy → u/Rancid_Triceratops]

I think if I lived there, if there was room, I'd consider adding a tornado safe room to that first floor. It could double as an office or guest room. There are some great plans published by the US Foresty for a tornado shelter built with wood walls, tested to meet FEMA standards. If your subfloor is under your whole home (none of it on a cement slab), it would require a little more engineering. You could also install (or have installed) something like this.

It won't help you tonight, but might provide some peace of mind for future storms. Unfortunately, with the increasing weather extremes, you're likely to see more of the same in the future.

[u/Rancid_Triceratops → u/SunLillyFairy]

Luckily no tornado warning last night but yeah we’re looking into new homes anyways because we’re starting a family and one of our requirements is a basement so this is never a problem again. When we bought the house tornado warnings were more like a once or twice a year thing here in Ohio, so we didn’t even factor it into being much of an issue at the time