The Vault: The 1974 Tornado Outbreak that Impacted Kentucky & Indiana

WHAS11's Joe Federle and Doug Proffitt take you back in time to when one of the deadliest tornados hit Kentucky.
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#tornado #1974 #kentucky

[@bellatitanictinker8251]

Kudos to WHAS for saving the tornado footage from April 3, 1974. ❤

[@saintsfan1258]

Gentlemen, this is beyond amazing. Thank you for finding this and letting us see this. 50 years is definitely a milestone for this event.

[@user-hf3nj2rx2h]

Yes, thank you!

[@styles8007]

Being originally from Louisville, Ky. I remember when it happened. There was a book called April 3, 1974, as well. There was so much destruction on that day. A curfew was issued by the city. Billboard signs completely bent in half by the Fairgrounds. It's hard to believe it's has been 50 years.

[@TB21660]

I was almost 8 years old living in Bullitt County. Overdale Elementary School sent us that lived in walking distance home. They told us to run straight to our houses. My parents were not home. I stayed in the basement inside a homemade brick bar. Tried to be brave. Lol. We did not have damage but I do remember the water shortages and then having to boil water for what seemed like a week or more. Thank you for releasing this.

[@stargazer5784]

This was the same storm system that also devastated Xenia Ohio. What a terrible day...

[@JayYoung-ro3vu]

I was 6 years old when this system passed through Xenia (zeenya), Ohio.

[@professorstokes6596]

I looked out my bedroom window to the south and it was there heading our direction. It was immense...it filled the entire frame of my view and I was literally paralyzed with fear. We took cover and waited for it to hit. After several minutes nothing happened and we went outside to see that it had veered to the east and we watched it travel to Xenia from there. I went with my uncle and cousins to help as volunteers with the Easter Seals in the relief effort. What we saw there was unimaginable. Seeing these videos reminds of the horror but actually being there was beyond description. Sheer devastation...just....yeah...no words...

[@user-hf3nj2rx2h]

And Brandenburg, KY. F5

[@silverstar4289]

Aside the stories in Indiana, Xenia was the biggest story

[@garyhighley9022]

Xenia 🌪️ was classified as an F6 at first ...then they decided not to make an F6 on the scale leaving it at F5.

[@nancyadams9228]

The WHAS coverage saved lives! I see Crescent Hill and my old house with the 2nd story missing. 😢

[@user-xi8xc7vf8y]

It was the Louisville Reporters and Meteorologists that informed Northern Kentucky and Cincinnati of the Tornados that were coming our way!! No doubt saving a lot of lives!! I'll never forget it.I was 17! I remember seeing Louisville coverage on my Aunt's TV.We went there for shelter in her basement!! Seeing all of that Louisville coverage is what prompted our family to go seek better shelter in Union,Boone County,KY.!!God Bless All Of Those Who Risk Their Lives For Us!!!

[@392horseplay2]

I was in my mother’s stomach. I was born in August. My dad said he had to jump out of his car and run for a ditch for cover. He said it was the scariest thing he has ever seen!

[@davidrice3337]

Until you brought your first date home !

[@Johnny53kgb-nsa]

Great footage and reporting by the late Ken Rowland and Dick Gilbert. Thank you WHAS for saving and showing this film footage.

[@prissypants2336]

It's tornado season now. We live in Oldham Co, KY. I hope we can all be safe this year

[@Whisper_292]

Amen.

[@tandiparent1906]

I'm in SW OKLAHOMA & we had our 1st tornado watch yesterday/last night. Prayers that we all stay safe this year🙏❤🙏

[@Whisper_292]

I lived there for 20 years. I was worried about y'all yesterday.

[@soonerwhirle]

Decatur County Indiana was in one of the tornadoes path. It was an unreal afternoon and evening.

[@russelldarnell402]

I was 3 but lived in western Ky which dodged any tornadoes however we had a bad hail storm with stones being grapefruit size. Dad saved a few in the freezer afterwards. I remember mom carrying me going down to my grandparents since they had a basement-it busted several of the windows out in our trailer.

[@lookingglass9966]

I was 9 years old & remember as if it was yesterday. I lived off of Rockford Ln. My Dad & Mom rushed me & my siblings across the street to the neighbors basement, I was so scared 😳

[@davidrice3337]

My grandparents operated Cane Run Farm - we went to the basement and my crazy Mamaw went to the barn and cleaned stalls !

[@tammysims8716]

​@@davidrice3337Dang! That generation. They weren't gonna let a silly storm stop them from their chores! Salt of the earth kind of people.

[@juliewatson4314]

I was in elementary school and we had to go in the hallway. Couldn’t go home

[@ramann68]

I was 5 years old and we sheltered in a church basement on 17th and Chestnut, I was playing with blocks. I will never forget that day.

[@user-dc2tp3tk1m]

I was 9 years old but I don't remember this happening.

[@robertarnold3603]

I remember it so well I was 25 driving a S&T hardware truck down Bardstown road. And Eastern Parkway the damage was shocking

[@Whisper_292]

Ken Rowland was right--I remember exactly where i was and what I was doing. I was 8 years old, sitting in the bathtub with my grandmother in a basementless house about a mile from the fairgrounds. My parents were on the other sude of town, watching the funnel cloud go by. We were lucky--no injuries or damage, although I still have tornado dreams to this day. I also still have the book the Courier-Journal published about the storms.

[@drewski1535]

Soon it will be 50 years since this outbreak

[@reneeodayok859]

Mr. Sanders at west washington highschool in southern indiana played this footage for us in science class in the late 90s RIP Mr. Sanders ❤

[@johnshields6852]

I was 14 that year, we had heard on the news but being from the Boston we didn't know first hand, but the news back then was slow and intermittent.

[@user-hf3nj2rx2h]

Just think the tornado outbreak was 50 years ago this next week!

[@timme2844]

I lived/llive in far S. Illinois at that time and remember this outbreak very well. It was just a few short days before my 7th birthday. My family lived out in the country on a farm in a house with no basement. The weather started turning real bad and i remember my Dad coming in and telling our Mom who was starting dinner to shut everything down and get us kids in the car we were going over to my grandparent's house(they had a basement) just a couple miles down the road. We didn't have a tornado but the winds got bad enough to blow some trees down one of which was across our driveway and it blew our TV antennae down! I distinctly remember how cold it turned after that storm and for several days it stayed cold and gloomy including my birthday lol. Man I'm getting old lol!

[@dougedwards8022]

I was 4 yrs old,,,my grandparents lived in Hanover Indiana in a ranch style brick home near s.w. high-school. It tore the soffit off the house an the low pressure in the area sucked all the insulation out of the ceiling. It also tore up Clifty power house,,,we live in Switzerland county Indiana up river a good way,,,it tore alot of woods, a feed mill and alot of homes,,,remember taking a ride with my parents next morning. It was devastation everywhere

[@ralphneal9743]

I was 15 years old when these tornados hit in North Alabama ! I remember channel 19 News (CBS ) and H. D. Bagley talking about the Weather that night !! I’ll Never Forget That Night !!!

[@madpax14]

Thank you so much for this special! It means a lot for those who lived through and remember. I really appreciate it.

[@user-hf3nj2rx2h]

I lived through that day. I was the Secretary at Audubon Baptist Church.

[@brianarbenz7206]

Amazing find. I was 15 and we watched this very coverage in our living room in New Albany. Since Floyd County, Ind. was not hit by any tornado, it took us until the evening -- when we saw this very WHAS report -- to grasp the full extent of the disaster. This has brought that day and evening back. It's like I'm still seated there on our living room couch hearing Ken's powerful delivery.

[@tammysims8716]

Love the commercial interruption. Made for comic relief reprieve from the harrowing events of that terrible day.

[@gregwilkin6565]

Thank you for sharing. :)

[@thorenshammer]

Thank you for sharing this historic footage. The one thing that never changes is the amount of damage a high-end tornado does to a community when it strikes. If you look at the aftermath footage of the Ziena, OH damage that happened in the same 1974 outbreak and compare it to the Joplin, MO damage in 2011, both would look the same. Tragically, people's lives are changed also. I was in the Dallas EF-4 storm in Dec 2015, the damage path, if shot with film of the era of 1974, would have looked like this.

[@chriswitt2596]

That's just pretty amazing

[@Jablome333]

I was 49 in 1974. I remember it well.

[@davidrice3337]

I wish I was in my 40s during the 70s - much more fun then than now ! And everyone got along better -

[@davidrice3337]

I wish I was in my 40s during the 70s - much more fun then than now ! And everyone got along better -

[@ramblinman4197]

My earliest childhood memory is of April 3, 1974 standing at our back door in Meadowvale with my mother watching the clouds from the storm that had hit Northfield spawn a funnel over E P Tom Sawyer Park.

[@Tanacarroll]

I was 8 years old and have vivid memories of that day and into the night. It was such a scary day and night as my family all hunkered down and was safe in our basement. It’s been 50 years and it seems like it was yesterday. It’s now 4/2/24 in the very early morning hours and tornadoes are in the forecast for today. I remember Ken Rowland and Dick Gilbert flying in the chopper giving us updates and first video of our city. I was off of Old Shepherdsville Rd on Tacoma Court. I remember riding around the city with my parents and siblings checking out the damage. Cherokee Park I remember the devastation was unbelievable to my young eyes.

[@nomiddlenamenmn427]

Dr. Fujita reportedly said, even under ground, the chance of surviving a direct hit of an F5 is zero. The tornado sucks off the storm shelter door.

[@stevehicks8944]

I remember sitting in my parents’ living room in Memphis, IN watching this special. I also remember the principal of Memphis Elementary School, Wayne Hobbs, stopping all the buses from taking students home on April 3,1974 because of the tornadoes that struck Borden and Daisy Hill. We spent quite of bit of time in the basement of the school until the “all clear” was received.

[@annamineer2521]

I was in Florida, age 6, but I remember the day after because it was stormy there and I knew Alabama had suffered horrible storms and that my family in Kentucky had lived through the F3 that hit Cynthiana.

[@ottolottogaming8418]

Louisville looks so different. I don’t recognize anywhere everything has changed so much

[@tandiparent1906]

It's wild to think that it really wasn't that many years before this happened, that there were NO tornado warnings even given!

[@jodythomas9203]

I was 10 when it went through..it was the most frightening thing I ever went through..

[@evonnewhalen9794]

I remember that day.

[@edblevins681]

I remember that day like yesterday, It barely missed us and went on to destroy Zenia Ohio.

[@nodakliberalhawk]

There would have been numerous PDS Tornado Watches issued during this outbreak if the wording had existed at the time.

[@leegionxavier]

🌪️I was married to a woman that was a little girl with her mother in the downtown area of Louisville eating a hamburger in a Walgreens on 4th Street. She said that they had to get under neath the table, but was fortunate that the tornado missed them when it veered North/West of their location..🌪️

[@juliewatson4314]

I was 7. I think Alabama got it too.

[@Railbrony]

Huntsville got hit by 2 tornadoes just 30-60 minutes apart

[@davidmatheny1993]

​@@Railbrony Huntsville itself was hit by an F3 tornado, but the two you are thinking about are the two F5s that had a path maybe a mile apart through places like Tanner and Harvest. Another F5 leveled Guin with what some consider the worst tornado damage ever evaluated.

[@Railbrony]

@@davidmatheny1993 yeah. The video was based on the 74 outbreak and it seemed fitting. Brandenburg was arguable stronger then the Xenia twister

[@prissypants2336]

What was the number of fatalities?

[@soonerwhirle]

The 1974 Super Outbreak was the second-largest tornado outbreak on record for a single 24-hour period, just behind the 2011 Super Outbreak. It was also the most violent tornado outbreak ever recorded, with 30 F4/F5 tornadoes confirmed. Wikipedia Dates: Apr 3, 1974 - Apr 4, 1974 Fatalities: 319 fatalities

[@renstimpy3568]

RIP Dick G, fly high sir

[@davidrice3337]

The Rowlands were very nice people - Mrs Rowland worked with my Mom - Good Folks -

[@JosephThomas-xb9wo]

Remember it well coming through Albany killing 8 I believe .and devastating destruction .

[@Og-Judy]

It was part of a super outbreak

[@calvinhobbes6646]

2 of the F5s recorded that day were in Ohio!

[@h.a.n.na17]

THATS GREAT BUT... WHATS A BACK UP GENERATOR??? WHAT IS IT SUPPOSED TO DO???? HOW IS IT RELATED TO THUNDERSTORMS SPECIFICALLY??? ARE THEY EXPENSIVE??? SHOULD EVERYONE HAVE ONE????

[@tandiparent1906]

They're great to have for anytime that your electric goes off whether it's during thunder storms/tornadoes or during the winter during ice storms to be able to stay warm if the electric goes off. Most of them go on automatically when your electricity goes off. Often they're expensive unfortunately but you just have to do your research, like with every big thing you buy, to find the least expensive for your area.

[@davidrice3337]

WHAS radio and WHAS ACTION NEWS , and the Louisville Times were sooooo much better - 84 am has went to hell along with the Clueless Journal

[@user-bs6kh7qm3x]

I remember this day I was 12 years. We live just west outside Akron Ohio. Unfortunately I have gotten The misfortune of living and experiencing through the two most deadliest days in tornado history in America. This outbreak and the super outbreak of April 27th 2011 where at the time and still do live just north of Tuscaloosa Alabama.