Talk:List of tornado-related deaths at schools

Delete?

Do we really need this article? What is special about deaths at schools from tornados? Why not deaths in trailer parks or malls or workplaces? This just seems like listcruft. eaolson 04:53, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

School fatalities are rare events; and of interest to some since the data is difficult to find. It also shows that fatal tornado events do occur at schools. It's not the most noteworthy list, but I vote to retain it.

I vote to delete or to merge into a general "Tornado fatalities" article. I can't see any equivalent pages for "tornado fatalities in cinemas/workshops/postoffices/brothels/whatever/etc" articles. I don't think anyone's seriously contesting that tornadoes have historically avoided schools, or that schools have better protection. This just strikes me as surreal. Garrick92 18:40, 26 January 2007 (UTC)

Merger perhaps, but I wouldn't delete the info here outright. The big difference between schools and other buildings is that (in the past half-century, at least) they are among the few places to have tornado preparedness and evacuation protocol written and rehearsed on a regular basis. Thus, it may be of interest to some to compare the modern record of school deaths to events from the pre-tornado forecasting era (i.e., before 1953 for official forecasts), for the purposes of deducing the effectiveness of such emergency plans. It is also worth noting that the author of the cited source, Thomas Grazulis, dedicates space in both his book and on the Tornado Project website specifically to school tornado disasters. So it's not entirely without precedence to compile lists of such data. CapeFearWX 03:27, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

Indeed, physical location of fatalities are officially recorded, as can be seen in the external links section of the article, which links to here.

Regarding "equivalent pages" for other structures: The average US school has nearly 1,000 students (lower in less dense areas, higher in more more dense areas), with most states having at least a thousand schools. There are factories and office buildings with thousands of employees, but in vastly smaller numbers, and not distributed throughout the country. There are post offices and gas stations throughout the country, but they have very few people in them. The "population" and ubiquity of public schools set them apart from other other types of structures. In addition to those properties, there is added interest in their safety simply because they protect so many of our nation's children, and their funding is directed by the public. As a result, data about preparedness, expenditures, damage, injuries and fatalities tend to be separated for public schools in a manner not done for any other class of large building. 71.238.69.41 (talk) 04:27, 22 May 2013 (UTC)

Possible school fatalities: 1957 Ruskin Heights

Missing information: in May of 1957 a tornado passed through the Ruskin Heights area south of Kansas City, Missouri. It was in the evening, after school hours, but there were some school personnel killed at Ruskin High School by the storm. Perhaps this incident can be added to the list.

Source? It cannot be added without reliable sources. CrazyC83 02:40, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

Non school hour events raise an interesting problem in whether all such events resulting in fatalities are recorded (that is before such information was officially recorded). Without proper sourcing, however, possible events cannot be added. Evolauxia (talk) 11:22, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Tornado deaths at schools outside the US

Are there any known cases of such? They should go on a separate list if any can be found... CrazyC83 02:40, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

I've heard of cases, but there isn't anything close to an organized record of non-U.S. events. It would have to be a case-by-case basis as records of school fatalities in other locations are found. It should be a separate listing (section) and there should be a notice that the U.S. listing is exhaustive whereas anywhere else is not. The locations of all fatalities in the U.S. are recorded. Information recorded includes public/private and type of structure. This is used in studies of casualty patterns, so problems can be identified and addressed. That this information is officially recorded is also evidentiary to supporting this article's listing of school fatalities, at least in my opinion. Evolauxia (talk) 11:04, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

I agree it should be a separate list, since they have probably (in fact almost certainly) happened elsewhere before, but there are no organized lists. It would also be slanted towards recent events since that is all media reports would be able to reach back to. CrazyC83 (talk) 20:32, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

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