El tornado de Fuentes de Valdepero (Palencia)

Abstract

On July 12, 1935, a violent tornado (EF-2 on the enhanced Fujita scale) devastated the small village of Fuentes de Valdepero (Palencia, Spain). It is the tornado with the greatest media impact of the first half of the past century in Spain. The complete information that appeared in the national and international press, the meteorological observation data and the reanalysis of numerical models allow for a mesoscale and microscale study of this event. The tornado was associated to a supercell that affected the surrounded area, in an environment of great instability and windshear, favorable conditions for the development of severe convective weather. The witness account confirms the presence of the tornado and a supercell, but also adds an aura of mystery by describing the presence of a “wave of fire.”