Manufactured, Mobile Homes Unsafe for Tornado Season, Census Bureau Says

Both manufactured and mobile homes are statistically more vulnerable to tornadoes as highlighted in the most recent report by the Census Bureau.

The dangers of staying inside either a manufactured home or mobile home during severe weather are highlighted by the storms in the South that claimed the lives of more than twenty people in Alabama and Mississippi.

The storms destroyed dozens of homes, many of which were manufactured.

As per the Census Bureau report, 24% of the county's housing units in Rolling Fork, Mississippi, are manufactured homes.

This was the country's most severely affected area.

Tornado Deaths vs. Manufactured and Mobile Homes

According to NOAA's Storm Prediction Center, 23 out of the 104 tornado-related fatalities in 2021 occurred in manufactured homes.

Meanwhile, in 2020, 39 of the 76 tornado-related fatalities occurred in mobile homes.

Furthermore, 13 out of the 22 tornado-related deaths that have occurred this year since November 30 of last year, involved manufactured homes.

This is a lot because the percentage of manufactured homes in the US housing stock is only around 6%.

To put it into perspective, the National Weather Service estimates that during severe weather, you have a 15-20% higher chance of dying in a manufactured home than in a permanent one.

Stephen Strader, an associate professor, claimed that the southeast of the United States is particularly dangerous, Villanova University reported.

The study of the impacts that natural disasters, such as tornadoes, have on society and the environment is Strader's area of expertise, which he refers to as "disaster geography."

In contrast to other regions of the country, the majority of manufactured homes are found outside of traditional mobile home parks in the Southeast.

According to Strader, the mobile homes are situated separately on various parcels of land, possibly alongside one or two other houses.

This means the occupants are 20 to 30 minutes away from the nearest shelter.

Therefore, if the family has two children and the tornado warning, for example, is 13 minutes away and they are 20 minutes away from their shelter and it is the middle of the night, the parents will need to wake them up.

If the car doesn't arrive right away, things might just start piling up.

Expert Advice

When severe weather is expected, the NWS advises all residents living in manufactured homes to evacuate and relocate to a more secure location.

Strader's advice is a little bit more detailed.

When a tornado watch is issued, he advises people to make sure they have a place to go.

When compared to a warning, tornado watches typically give residents more time to evacuate.

For many people who live in manufactured homes, Strader acknowledges that this is simpler said than done, yet it might make a big difference.

Also Read: Heavy Snow Forecast Prompts Winter Weather Advisory in Chicago

Better Construction

The good news is that manufactured homes have improved, and it is now possible to purchase one that is adequately anchored to the ground, according to Strader.

However, those anchors need to be maintained, and work still needs to be done on estimating maintenance costs.

According to Strader, the anchoring of a mobile or manufactured home to the ground is either inadequate or fails, or something is simply lost in translation between the time that the home is built and the time that it is installed, and this results in a deadly scenario.

A manufactured home can be moved or thrown during a tornado or even just by straight-line wind events if the anchor is not properly installed or fails, The Weather Channel reported.