Nightly News   |  April 29, 2011

April storms break weather records

Not counting Wednesday's massive storms, a record 453 tornadoes have been confirmed in the month of April alone. Weather Channel meteorologist Jim Cantore discusses why it's been such a devastating and deadly season.

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This content comes from Closed Captioning that was broadcast along with this program.

>>> back now from tuscaloosa, alabama. some more of the staggering numbers we have been telling you about. in the month of april, a record 453 tornadoes have been confirmed. this not counting wednesday's line of massive storms and when they tally those up, that will be larger, and remember, may is usually worse than april. our friend, weather channel meteorologist jim cantore who has been covering this has been kind enough to join us. you were here earlier. is it fair to say, at the center of this storm, at the center of hurricanes like katrina, it's the most energy mother nature can produce on the planet?

>> i think it is. when you look add the biggest tornadoes, ef-4s and ef-5s, which we feel this destruction is, we're talking about those kinds of numbers. that makes up .4% of all the tornadoes. we have about 1,300 a year.

>> you get stopped everywhere you go every day on the subject of weather, and wherever you go, whfrb you hear people talking, you know what i'm going to say, it didn't used to be like this. what's going on? what are we doing that's causing it? it seems newly virulent and violent all across the country.

>> when you go back, you look for evidence of something. sometimes the most obvious things don't hit you until they're right there in front of your face. if we have a warmer earth, and the purpose of the jetstream is to help equalize all that, because it's warmer, it's going to have to work harder. that in addition to the fact we have so much snuinstability in april, heat and humidity, cause this monster, monster april.

>> looking for a way to describe away what happened here.

>> it's hard to do that.

>> thank you for your ongoing