A tornado that touched down Monday, May 26, 30 miles southeast of Williston, North Dakota, where the population is mushrooming due to the oil boom, severely damaged 15 workforce housing units and injured nine people, one of them critically. The other eight were treated and released, according to kaaltv.com. William Bunkel was in Watford City, about five miles away, with some co-workers when they heard the tornado warning and spotted the funnel cloud. “We saw it form, come out of the sky, hit the ground and go back up into the clouds,” he said. He estimated it was on the ground for almost a minute. The rapid influx of thousands of workers has strained the housing stock, leading to people living in cars, travel trailers and tents, as MHProNews.com has reported in numerous posts. A one bedroom apartment in Williston can cost $2,000 a month; a spot to park a recreational vehicle may run $800 monthly.

Without detailed information about installations, definitive statements about modular or manufactured homes in tornadoes or high winds are problematic. But as the videos on this page below shows, site built houses can be blown away by a tornado, and surprisingly, properly installed manufactured homes have survived tornadoes, although it certainly isn’t a guarantee. The safest place is in a properly designed underground shelter, as this video link states. ##

(Photo credit: kxmctv.com–Tornado hits near the Bakken oilfield in North Dakota.)