Tornado Shelters

[impdaddy]

Since we only have a crawl space under the house and it is usually damp/wet, SWSBO has decided that we need a tornado shelter. Has anybody used those pre-made types that go about 4 feet underground and then you fill around them with dirt? They include vents i think also. Any experiences you would like to share?

 

[schmism]

id really like to do that with a 20' shipping container.

FEMA decided that was good enough so....

 

[NuBota]

I remember some threads on here that had some great details about a few options

Here is one I found quick......

http://www.tractorbynet.com/forums/projects/144889-storm-shelter.html

 

[piller]

I don't have one, but there is a place nearby that does offer them. I've seen their storm shelters being transported via tractor trailers on the interstate.
Barger & Sons, Inc. - Storm Shelters

 

[user.69169]

My second wife's sister Nell was one for that tornado anxiety too, of course she and the fellow she was married to till he went off to prison did live in a trailerhouse. Well they went to planning that shelter thing using a concerete septic tank, and when they had one delivered, think it was 1000 gallons, the park manager lit up like a neon sign.

Long & short of it was they wasn't allowed to bury that dang tank in the trailer park. Being a concerned fellow it hit me that sheltering from the tornado ain't near as important as having a place to collect your posessions and live after the storm passes, so I found plans on the internet to build an igloo out of cardboard and sticks. We all went over to the appliance store and rounded up a batch of fridgerator and laundry machine cartons, and rounded up a bunch of sticks too. Nell got the sticks all cut to size and mitered proper at the place she worked, and we preassembled some shelters. Then we took em apart down to panels and stuffed em into crawlspaces in several locations around town for just in case of a tornado.

If you notice when a tornado goes thru it hardly ever pulls up the floor so the crawlspace is a safe place to store your shelter. Now, here's the dangest thing, ever since we went and prepared ain't been a one of us hit by a tornado. Nell did have to use hers after her husband got locked up and she got evicted from the trailer house, but that's an entirely different situation. She did say it was real comfortable in there tillthe Park Ranger got on her case.

 

[jayste]

Yes, I have one. I've had it for about 8 yrs now. No issues with it whatsoever. Mine has a 10 yr. warranty on the seal. It comes in two pieces. They dig the hole with a backhoe and drop the bottom half in the hole. Ours just happens to sit on some pretty solid sand rock. Anyway, they put a sealant around the top lip, of the bottom half, and sit the top half over on it. At this time they use metal straps (2"X3/16"x8" long I think) and attach the two pieces (top and bottom) together. I think there are 4 of these. Then they backfill the around the bottom and pile the rest of the soil around the top half leaving the sloped front side exposed. This one came with a water tight door, stairs w/ handrail inside and a whirly bird vent on top. On one side of the top half there is a piece of 1/2" plastic conduit installed in the concrete to run power into it or a great place for scorpions to come through at if you don't plug it! Of course, those little suckers will get in anyway. I'd have to go back to look up the price we paid for it. Might not matter anyway since it's been a while. We bought ours prior to the "May 3rd tornado" here in Oklahoma and seemed pretty reasonable. After the big tornado they went up in price and availability. That's been some time now so I'm sure the market and price has righted itself. Anyway, I'd recommend them for a good source but so far I haven't had a twister overhead of me and hope I never do.

 

[WTA]

I once had a neighbor that buried an antique suburban in his yard just for a tornado/bomb shelter. The 70's were kinda funny this way.

Other neighbors gave him all kinds of **** till one day when half the houses got blown away on our block by a tornado, in a place where tornadoes never happened. Several people were killed, some never seen again, the guy with the suburban buried in his front yard lost his house but his family was all safe in that old truck under the front yard. It worked.

 

[Mike Costello]

Here's a website that offers tornado shelters.

Lifesaver Storm Shelters, Benton Illinois

 

[dirt ditch]

It is only tornado anxiety until a big one hits. We did not have one before but we do now. There were a few of these in ground shelters and above ground shelters before the EF5 hit. None of them failed. The first pic was on my grandmother's street.

 

[Redneck in training]

We don't live in extreme tornado region (such as Kansas) but there are tornadoes occurring in the area quite regularly. Therefore I decided to design and built a tornado shelter just for a piece of mind.
Several options were considered such as underground made of steel sea container, concrete, plastic etc. and built in the house. At the end we selected shelter built in the house mainly due to ease of access and possible dual purpose. Since we have large garage I am going to build a shelter in a corner anchored to the reinforced concrete slab by Hilti anchors. The design features such as thickness of the steel plates, square tubing skeleton etc were copied from commercially available units. The shelter will have triangular shape that is, IMO, more crush resistant by lateral forces and is more space efficient. The walls and ceiling will be insulated and it will be turned in to a four people sauna later on. I already bought and have precut cut the steel material and hopefully will find time to build it this year.