Churches and Trailer parks are often built on places where they can find cheap land. One of the places you can find cheap land is in places that are likely to be hit by tornadoes.
It may seem as if god hates trailer parks and churches, but there is a good explanation for everything. I wonder where you have evidence that in this case there were more trailer parks hit, entire towns wiped off the maps and you blame trailer parks?
Storms are random but churches are built on high spots and trailer parks on cheap land near the creek. Plus the churches have steeples and such so are more susceptible to tornado winds.
A little known fact is that buildings are not designed for tornado and hurricane winds. In the Piedmont as well as 95% of the country we design for 90mph base wind speed. Buildings where more than 300 people assemble, like a church, or a building that is depended on in an emergency, like a government building, have a small factor added on, like 1.15 or so. Residential buildings use a factor of 1.0 and barns and utility buildings 0.85.
Residential trailers are factory built with 1.0 factor. It's the installation that's a problem. About 12 years ago I got several calls to inspect trailers for refinance. The first one I did I found the install manual from the manufacturer and they had a table for required tie-downs. A typical tie-down is a galvanized auger about 6" in diameter and 6' long screwed into the ground with a small hydraulic torque head powered by a small gas engine. I contacted the installer for the specification of the auger he used and if he "proofed" any of them. "Proofing" is done with a hydraulic jack and a pressure gauge; try and jack the screw out of the ground up to the required load. If you poof, say, two out of ten screws and torque the remainder at least as hard as the ones you tested then you've got a good installation.
The installer had no idea what I was talking about and used 4" augers 4' long. In fact those were the only augers that he had ever used in 15 years of installing thousands of trailers. I, of course, according to him, was "inexperienced" and didn't know my ass from a hole in the ground.
I checked with the manufacturer and the augers he used were rated
only for installing in coral. I know enough about geology to know that we don't have any coral in the entire state never mine 5 hours west of the beach. Here we have silts and clays and that auger wasn't rated for either. Needless to say I flunked that installation. The next two or three I did I asked for the installer's name right off the bat and they were all same guy, so flunked those. Now when I get a call I am obligated to tell the customer that the chances of me getting his installation passed is very close to zero, and I don't accept a job until I get paid first and the check clears. Big surprise I haven't done one in 12 years.
Honestly though I haven't paid much attention to this latest round of storms. Two weeks ago when they hit NC I was in the garage with both doors opened working on my car. The dog was whining but the wind was going the right way so wasn't coming in the garage. Two days ago the fire dept. sighted one about 1/2 mile from my house but it didn't touch down. Again, I simply wasn't paying attention.
Back in '98 I lost a small piece of roof and 7 mature trees in my yard. The "charter" hickory just off my backyard, about 4' caliper, got knocked down. Another neighborhood 1/2 mile away lost about 15 homes. The feds came in and told everyone 'y'all have adequate insurance so we're outtahere, fuck you for being personally responsible'. It took me several days to clean up but the damage was less than my deductible. I figure I got mine and don't need to worry about tornadoes anymore.
