With the El Nino effect expected to increase, the number of tornadoes will probably be a bit above average during the fall, but so far 2009 has shaped up to be a year with 15% fewer than average tornadoes.
In fact, looking at all years from 1954-2007, the year 2009 is just above the 10% line for this point in the season. This means only 5 or 6 years during this period have had equal or lower tornado counts. So far there have been just over 1000 tornadoes reported nationally (adjusted for duplicate reports).
Not a bad thing at all.
