I arrived back into the country from international travels and spent a week in beautiful Ventura CA before getting back on the road for a drive through several states to Oklahoma.

I planned on educating native Americans, the Cherokees on how to simply prevent exposure of lead based paint to the occupants of their housing.

I had a few stops along the way educating interested parties on my favorite topic of encasement with green coatings and breaking up the run.

I’m always amazed at how fast the terrain changes along the way.

From beachside highlands to green rolling hills to stretching flat desert into lush, foliage filled mountains.

Driving along the weather changed even faster than the landscape.

I arrived in Oklahoma also known for being one of the states in tornado alley just in time to dodge strong rains, winds and yes tornados.

I hit the state just as numerous tornados had been touching down all week with many more expected to hit the area and surrounding states.

They have experienced 61 touching down in just the month of May alone.

The power of these destructive vortexes is both exhilarating and terrifying.

These violently rotating wind storms are one of the most powerful and devastating forces on the planet and always leave a trail of catastrophic ruin in their wake.

The immediate damage is obvious although further harm can be subtle and lurking in remaining debris, dust and microscopic particulate matter that is left behind after the tornado has past.

This toxic debris left behind on surfaces and in the air can contain all types of hazardous material including but not limited to asbestos, heavy metals, antimony, chromium, arsenic, cadmium, copper, lead, PCB’s and zinc.

This mixed array of hazardous debris also usually contains electronic waste from computers, monitors, batteries and other toxic substances from, paints, PCBs (polychlorinated biphenyls) and other toxic substances.

It is indeed a carcinogenic mixture.

People going into the debris sifting through to find personal belongs and ones that do the clean-up are unintentionally exposing themselves to toxic material and are coming down with what has been classified as tornado cough.

That is the results of immediate exposure to inhaled caustic material.

There are studies now being conducted on the long-term effect of this and other exposure from different natural and man-made disasters, such as wild fires, building demolitions, tornados, typhoons, hurricanes and flooding.