Update on Heavy Rain and Severe Thunderstorm Threat

By -
The evening computer models continue to show a trend toward even heavier rainfall amounts with each (6-hour) run.

The bright orange areas in Oklahoma and in northern Illinois are forecasts of 4 to 5 inches from tomorrow through Halloween. Do not take the locations of the heaviest rainfalls too literally.

There is also an increasing chance of severe thunderstorms, and possibly tornadoes, between I-35 from Minneapolis to Laredo and I-55 from Chicago to New Orleans.

It is a good time to review tornado safety procedures.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

“We Encourage All Citizens to Take Steps to Prepare Themselves for Any Type of Emergency or Disaster"

By -
Image
The title of this essay is from a press release that indirectly "blames the victim." The author is Sedgwick County Emergency Management regarding a fatal tornado that occurred just north of Wichita at 1:14 this morning. The tornado was rated EF-2 ("strong") intensity. I believe the wording is unfortunate as discussed below.  Photo: KAKE.com. Note that with a basement, as little as seconds to dash down the stairs might have been sufficient to avoid injury.  In what has increasingly and unfortunately become the norm in tornado situations, no NWS tornado warning was issued even though: Rotation was depicted on radar Radar shows lofted debris People from outside the NWS are observing tornadoes and bringing them to NWS's and the public's attention.  I want to be clear: the tornado formed practically on top of the home and there was probably no way to have warned in time to help the man killed. But there is absolutely no reason a tornado warning could not have bee...
Read more

"We Didn't Know This Flood Was Coming"

By -
Image
[Note, no more updates to this story as of 1pm Tuesday;  there is an updated story here .] ...so said the chief executive of Kerr County, Texas, Rob Kelly. He went on to say, "We had no reason to believe that this was going to be anything like what's happened here, none whatsoever."  I'm sorry to report that he is probably correct. The flood was underforecast and the "emergency" warnings were later than they could have been. In fairness, as of the time of this update, 1:30pm Monday, the U.S. Geological Survey has determined this was the highest crest on the Guadalupe River at Hunt, Texas, since the river gauge was installed.  As of 1p Tuesday , 105  have been confirmed to have been killed and "dozens" are missing. Those numbers imply a total death toll near 130. This past autumn, Hurricane Helene killed 249. In 2011, a single tornado killed 161 in Joplin. We must stop these mega-disasters! This is another tragic example of why America desperately n...
Read more