Today's Tornado Threat: 5 Things To Know
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Today is the third day of a severe weather outbreak this week, and it will bring another threat of potentially damaging tornadoes to portions of the Midwest and South.
Below, we have five things to know about the tornado threat through Wednesday night.
1. Here’s where the highest threat for tornadoes is located: The areas shaded orange above in southern and central Missouri into southern Illinois, southwest Indiana, western and central Kentucky and northwest and middle Tennessee have the highest risk for tornadoes through tonight, according to NOAA’s Storm Prediction Center. That said, a more isolated tornado threat cannot be ruled out in other areas shaded yellow in the Midwest and South.
2. Strong tornadoes are a possibility. A strong tornado causes EF2 or greater damage. Tornadoes with this higher-end damage potential are most likely in the hatched area above, which includes cities like St. Louis; Paducah, Kentucky; and Nashville, Tennessee.
3. Tornadoes could develop in two ways. Those storms could be in the form of lines or supercells, both of which might pack a tornado threat. If supercells develop, the tornado threat will be maximized, as the National Weather Service in Nashville said early Wednesday: “If discrete supercells can develop this afternoon and evening, this would spell big trouble for the tornado threat and increase the severe weather potential significantly.”
4. The tornado threat could be after dark for some. While the tornado threat begins in the daytime, it could last well into the evening for some. Be sure you have multiple ways to get warnings. For tornado safety tips at night, see this link.
5. Even if a tornado threat doesn’t affect some of these areas, high winds, huge hail and flash flooding are also concerns. At least isolated wind gusts higher than 75 mph are possible in the most intense lines of storms, and hail the size of golf balls or larger could also cause damage. Repeated rounds of heavy rainfall could trigger flash flooding in many of the same areas at risk for severe weather.
(15-min details: For even more granular weather data tracking in your area, view your 15-minute details forecast in our Premium Pro experience.)
Chris Dolce has been a senior meteorologist with weather.com for over 10 years after beginning his career with The Weather Channel in the early 2000s.