Tornado Drought Interrupted: Severe Weather On The Gulf Coast Tomorrow

Tornadoes are possible Monday especiall in the yellowand orange
zones in this map, centered on Louisiana.

The autumn in the United States has been great in at least one respect: There have been very, very few tornadoes.

Most tornadoes are in the spring and early summer anyway, so it's not unusual to get fewer tornadoes in the fall and early winter.

But they do occur on occasion. This year, there have been far fewer twisters in what is already a normally slow season.

There were 23 reports of tornadoes in October, almost all of them early in the month, Usually there's double or triple that number.

Remarkably, there have been no tornadoes this November. I think this would have been the first November on record without an American tornado. (Again, on average there's usually a couple to a few dozen tornado reports in November.)

I'm saying would have been because I'm almost sure there will be a few tornadoes in the Deep South on Monday.

Things are coming together for a Louisiana tornado outbreak that might also affect parts of East Texas southern Arkansas and western Mississippi.

A storm system will bring oodles of moisture from the Gulf of Mexico, and strong winds, veering with height will create severe, rotating thunderstorms.

That's perfect to form tornadoes, and the Storm Prediction Center in Norman, Oklahoma says a couple of the tornadoes could turn out to be quite strong.

People in that neck of the woods will want to watch the skies Monday, and listen for tornado warnings. This time of year especially, tornadoes can move forward very quickly, giving people little time to take shelter.

The good news about this storm system is it's going to spread heavy rains across the Southeast, which is having a terrible drought. Atlanta, Georgia and Birmingham, Alabama have had their longest stretch of consecutive rain-free days on record.

A few inches of rain is likely to fall on the drought region this week, which won't end the drought, but put a dent in it and help control a lot of the wildfires burning in the area's forests.

The New England drought is still ongoing, too, but it has diminished a bit in recent weeks with rains and snows. This storm is going to spread more rain into New England this week, which will bring a bit of additional help to the situation.