No, All These Tornado Outbreaks In The South Are Not Normal

A tornado safety closet that a family huddled in is the only thing
left of a home swept away by a tornado last week in Mississippi.
The family survived. More dangerous tornadoes are expected
today in the same region.

Another outbreak of tornadoes appears likely in the Deep South today, continuing a terrible winter and spring down there of heartbreaking twisters, severe storms and repeated, devastating flooding, all amid the coronavirus pandemic.

Today looks especially bad across the northern half of Louisiana and the southern halves of Mississippi, Alabama and Georgia. NOAA's Storm Prediction Center has this area on level 4 of 5 in terms of risk level today.  So it's pretty serious.

Already, as of mid-morning, a tornado watch was up for eastern Texas and western Louisiana, including the Houston metro area. Some straight line wind and hail damage had already been reported in parts of the South as of 10 a.m. It will get worse as we go through the day.

Many of these areas are just coming off a terrible tornado outbreak exactly a week ago, so this is definitely bad news.

A few tornadoes today in this region might once again be especially strong, especially if supercell thunderstorms get going without interference from larger clusters of thunderstorms moving in from the west.

Even that larger cluster of storms from the west wil cause trouble with their own batch of tornadoes, strong winds, hail and flooding rains.

We obviously won't completely know until tomorrow how many tornadoes will form, how big they will be and whether they hit any heavily populated areas. But once again, people in the Deep South are hunkering down and praying the tornadoes miss their houses.

We are heading into the peak of tornado seasons and April tornadoes are rather normal, especially in the southeastern quarter of the United States.  Yes, tornadoes are normal, but the number of them this year, and the deaths they are causing, is anything but normal.

It turns out the tornado outbreak last Sunday and Monday yielded 132 twisters, which is a huge number for two days of severe weather.  Preliminary research indicates this is tied for the fifth-most numher of tornadoes in a two day outbreak on record in the United States.

The tie is with an April 15-16, 2011 southeastern United States outbreak. The record biggest outbreak for two days was 271 on April 26-27, 2011. So you can see 2011 was the benchmark for a horrendous tornado season, and one we don't want to repeat.

In addition to the tornado risk, flooding is a big concern in the Deep South, as it has been frequently for months now. Potentially life threatening areas of flash flooding are expected today in the same areas with the greatest tornado risk.

Not good.

The weather pattern will remain bad in the South in the upcoming week or more. Severe weather threats look like they will ramp up again Wednesday, then after, that, probably next weekend.

Why It's Hard To Predict Whether Vermont Will Have Spring Flooding This Year

Motorists slog through spring floodwaters near Enosburg, Vermont
in April, 2011. 

We here in Vermont are getting toward the start of the spring flood season, so it's only natural to start wondering if this year will be bad for that kind of nastiness.

At the moment, there are plenty of mixed signals on what kind of spring flooding, if any, the Green Mountain State sees this year.

First, some background. Flooding can and does occur at any time of year in Vermont. Ice jams during rainy, very warm January thaws can trigger floods, as they did in 2018.

Late spring and summer torrential thunderstorms can set off big local flash floods, as they have in many years, like in 2013.  Tropical storms heading north into New England we know can cause serious floods, as we remember from Irene in 2011.

Large autumn storms can sweep through and cause floods, as we saw big time last Halloween.  And of course, rain and melting snow can cause spring flooding in March and April.

Quite frankly, Vermont doesn't need any more flooding.  Last April, the kind of spring flood I'm talking about hit parts of central, southern and eastern Vermont, prompting a federal disaster declaration.

Then that even worse Halloween storm a few months back triggered serious flooding across the northern half of Vermont, prompting another federal disaster declaration. Yep, two such declarations within about seven months.

So, on to this spring. We might as well talk about it today, Sunday, since the outdoors does have a mild, spring-like feel.

Today's weather signals that we are now entering our first good thaw of late winter and early spring.  The first chance of any late winter or spring flooding comes late this week, but that is decidedly iffy. The chances that an expected pretty big storm late this week are pretty low.

That's because at this point, the storm looks like it will bring us a mix of stuff. It will probably include rain, but that rain will likely mostly just soak into the existing snowpack. Plus the storm will probably bring other types of precipitation, like wet snow, sleet and/or freezing rain.  If the storm ends up being mostly snow or mixed precipitation, that would actually add slightly to the risk of flooding later.

That's because there will be even more snow and ice locked up on the ground, waiting to melt.

Even if that happens, the amount of snow on the ground, and the amount of water locked up in that snow, is roughly normal for this time of year, says the National Weather Service South Burlington.

That NWS office issues a winter/spring flood outlook every other week this time of year, so that's where I'm getting this information.  A normal late winter snowpack implies a normal spring flooding season, if you ignore all other possible factors, which of course you can't do.

Moisture in the soil is near to just a little above normal, which is largely a legacy of last year's very wet autumn. River flows currently are also near or a little above normal.  There's ice in the rivers which could cause ice jams, but it's not a huge amount of ice. We've had a warm winter.

Lake Champlain also has a near normal level heading into the spring flood season.

All this means is it's a tossup as to whether you should think about any spring flooding in Vermont this year.

Spring flooding is a major concern for much of the nation this year.  

Last spring brought widespread, disastrous and in some places unprecedented flooding to much of the central United States, especially in places like South Dakota, Nebraska, Iowa and Missouri.

The outlook for this year is pretty grim, especially in the eastern Dakotas, the upper half of the Mississippi Valley, around the Great Lakes and other parts of the Midwest, as The Weather Channel reports.   Of course, we've already had super serious flooding in the South this month.

In the bigger river systems like the Missouri, Mississippi, Ohio and other large rivers, you can make an educated guess ahead of time as to how serious flooding might be a month or two down the road,

Vermont lacks those big rivers.  In the large river systems further west, floods are slow rolling disasters.  Vermont floods are like a mugging.  They hit you in an instant, and just as quickly, they're gone.  It's hard to predict a mugger, and it's hard to predict a Vermont flood well in advance.

In some years, when the snowpack and the soil moisture and the rivers are high in late February, you can safely anticipate at least some flooding later in the spring. In normal-ish years like this, it all depends on what March and early April does.

If we have a lot of very wet storms over the next two months - either rain or snow - that can make the flooding risk skyrocket.  If we have a March and early April full of perfect sugaring weather - mild thawing afternoons and freezing nights - the snow melt is slow and we have a low flood risk.  A big bout of super warm, record temperatures, especially if accompanied by heavy rain, you get floods.

Long range forecasts are tricky, but some of those forecasts do predict a relatively stormy first half of March. Beyond that, you might as well flip a coin.

Climate change adds an additional twist.  The risk of heavier individual rain storms is getting higher.  However, that overall risk is a big picture thing.  You really can't tell when those bigger, heavier storms might hit.  The next monster storm could be next week, or it could wait five years or more. Who knows?

The only thing I can say is have your sump pumps ready, just in case. This year truly is a tossup.

Early Winter In Western Canada, Northern U.S. Rockies

Too early? A snowy, very difficult commute in Calgary Canada this
morning. Photo via @mookalicious on Twitter.   

In early October here in Vermont, we start to look toward the mountain peaks for the first few dustings of snow.

There's nothing like that this year, and no snow on the summits is in the forecast for the foreseeable future.

Sure, it's chilly and wet today, but it's surely not snowy.  The forecast calls for near to above normal temperatures for at least the next week.

It might even get almost summery for a time next week. There's a chance it could hit 80 degrees i Vermont then. We'll see.

But it's fall. If it's warm in one place, it has to be chilly in another. Sure enough, western Canada and the northern Rockies fit that wintry bill.

Actually, while we roasted in September,  most of Canada was unusually chilly. Only the southeastern part of that country was warm. Yellowknife, in northwestern Alaska, had its coldest September on record and Calgary had its chilliest September since 1985.

Overnight, four to eight inches of snow, with locally higher amounts, really screwed up the morning commute in Calgary. I don't know about you, but I'm not quite ready for a morning like that yet. Let's wait until after Thanksgiving here in Vermont, at least.

The cold air and snow has been starting to bleed across the Canadian border into places like Montana.  In Billings, 1.4 inches of snow came down Sunday. Yes, it was still September. Today, in the high elevations around Glacier National Park, winter storm warnings are up as some areas in the peaks will get more than 18 inches of snow.

If anything, this winter pattern will intensify out west next week. It's possible a wide area of the northern Rockies and the western Dakotas could get quite a bit of snow. 

It's a little early for that, but not unheard of in that part of the country.

Here in the Northeast, a northward bulge in the jet stream will keep us protected from any real snow, at least through the middle of the month. It's possible the highest peaks could get a little rime ice or flurries in that time, but there will be no snowflakes in the valleys, like we can get this time of year.

Don't worry, winter will come and some of us will probably regret it.

Snow, Severe Storms, Tornadoes, Hail, Green Skies And Pecos Hank

Greenish clouds associated with severe weather. Photo by Nicole
Ubalducci, via Lifehacker 

The nation is getting into the heart of the spring severe thunderstorm and tornado season now, despite the mid-winter chill gripping much of the North.

Severe storms need warm, humid air to get going, so the areas that have gotten scary severe thunderstorms has so far been mostly, but not completely, limited to the South.

A quick interjection here for us Vermonters: After yesterday's snow, another snowfall will miss us by a long shot Sunday, and the chances of a snowy nor'easter on Tuesday or Wednesday keep dropping, which is good news for most of us.

Anyway, severe storms. There was another batch of them last night, including one that looked like a monster on radar that was about to destroy the city of Choushatta, Louisiana. Luckily, that tornado weakened some by the time it got into the city, so there was lots of damage, but it wasn't as bad as it could have been.

Other spots had tornadoes and strong winds. Many communities had damaging hail. Plano, Texas had baseball sized, hail, for instance

I'm sure some people that that got hit by severe storms in Texas and Louisiana on Friday saw green skies as the storms approached.

Which leads me to a video by musician and storm chaser Pecos Hank. He's just about the best storm videographer out there, mostly because of his wonderful time lapses, and especially his storytelling abilities. Most storm chasers just video tornadoes and scream and yell.  Pecos Hank puts together video packages that are engaging and so well done, as he unfolds his story in a deep Texas twang.

You really need to check out Pecos Hank's YouTube page. 

A recent Pecos Hank video explains wonderfully why the sky sometimes turns green - an eerie greenish/bluish/ugly - when severe weather approaches. (The cliche has always been if the sky turns green, you're screwed.)

Pecos Hank explains how low angle sun in the late afternoon and evening, when severe storms are most likely, scatter light in storms that contain a lot of rain, hail and blowing dust from strong winds.

Next, watch his great video, then below that another video - not as good as Pecos Hank's, but still really dramatic showing the hail storms and severe weather in Texas and Louisiana yesterday.

First, Pecos Hank:



Here's a good overview of several Texas hailstorms on Friday:

Atlantic Hurricane Season Ramping Up

The National Hurricane Center is watching
two disturbances in the Atlantic Ocean that could
become tropical storms. The X's are where they were
Friday morning, and the yellow and orange shaded
areas indicate possible forecast paths for the disturbances.A

There's a couple areas of bad weather way out over the eastern Atlantic Ocean that have some potential to turn into tropical storms or hurricanes.

They may or may not, and even if they do, chances - so far anyway - indicate they won't hit the United States.

But the fact there are suddenly two areas out in that part of Atlantic that the National Hurricane Center is watching means we are now getting into the meat of the hurricane season.

Tropical storms can form almost anywhere in the Atlantic where the water temperature is warm enough. (These storms need very warm water to survive)

Once you get into August and September, though, potentially the most dangerous storms form.

During this time of year, weather disturbances move westward and emerge off the west coast of Africa into the Atlantic.

Some of these disturbances make a long journey westward, and a few of those take advantage of warm water and favorable atmospherics to become hurricanes. Since these storms are out over water for so long, they have plenty of time to develop.

These storms are called Cape Verde hurricanes because they originate near that area. If the Cape Verde hurricanes can hang together, and not get ripped apart by high winds in the upper reaches of the atmosphere, or curve northward as many do, the can cause real trouble for the United States.

Many of the worst hurricanes in American history were Cape Verde hurricanes. This includes a Florida hurricane in 1928 that killed more than 1,800 people, and the Great Long Island/New England hurricane of 1938 that killed more than 600 people.

Cape Verde hurricanes can strike the United States anywhere along the Atlantic Coast between Brownsville, Texas and Eastport, Maine.

If you live anywhere along the coast, now is the time to see if you've got the supplies or readiness to prepare your property for a hurricane. You don't want to start that if and when such a storm is already heading your way.

By the way, much of the tropical Atlantic Ocean is toasty warm - warmer than normal. That is one factor that could make this year's Cape Verde hurricanes this year perhaps more frequent and stronger than they otherwise would be.

Plus, it's been a decade since a major hurricane has made landfall in the United States, so we're overdue. It's the roll of the dice.

Tornado Season Past, But That Doesn't Mean We Won't Get More Tornadoes

A tornado near Gilman, Minnesota on Sunday.  

It's late summer, so the spring and early summer tornado season is gone.

So we don't have to worry about twisters, right?

Wrong.

There are fewer tornados in the United States once we get into August and beyond, but that doesn't mean we're in the clear.

True, the average number of tornadoes in the United States falls from about 240 in June to 74 in September and down to 24 in December. But any tornado can be dangerous, and they can form any time of year.

Strong cold fronts this time of year can help produce tornados, although the outbreaks aren't nearly as widespread as they are in the spring.  Minnesota just got hit by a tornado on Sunday.  

We're also getting into hurricane season.  Once a hurricane or tropical storm makes landfall, the storms can generate tornadoes even days after they hit shore. That's particularly true if the dying hurricane interacts with other weather fronts or disturbances. interact with other weather disturbances, or t......

Then in October and November, the large scale storm systems get stronger as we head toward winter. That can create a secondary tornado season in the United States, but one that's not nearly as big as the one in the spring.

One ingredient in the formation of tornadoes is the strong spring and early summer sun that can destabilize the atmosphere to help supercell storms to form. That strong sun is missing in November.

But on a few occasions, as was the case in a big tornado outbreak last November 17,  a storm can overcome the lack of heating from the sun and cause a nasty round of twisters.

Below is a video of the tornado in Minnesota last weekend.

In the video,  I bet the occupants of the house in the foreground at about 45 seconds in were REALLY glad the twister was barely able to miss them, instead of scoring a direct hit.

Watch: