Will This Be A Bad Tornado Year? Lots Of Questions

A large nighttime tornado shown spreading death and destruction in and
near Nashville earlier this month. 

It's usually hard to anticipate whether a national tornado season will be a bad one or a mild one.

One thing's for sure, this year is not off to a good start. Those big tornadoes in Tennessee last week killed 24 people.

Through the end of February, there were 141 tornadoes in the United States, compared to the average up to that point of 104.   This, of course, does not include that fatal Tennessee outbreak on March 3.

Through the beginning of March, there had been 32 tornado deaths in the United States this year.
The United States has, on  occasion, gone through entire years without that many tornado deaths. On average about 80 people in the United States are killed by tornadoes annually.

Some years are extremely bad. For instance, 2011 saw 553 U.S. tornado deaths. We don't want a repeat of that.

Short term, the weather pattern for much of the rest of March favors some severe weather, though it's hard to predict if those favorable patterns will yield severe weather.  There were a few tornado warnings yesterday in California of all places, but so far, there's no reports of confirmed tornadoes.

Some strong thunderstorms and maybe a couple tornadoes are possible in the South today and especially tomorrow, but again, we don't know the extent to which that will develop.

The overall pattern features a dip in the jet stream in the western United States and a ridge, or northward bulge in the East.  That favors storms moving northeastward across the central United States.  That type of track can create severe weather in the South and Midwest. But would the severe weather be widespread or not.  It depends on the dance of atmospheric conditions on that particular day.

Beyond that, who knows?  According to the Washington Post's Capital Gang, some experts predict a near or above average season.  The experts say there will be bouts of intense activity, interspersed with lulls of little activity.  The peak of tornado season in the United States goes through much of April, May and early June.

Years with a La Nina weather pattern, in which the eastern Pacific Ocean is cool, tends to favor U.S. tornadoes in the spring and early summer. This year is kind of a neutral pattern.  The eastern Pacific Ocean is in sort of a Goldilocks pattern - not too hot, not too cold.

As we know well from Tennessee, where the tornadoes hit is a big wild card, too.  If a bunch of big tornadoes go across open, unpopulated fields and forests, then who cares, right?  Blast a tornado through a city and its suburbs like Nashville, and you have a tragedy on your hands.

That's the problem we had in 2011 when big, deadly tornadoes went through cities like Tuscaloosa, Alabama and Joplin, Missouri.

So, like every year, heed those tornado warnings if they come along to your neck of the woods and do everything you can to protect yourself if you do get such a warning.