Dallas Tornado: Destructive Storm Odd For October, Not Unheard Of

One of last night's Dallas-area tornadoes
lit up by lightning. Photo by Billy Frank Watkins Jr.

A tornado struck the Dallas, Texas area last night, and apparently it was a very serious one.

Details were still somewhat sketchy early this morning, but news reports and social media videos showed a debris-strewn Interstate 35 with battered cars, a demolished Home Depot and dramatic video of what looked like a big tornado lit up by lightning and power flashes.

The tornado or tornadoes hit shortly after 9 p.m. last night in the northern sections of Dallas, near Love Field.

It was terrible timing for a tornado.  It was dark, so a lot of people would not be able to see it coming. (People seem to always want a visual cue of a tornado. They look for it at night, but then it's on top of them before they can see it and take shelter).

Plus, it was early enough that people were still out and about, perhaps driving home from dinner, a movie or a visit with friends.

As of this writing, there were several reports of injuries but so far no deaths.  Which is surprising. Traffic was heavy on freeways hit by the tornado.  The tornado's path took it through heavily developed neighborhoods consisting of large commercial buildings, apartments and densely packed single family houses.

Spring and early summer are the peak times annually for tornadoes, especially in Texas, but twisters can of course happen any time of year.

Sometimes, as is the case here, a potent storm can overwhelm the relative lack of heat and instability this time of year  to produce dangerous weather. In North Texas for instance, there is a big peak in tornados in the spring, followed by a lull during mid to late summer.

As autumn arrives, storm systems get stronger, leading to a secondary peak in severe weather in parts of the country, including Texas. There aren't nearly as many tornadoes this time of year as in the spring but there is a slight upticik.

This particular system contributed to severe thunderstorms in Idaho Saturday. It moved on to cause widespread strong storms Sunday, not only near Dallas, but also through large sections of Oklahoma, Arkansas and Missouri.

Tornado watches and warnings continued this morning in western Tennessee. Terminals were evacuated at Memphis International Airport this morning amid tornado warnings and strong winds. People who were in the terminal reported damage, but the airport said the damage was relatively minor.

But the mess wasn't. Everyone had to go back through security to get to their flights. Long delays and cancellations were going on at the Memphis airport this morning.

A good chunk of the South is at risk for severe storms and possible tornadoes as we go through the day today.

This is also at least the third time this year that a heavily populated area has been hit by an especially dangerous nighttime tornado. Tornadoes caused a lot of destruction in the dark earlier this year in Jefferson City, Missouri and Sioux Falls, South Dakota.

Here's a video of the large gornado near Love Field:



 A motorist stunned by the tornado afternmath on this Dallas-area freeway last night:

Oh, What The Heck? Let's Do Storm Videos Two Days In A Row

Yesterday, I posted videos of weekend storms, but didn't get to all of the ones I saw online.

I do call these videos "weather porn," as weather geeks do get a rise out of these videos. Since we're now somewhat in the summer weather doldrums, let's do two video days in a row.

So here we go. The first one involves the massive, severe thunderstorm that hit Dallas on June 9. (As noted yesterday, a second huge, tornadic thunderstorm hit Dallas-Fort Worth again on Sunday.)

This video involves the storm that knocked a construction crane onto an apartment complex, killing one person and injuring several others. The video here is a compilation of storm scenes on June 9 put together by television station WFAA. Talk about rough weather!



The next one shows security camera footage from several angles as a relatively small German tornado damages a house. In the middle of the clip, we see a man who clearly regrets going outside to secure his garage door:



Here's a really cool waterspout taken at close range recently just off shore of Marathon, in the Florida Keys:


Finally, you don't want this kind of turbulence about an airline flight.

This plane over Europe headed toward Basel, Switzerlahd recently encountered extreme turbulence, sending a flight attendant into the ceiling and sending a beverage cart flying. Ten people were taken to hospitals when the plane landed.

The flight attendent is reportedly not seriously injured. Watch:

Stormy Weather, So Stormy Videos Naturally Pop Up

Storm damage around Dallas-Fort Worth yesterday.

As I've repeatedly mentioned in this here blog thingy, it's been awfully stormy and wet and sometimes dangerous in many parts of the nation this spring and early summer.

Things continued on pace like this through the past weekend. So of course there's videos.

The Dallas-Fort Worth area got hit by severe storms for the second Sunday in a row.  Possible tornadoes caused damage in and around Fort Worth.

In this video, people probably should not have been standing outdoors. This shows a wall cloud that eventually produced a tornado after this video was shot.  Scary seeing this come at you, huh?



Here's LOTS of hail in Colorado:



It's not just the United States. Check out this video from southern France as a motorist encounters an intensifying hailstorm. A crack appears in the windshield, then things get dramatically worse:



Back in the United States, tornados extended to as far as the East Coast.  Here's a twister last Thursday re-arranging a back yard and pool area in Mullica Hill, New Jersey.

Unhappy Flood Surprise For Car Owners Returning To Dallas Love Field

An almost artistic view of cars submerged in floodwaters inside a
parking garage at the Dallas Love Field airport on Wednesday.

Torrential rains hit the Dallas-Fort Worth area Tuesday night and Wednesday morning, causing flash floods around that metroplex.

At Love Field, one of the major airports in the region, water flowed into the lower level of a parking garage, meaning people who return home from trips and go to their cars are going to get a very wet, unhappy surprise.

It's unclear if the City of Dallas or  owners' insurance carriers will foot the bill for the damage, or will this be out of pocket expenses for the car owners.

Actually, I'm sure most of the ruined cars will have been towed out of the garage. Maybe. I'm not sure what they're going to do with the cars. Dozens of cars were wrecked. The flooding, the structure of the garage, its lights and the cars made for some pretty striking images.

If I didn't feel sorry for the car owners, which I do, I would actually call some of the images almost artistic.

Here's a video:

Texas Flash Flood Aids In Extinguishing Car Fire

How to put out a car fire during a Texas flood.

Flash flooding struck the Dallas-Fort Worth, Texas area on Friday, closing quite a few roads, stranding cars and causing the usual flash flood havoc.  

There were no fewer than 81 rescues of people stranded in flooded cars, and lightning set off five house fires i the Dallas area, says the NBC affiliate in Dallas.

In the video below, the flooding sort of had a silver lining. A car caught fire in a flooded parking lot, and a Texan found a nice weather-related way to put out the fire.

Watch:

Dallas Is The Latest Southern Plains City To Drown

Ellen Bryan of NBC Dallas/Fort Worth Tweeted
images of flooded cars on Dallas area freeways early today.  

The Oklahoma City metro got hammered by flooding earlier this month. Houston metro got it big time last weekend.

Today, it's Dallas and environs that are totally underwater.

Three to seven inches of rain swamped the already soggy city overnight, and just before dawn, it was still raining hard.

In a rather dire flash flood warning, the National Weather Service in Dallas early this morning said, "significant and life threatening flash flooding is occuring near Duck Creek in Garland. Spring Creek and Howlett Creek are also likely overflowing their bans. 

"This is a flash flood emergency for the area from Garland to Allen. Flash flooding is occuring with numerous roads now dangerous and impassable. Multiple high water rescues are occurring. Trave has become impossible  in many areas."

The Dallas Morning News was blogging about an unfolding scene of chaos in North Texas early Friday. Dallas Fire and Rescue was pullling people from cars stuck in flooded roads. Television station WFAA said an apartment complex was being evacuated with water in first floor apartments. White Rock Creek was about to experience a record high flood crest.

Major flooding is now forecast along the Trinity River, the biggest waterway in the Dallas area. It crested at 40 feet the other day, just barely at major flood stage, and is now expected to go to 43 feet. The last time it was at 42 feet was in 1991,

The heavy rain causing the flooding is expected to crawl into eastern Texas today, causing more flooding there.

I'm sure there will be many more updates to this story later today on the news.

The rain is forecast to become somewhat lighter and spottier in the southern Plains over the next few days, but there's still the risk of heavy downpours and more flash flooding in what has been easily the wettest month on record for the region.