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| Sunday’s Severe Storm Outlook |
Just want to send out the “heads-up” that the Live Doppler 15 Fury Weather Team is currently monitoring the potential for severe storms on Sunday. Nothing’s set in stone yet and the overall severe chance remains low as of this post, but it does, indeed, exist as the weekend comes to a close.
The tornado siren test that normally happens throughout Allen County, Indiana at noon on the first Wednesday of every month did not happen today. The Allen County Department of Homeland Security (DHS) notified the Allen County Amateur Radio Emergency Service (ARES) this morning that the county would not test sirens today.
ARES Emergency Coordinator Jim Moehring, KB9WWM, did not indicate in an email message why DHS canceled the test. The department, has, however, canceled tests in the past when the weather was rainy, out of fear that citizens might confuse the test with an actual tornado warning.
The National Weather Service activates weather alert radios every Wednesday morning for a weekly test and postpones the weekly test if there is a threat of severe weather on Wednesday. The NWS conducted its weekly test this morning, as usual.
The northern Indiana office of the National Weather Service issued an Areal Forecast Discussion at 4:58 p.m. EDT in which a forecaster writes that the potential for severe weather this evening appears “well in check and approaching zero, though never quite removed entirely.”
A narrow line of intense showers is forecast to move through this evening along an approaching cold front. The forecaster writes that line will bring a risk of strong wind gusts.
The forecaster also writes, however, that pervasive, sustained rainfall throughout the day has effectively stymied the development of thunderstorms along an approaching cold front.
A slight risk of severe weather continues for most of Indiana, extreme southern Michigan and most of Ohio, according to an updated Day 1 Convective Outlook that the National Weather Service (NWS) Storm Prediction Center issued at 4:02 p.m. EDT. The slight risk areas in the latest update are essentially the same as they were in the 9 a.m. update. The main difference is that extreme western and southwestern Indiana now have a slightly enhanced threat of a tornado.
The northern Indiana NWS office indicated in an infographic a short while ago (see my earlier post) that any severe weather in northeastern Indiana and northwestern Ohio is not expected to occur before 10 p.m.
In addition, in an email sent to SKYWARN storm spotters at 12:13 p.m. EDT, NWS Warning Coordination Meteorologist Michael Lewis wrote that the day’s steady rainfall had greatly reduced the risk of severe weather but that isolated severe thunderstorms remained possible along and slightly ahead of an approaching cold front. The most likely severe threat is wind gusts of 55 mph to 60 mph. Forecaster expect no hail.
The area of greatest threat is along, south and east of U.S. 24.
Lewis said the following storm impacts are possible; branches down, weakened and dead trees down, and scattered power outages. Also, damage to weak and compromised buildings and other structures is possible.
There’s also a flooding threat. Additional rainfall amounts through midnight of one to two inches (with isolated higher amounts with thunderstorms) are possible. Significant leaf fall has caused drain blockages and subsequent street flooding.
As you can see in the NWS infographic above, the line of strong storms about which forecasters are concerned is not forecast to arrive in the Fort Wayne area at around 10 p.m. EDT, well after official trick-or-treat hours.
At 10:12 a.m. EDT, Michael Lewis, warning coordination meteorologist at the northern Indiana National Weather Service office, issued the following advisory to trained SKYWARN storm spotters:
Severe weather in Northern Indiana/Southern Lower Michigan and Northwest Ohio is not limited to the Spring. September-November is another peak period for severe weather.
We are currently assessing the latest model data concerning the potential for severe weather today.
We will post our assessment as soon as we have a better idea of timing, duration and intensity. It is hoped to have this posted before noon today.
In the meantime, the NWS in Northern Indiana continues to monitor Social Media (Facebook and Twitter)
All spotters are encouraged to review the reporting requirements and communications methods.
Skywarn Spotter Resource Page:
http://www.crh.noaa.gov/iwx/?n=nwsnorthernindianaskywarnpage#Downloads
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Northern Indiana continually monitors:
* Social Media – (Facebook / Twitter)
* e-mail (w-iwx.webmaster@noaa.gov)
Webpages of interest:
https://nwschat.weather.gov/live
http://www.crh.noaa.gov/iwx/?n=embrief
http://preview.weather.gov/edd/
http://www.crh.noaa.gov/iwx/?n=nwsnorthernindianaskywarnpage
The mayor and police chief of the City of Fort Wayne issued a statement this morning that official trick-or-treating hours in the city will remain 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. EDT this evening, despite the risk of severe weather today.
The statement reads, in part, “Though we received some inquiries into the rescheduling of Trick-or-Treating due to the weather forecast, it was decided that because of several area events already scheduled for Friday evening, the move would create a burden for many families.”
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| Van Wert cinema destroyed by November 10, 2002 tornado. (From NWS website). |
While spring is the main season for tornadoes, don’t rule them out in late fall. You can bet the people of Van Wert, Ohio won’t. An F4 tornado hit that city on November 10, 2002. The same day, an F3 tornado touched down near Berne, Indiana, an F1 hit Hartford city and an F0 touched down near the southeastern Wells County village of Petroleum. Read more about the November 10, 2002 outbreak.
So, are we in for another day like November 10, 2002, today? Probably not, according to meteorologists at the northern Indiana office of the National Weather Service. The amount of atmospheric instability forecast for today is significantly less and more conditional than it was for the 2002 outbreak. In addition, several other meteorological metrics are below the levels seen in 2002.
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| Top: Probability of damaging thunderstorm winds or wind gusts of 50 knots (58 mph )or higher within 25 miles of a point (yellow = 15%). Bottom: Probability of a tornado within 25 miles of a point (green = 2%). |
All of Indiana remains at slight risk of severe weather today, according to the Day One Convective Outlook that the National Weather Service Storm (NWS) Prediction Center (SPC) issued at 8:50 a.m. EDT. The slight risk area also includes approximately the southern third of lower Michigan and all but extreme southeastern Ohio. It includes the entire 37-county warning area of the northern Indiana NWS office.
The primary risk is damaging straight-line wind. The probability of damaging winds or wind gusts of 50 knots (58 mph) or higher within 25 miles of any point is 15 percent throughout the slight risk area. There’s also a two percent probability of a tornado within 25 miles of any point in an area that includes most of Indiana and two counties into Ohio (for SKYWARN spotters, the 2 percent tornado probability includes all of IMO SKYWARN quadrants two and three, a large part of quadrant 4 and a small part of quadrant one).
The chance of thunderstorms will increase early this evening as a cold front approaches from the west, according to a Hazardous Weather Outlook (HWO) that the northern Indiana NWS office issued at 5:21 a.m. EDT. Forecaster also indicated that locally heavy rainfall amounts are possible from today through this evening that could lead to localized flooding of low lying and poorly drained areas (including streets where catch basins are blocked by leaves).
SKYWARN storm spotter activation might be needed this evening, according to the HWO. See an email message to spotters sent mid-morning by the warning coordination meteorologist at the northern Indiana NWS office.
The mayor and police chief of the City of Fort Wayne have decided not to change today’s official trick-or-treating hours in the city (read more). Parents who plan to take their children trick-or-treating this evening should have some means of receiving immediate word of any watches or warnings that the NWS might issue. Possibilities include keeping the car radio tuned to a local station, signing up for text alerts available on the websites of many local media outlets and/or installing a weather alert smartphone app.
We’ll get our next looks at today’s severe weather risk with updated convective outlooks that are due by 12:30 p.m. 4 p.m. and 8 p.m.
You can also learn more about today’s weather event by watching and/or participating in a Twitter “tweet-up” that the northern Indiana NWS office will conduct between 2 p.m. and 4 p.m. EDT. Read more about the tweet-up.
October is not part of peak tornado season but that’s no reason to ignore today’s risks. Read more.
For visually impaired readers whose screen readers won’t be able to read the graphic above, here’s the gist: The Northern Indiana office of the National Weather Service will conduct at “tweet up” tomorrow afternoon, during which it will use Twitter to send live updates on Halloween weather and answer questions from Twitter users. The tweet up will run from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m. October 31. To participate, use Twitter to follow @NWSIWX and include that tag in any questions you tweet.
If you don’t have a Twitter account, you can still read all the tweets using this Web link.
