Archive for the ‘Damage Reports’ Category

Severe Storms have become a common occurence across portions of Alabama over the last week or so with several MCS systems coming through the area every other day or so.  Today a slight risk of severe weather was posted for much of the Southeast/Ozarks…but reports were lacking a bit. Some wind damage came in from areas like Lamar/Sumter/Hale counties across the west….as well as the Tennessee Valley counties.  Most of the damage was minor being in the form of trees and power lines.  Since we are down on the Gulf Coast…..we did note the storm near DeFuniak Springs, Florida overturned some RVs and destoryed some vehicles with trees this afternoon.  Lots of wind/lightning in these intense summer time storms.

More MCS activity can be expected as long as the northwest flow maintains.  This looks to continue across the region for the next few days.  We will have a look at the latest model data and update you on the forecast and expected conditions.  Updates later…

This damage was seen along HWY-21 as we entered Coosa County this afternoon just outside of Sylacauga.  The driver was uninjured and the tree was cleared rather quickly.  High winds also caused damage to many other areas south and east of 20/59.

Friday, April 15, 2011 proved to be one the most intense chases we’ve ever been on, and was certainly the most intense chase we’ve had in the state of Alabama. For nine straight hours the western portion of the state was battered by supercells and tornadoes. This is a recap of that day from our perspective.

We departed our office around 8:00AM and met with our rider, Justin Chandler, for the day in Birmingham. We then traveled to Tuscaloosa and initially were going after some storms that had fired to the north of there. While we were sitting in traffic on the bypass, a supercell erupted just across the Alabama/Mississippi border in Wayne County, MS and immediately began rotating. This storm went tornado warned within the first 20 minutes of its life. We spun around and headed south down I20/59 then AL28 toward Livingston, AL. We intercepted the storm just south of Linden in Central Marengo County, AL. Timing and placement were perfect. Just as we approached an open intersection at AL69 and AL10 a massive multi-vortex tornado appeared from our right. Below is a video clip from that. We would later learn that this tornado killed a person in a mobile home just southeast of Linden. Due to our partnership with WBRC-TV FOX-6 in Birmingham, Brett was in contact with Robert (Our Producer) for the afternoon.  Here is a view LIVE of what Mickey Furgueson and the rest of the FOX-6 Storm Warn team were viewing from our vehicle during the noon newscast.

This really set the tone for the rest of the day and the outbreak.  The storms was really wrapping up as we sat at the intersection of AL-10/AL-69.  Here is our view of the radar as the cell approached and came right over our location.

This was radar imagery of the tornadic circulation as they approached us and crossed our area.  Figures 3 and 4 show the significant inbound and outbound winds showing strong rotation and the tornado as it approached and passed us.  This was our first storm intercept of the day….and there were several more.  I will be making an updated post of the next few videos that I take off when I get a chance. 

I will leave you with this radar and Water Vapor image of the entire outbreak.

Last night….a large supercell developed along the Nebraska/Iowa border and completely raked West-Central and Northern Iowa with several large tornadoes and a swath of damage.  We have some interesting radar imagery we wanted to share to show how strong this beast was along with some video and photo documentation from fellow chasers of our media group, KDR Media.

Base Reflectivity shows the well pronounced hook and inflow region gong strait into Mapleton around 710 PM Central time last evening.  This is as the tornado was getting organized on the SW side of town.

You can see the tornado coming strait through the town of Mapleton here with the 0.5 degree inbound/outbound velocities beginning to converge and max out as the tornado plows through town.  This tornado did significant damage all across this area.  This parent supercell thunderstorm apparently produced several large, destructive tornadoes over the course of a 4 hour period across Iowa.  So far, we haven’t heard of any confirmed fatalities.

The video below comes from fellow KDR Media stringers Skip Talbot and Mike Boik.

Also….some damage video from KDR Media Stringer Mike Brady.

We will continue to update this story as it unfolds.  Another high end severe weather event is expected across the northern plains and upper midwest later today.  Stay tuned…

Much of the rainfall has moved out, but the cloud cover is hanging tough.  Most of the mid level drying is back to our west and it may be hard for us to destabilize before the cold front comes through this afternoon that is already moving into portions of NW AL as shown by the isobaric trough on the surface charts trailing back through Mississippi.  Dewpoints are trying to surge once again, but I don’t believe that there will be enough time for things to get active again before the frontal passage. 

Here is a look at the Silverhill, AL tornado on radar this morning.  This storm produced tornadoes across Mobile and Baldwin counties from Tillmans Corner to the Florida state line.  NWS survey crews will be out in full force estimating the damage and strength of these tornadoes.  Luckily only minor injuries have been reported.

Tornado damage about 2 miles from some my in-laws home.  This tornado has apparently damaged a fuel station as well as the Food World and tossed many cars about.  An 18 wheeler also sustained significant damage at this location.  This was the tornadoes starting point as it raked Mobile and Baldwin Counties.

Here is radar of the tornado rated EF-0 near Crowley, LA where some structures were damaged.  This tornado was very weak and short lived but did produce about 3 injuries.

This shot is the second and stronger tornado that occurred in Rayne, LA on the NW side of town.  Estimates are that 60 homes have been completely destroyed and at least 50 injuries have been observed with some serious.  One person has been confirmed dead with unconfirmed reports of more.  Gas leaks have been reported and officials have been unable to get into some of the damaged areas due to debris and the threat of gas leaking.  Much of Rayne has been evacuated due to these threats.  This was one serious beat on radar a little earlier this morning. 

Thankfully, we won’t deal with anything like this across Alabama today.  Most of the rainfall will be out of here by late tonight and the front will move through North and Central Alabama calmly.  A tornado watch is in effect along the AL/FL Gulf Coast until 10PM this evening for the threat of an isolated tornado down that way.  Instability is much less than it was in Louisiana earlier….so the threat of major tornadoes has greatly diminished.

On Monday 2/28/11 we departed our central Alabama location at 3am en route to North Alabama for what looked to be a good chase day.  Early on we were cranking up the tunes while driving north bound and entertaining our guests on our StormScapeLIVE stream.  By 5am we were in the Decatur area and decided to exit off and have a good bite to eat with John Brown and Mike Wilhelm at the local Waffle House.  After grabbing a bite to eat we noticed that cells began going up right behind a gravity wave that was traversing north Mississippi and decided to fuel up and head NW. 

We progressed toward the Florence vicinity and noticed a distinct NE component to the storms.  Once we passed Waterloo, AL we observed lighting and some light rain but no real evidence of severe weather.  Thus, we backed off and went back into Florence and waited for later action.  After watching another storm weaken and go to our north from there we decided to head back to the interstate and make a play on later storms that were scheduled to form.  Just before noon storms began going to severe in Western Lauderdale and Colbert County.  We strategized and decided to go northward toward Athens and take the exit and drive in the direction of Rogersville just across the river and into Lauderdale county.  We noticed some evidence of rotation along Us-72 and took SR-207 northward to follow the developing storm.  Once we made it to Anderson the storm accelerated to our east and we were unable to really catch it.   After taking SR-99 eastward back towards Athens….we pulled over in the Cartwright community as we heard some kind of a roar with the cell departing to our ENE.  Inflow winds were picking up into the cell as it really ramped up in forward speed and entered Limestone County.  This storm went on to produce a tornado near the state line north of Hazel Green just east of HWY-231. 

After being bummed about missing a tornadic producing cell….we went back to I-65 to catch up with cells that were beginning to fire to the SW along the pre-frontal convergence.  After getting back on I-65 southward we noted that the cells were beginning to develop a little rotation even with the mainly veered low level winds at the surface.  We punched through a cell that had probably 5”/hour rainfall rates and got into position as a “kidney bean” shaped cell approached us at the rest area just south of Good Hope in Cullman County.  Once we got into position and at an elevated location we witnessed this at the beginning of the video.

This funnel was pretty consolidated for a few moments and actually extended probably 1/2 or 3/4 of the way to the ground at times.  Some folks on our stream thought they witnessed a touch down, but we can’t find any video evidence that would suggest that at all.  This was really the best cell that we caught on this day.

After intercepting the Cullman cell….we tracked south to the I-20/59 interchange and headed west.  This was a bad move on our part and put us too far north to get into the significant wind/hail that impacted parts of the Birmingham metro.  We got off at US-78 which mainly received heavy rain from the cell.

We sat there for a few moments in traffic gridlock and finally made it back to I-65 south bound heading toward the cells in Jefferson/Shelby.  We finally came out of the embedded rainfall while listening to all of the traffic on the 146.88 repeater out of Birmingham.  The reports of golf ball to tennis ball sized hail were pouring in and we figured that we may get lucky and get some rotation in the updraft base on the south side.  Once we got out of the core, we saw some rotation around the Shelby County airport.  We figured it was our last play of the day and decided to take the HWY-25 exit toward Columbiana/Wilsonville.  We saw a disorganized wall cloud a few times along the way with some higher base rotation, but the main show was further east with the Harpersville cell as a tornado warning was issued with damage being reported. 

We were unable to catch the cell, so we followed the rotational path of the cell that impacted Shelby/Talladega county and found the tornado damage located at the end of our video above.  The damage as all mainly minor, but looked like this on radar.

With veering winds throughout the event, you can’t ask for a much better day.  Instability was able to get storms fueled as the cap broke and the convergence kept them coming through the afternoon.  Had the winds stayed back…. a high end tornado outbreak would have unfolded.  Keep in mind that this is early spring and we still have a ways to go.

I don’t like to hear of fatalities when I get up in the morning…..and we already have three in the small community of Cincinnati in Washington County, AR from and early morning tornado that has destroyed at least one brick home and several structures.  Tornado watches and warnings continue to be in effect for portions of Northern Arkansas and Southern Missouri at this hour.

These storms intensified rapidly as they pushed across the OK/AR state line this morning into the warm, juicy flow of air coming northward out of the Gulf of Mexico.  There is more potential for such an event to unfold further east today.

The 12z sounding from Jackson, MS indicates a loaded gun type setup with quite the inversion around the 775mb level of the atmosphere.  This dry air aloft will likely aid in developing potential instability that could be unleashed if this cap breaks.  Given the incredible shear values…. it is likely that storms/showers will spin from the near the onset ahead of a massive mid level trough that will shoot northeast later in the period.

Our in-house mesoscale WRF model indicates that the capping should be broken shortly after noon with convection firing across most of Mississippi and potentially into west Alabama.  Shear values will be supportive of super cell structures with the potential for tornadoes.  This is a developing situation and one that we will possible deploy on for a chase within the next hour or so.  Stay tuned for more updates regarding this potential.

This afternoon an isolated thunderstorm or shower formed ahead of the cold front moving through the Jackson, MS forecast area and developed some pretty tight rotation.  This cell has apparently done some damage in parts of Simpson County due to a possible tornado.  Here is a glimpse of the cell as it moved off to the east with the damage markers indicated.  It did look rather stout after passing through.