High-risk severe weather threat to continue into the weekend

AccuWeather

AccuWeather Severe Weather Expert Guy Pearson warns that the high-risk severe weather threat is expected to continue into the weekend, bringing conditions favorable of producing more tornadoes.

Transcript

00:00We just had a map discussion, and there was a spirited debate and plenty of discussion

00:06on not so much about the flash flood threat today.

00:09We all believe that that is going to be significant in the next 24 hours, but there is some debate

00:15on the amount of tornadoes that can occur today.

00:20Let's go through this situation, this setup, and let's talk about some of the things that

00:26you and the severe weather experts are considering as we talk about the main threats today.

00:33Yeah, certainly.

00:36You know, we've got the next piece of energy coming out across the same areas, and we're

00:42certainly looking at more rounds of severe weather today and certainly again tomorrow.

00:48As we've got, looking at water vapor here and everything, that next piece of energy

00:52is kicking out.

00:53We already have a good cluster of showers and thunderstorms, but mainly what we consider

00:58north of the warm front boundary, so the storms themselves are a little bit more elevated

01:03and reducing rain across southern Missouri, northern Arkansas, but we are looking for

01:08additional thunderstorm developments as that warm front rides north today.

01:12It will help to destabilize things.

01:15There will be a change in wind direction there, which will all help sort of things tie together

01:20and bring more severe weather chances to Little Rock, as well as Arkansas in general, as we

01:27go through the afternoon and during the overnight hours tonight.

01:30Let's take a look at the future radar here, Guy, and let's go over this as we go forward

01:35here.

01:36The initiation time is around 2 o'clock.

01:39Now, you've heard me all morning talk about, I think there's a lot of tornadoes across

01:43Arkansas, a dozen or two tornadoes.

01:48Your concern is that, if I don't want to put words in your mouth, the atmosphere is

01:52so loaded with moisture that the thunderstorms just form really quickly, and although there's

01:59the threat for strong tornadoes, the numbers are a little up in question.

02:03Do you think the forecast is going to be all right?

02:06Yeah, I think so.

02:07I mean, we have all the ingredients there, right?

02:09We actually have a really good setup, and the general conditions are there for tornadoes

02:16and potentially lawn track tornadoes.

02:18But at the same time, some of the upper atmosphere limitations that we're looking at, sometimes

02:25you have to have a certain level or cap that we've talked about before, and if that cap

02:30isn't always in place, then when you have all this low-level moisture, you have different

02:34wind directions and everything, it really just sort of jumps in there and all the storms

02:39are able to sort of develop at once and turn into more of a cluster of storms and staying

02:45individual discreet.

02:46Now the one thing with this, as we're looking at future radar, it does start out as sort

02:50of individual discreet cells, and so in between that 2 and 6 o'clock timeframe especially,

02:55you want to be aware of where those storms are developing, and they very well could produce

03:00tornadoes as we start out the day.

03:03As we sort of then progress through the evening hours from 6 p.m. and beyond, you can really

03:08start to see it congeal into just a larger area of showers and storms.

03:13There will be severe storms in there, there will be damaging winds, potentially some large

03:17hail, but certainly as we get into the evening hours, the overnight hours, the heavy rain

03:21threat leading to flash flooding is certainly a big case, and you can see the next round

03:26then is already developed similar to what we saw this morning.

03:31We have this area across northern Arkansas, southern Missouri by 7 a.m. tomorrow morning

03:35that is producing more heavy rain and flash flooding as well, so that's something that's

03:39going to be a constant that you need to be on top of, understand where you are in relation

03:44to low-level areas, high-level areas, things like that as we go through the next 24 hours.

03:51I want to go through this future radar again here, Guy, because the one thing that I want

03:55to pick up on it from 6 o'clock on, here's the real scary part.

04:00Let's take the tornado equation out for just a second, because there is that concern, but

04:05what really looks bad is that area north and west of Little Rock, Little Rock certainly,

04:10but there's just the rounds of rain and the fact that there's terrain into the Ozarks,

04:17this could be very catastrophic tonight, could it not?

04:23Yeah, it potentially could be.

04:27Anytime you add hills, that water at the higher elevations does have to run to lower, and

04:31so you actually have all that extra pooling, so certainly through the Ozarks and northern

04:35Arkansas, southern Missouri, as we go through later today and especially overnight tonight

04:41and towards dawn to morning as you saw on future radar there, it really is just a widespread

04:45area, rainfall rates in there will be pretty good, and there will be flash flooding that

04:51everybody needs to be paying attention to.

04:54You got 10 seconds, Guy, quickly about tomorrow.

04:59So tomorrow, the whole boundary, you know, tries to shift a little further south, but

05:04certainly more tornado and severe storm risk, Louisiana towards Memphis, unfortunately,

05:10once again.

05:11All right, severe weather, AccuWeather severe weather expert Guy Pearson, Guy, thanks for

05:15joining us and breaking it down.

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