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Weather Service warns of possible life-threatening storms today

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Most of Missouri will have one round of severe weather to contend with today, that could include tornadoes, damaging winds, hail and flooding. Some of Missouri will have two.  

This graphic from the National Weather Service Office in St. Louis shows where the Storm Prediction Center in Oklahoma says there is a risk for severe weather today.

This graphic from the National Weather Service Office in St. Louis shows where the Storm Prediction Center in Oklahoma says there is a risk for severe weather today.

National Weather Service Meteorologists say storms today will be life-threatening and are urging Missourians to prepare now for severe weather. Governor Jay Nixon (D) has declared a state of emergency in response to the storms already happening and those to come.

A tornado watch has been issued for 21 counties in southeast and south-central Missouri, for storms that have already prompted a tornado warning in Arkansas this morning. Those storms are anticipated to sweep northeast from southwestern Missouri through the St. Louis area.

These storms could produce large hail, damaging winds and tornadoes. Flooding is a possibility locally in southern Missouri, and more so in central and east-central Missouri where heavy rain has already fallen overnight.

Then for this afternoon will come storms that have caused the Storm Prediction Center in Oklahoma to say much of central and southern Missouri has a “moderate” risk for severe weather.

This graphic from the National Weather Service in Pleasant Hill illustrates the threats of severe weather today.

This graphic from the National Weather Service in Pleasant Hill illustrates the threats of severe weather today.

Today’s threat of tornadoes is the highest the state has been under so far this year, according to Meteorologist Jayson Gosselin with the National Weather Service in St. Louis.

“Unfortunately there will probably be at least one tornado in the state and there could be quite a few,” says Gosselin.

“It looks like it should warm up by this afternoon and get very unstable and a cold front will head from west to east across the state. Out ahead of that and along it we’re expecting thunderstorms that are going to be capable of very large hail, very strong winds as well as tornadoes possible.”

Storms are expected to form in Kansas and Oklahoma before sweeping through the state, first as discrete supercell thunderstorms, which Meteorologist Ryan Cardell with the Weather Service Office in Springfield says are generally the most dangerous.

“They can produce large hail, damaging winds and possibly stronger tornadoes,” says Cardell.

Farther east, storms are expected to gather into a line.

“At that point the threat will switch over to being more of a straight-line wind threat with isolated tornadoes. That will happen early in the evening sometime.”

Flash flood warnings have already been issued in a swath of central and eastern Missouri where rainfall totals have ranged from between 2.5 to more than 3 inches from storms overnight. Gosselin says if more heavy rain does move through, more flash flooding issues are likely.

“Everything is very saturated now,” says Gosselin.

“This is a good time … before the storms have formed … to dust off your emergency plans,” says Cardell. “Make sure that’s all ready so that when the watches do come out you can kind of start heightening your situational awareness to where the storms currently are, if they’ve formed, things like that, so that way you’re kind of ready. When the tornado warning happens you’ve got one foot in place heading into your disaster plan.”

For information for your area, tune in to your Missourinet affiliate station and visit these Weather Service office websites.

In northwest and western Missouri:  Kansas City (Pleasant Hill) and on Twitter @NWSKansasCity

In northeast and eastern Missouri:  St. Louis and on Twitter @NWSStLouis

In southwest Missouri:  Springfield and on Twitter @NWSSpringfield

In southeast Missouri:  Paducah, KY and on Twitter @NWSPaducah

Scotland and Clark counties:  Davenport, IA and on Twitter @NWSQuadCities

House Budget Committee approves money toward State Fair storm shelters

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With damage done by severe storms at two state fairs last year fresh in memory, the Missouri State Fair staff wants to build some safe places for its guests to take cover.

The Missouri State Fair (picture courtesy, the Missouri State Fair)

The House Budget Committee has approved a capital improvement package that includes over $86,000 from the Agriculture Protection Fund, toward building four storm shelters on the State Fairgrounds. The 1,500 square foot safe houses would hold up to about 200 people each and be rated to withstand winds up to 250 miles-per-hour.

State Fair Director Mark Wolfe says several events last year illustrated the need for these shelters. “Unfortunately it takes sometimes tragedies like what something that happened in Indiana at the state fair grounds to make people wake up and go, ‘What are we doing on our end?'”

Last year, strong winds caused the collapse of a concert stage at the Indiana State Fair. Seven people were killed and 43 were injured. Another storm during the Missouri State Fair blew down some tents and other temporary structures, but no injuries were reported.

Wolfe says in that incident, the Fair staff had plenty of advanced warning and evacuated campers into the Mathewson Exhibition Center, the National Guard facility and the assembly hall that are on the grounds. “The problem there would be that if we didn’t have that much notice, would we have had time to get those people out of that campground and across and over on to the main body (of the grounds) to do that.”

The plan is to build these four shelters in the campground area, but Wolfe stresses, they will not take the place of the current shower houses.

$86,000 would be the state’s match toward an application for a federal grant. The total project is expected to cost $345,000.

The appropriation bill passed by the House Budget Committee must be approved by another committee before it can be debated by the full chamber.

Weather Service begins test of new warnings today

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Beginning today and for the next few months, when weather turns severe the National Weather Service will be trying some new things with the warnings it issues in most of Missouri.
 

The National Weather Service will use new language to tell the public when events like this tornado near Bellflower on May 25, 2011 are happening. (photo courtesy, tNational Weather Service)

These warnings will include new hazard, impact, source information and updated Call to Action statements. The weather service hopes the new warnings will get members of the public to take potentially life-saving actions faster.

St. Louis Warning Coordination Meteorologist Jim Kramper says this is the beginning of a test. “We think the warning process and the result is going to be overhauled eventually in a bigger fashion, but we just can’t do it at once. We’re going to take steps, and this is probably the first step.”

The warnings are being tested in five weather service offices covering most of Missouri and parts of Illinois and Kansas. Kramper explains why the Weather Service chose these offices. “They wanted to try to get offices that have been effected by strong tornadoes recently, and try to get a variety as well. Kansas sometimes looks at their storms differently than a lot of people in St. Louis do. So we’ll have a lot of variety in terms of the people that are going to be exposed to this new type of warning.”

Those offices’ coverage areas do not include the Bootheel and Scotland and Clark counties in far northeast Missouri.

The updates are based on the findings of the Weather Service and social scientists, who have studied people’s behavior when severe weather hits in events like the May 22, 2011 Joplin tornado.  Kramper says they’ve learned that most people, upon hearing a warning, will look for more information.

“They hear ‘tornado warning,’ in most cases they’re going to take a look outside, they’re going to see what’s going on. Is there anything right there in the vicinity or does it look clear? Maybe they can see the dark cloud off in the distance. Or, maybe all of a sudden they can see the wind howling outside. That’s what we have found people do. They don’t really take action just because they hear this warning. They’re going to assess the situation their situation and find out, ‘What do I really need to do?'”

See our earlier story on the new warning language.

Some things might not change, however. Kramper says for instance, the Weather Service has no say in what county and city officials do with local outdoor warning sirens.

“The local warning systems are controlled by local authorities. We’re hopeful that they will take this additional information that we’re going to try and make it easy for them to see the warnings and they’ll use that when they make their decisions … but what they decide in terms of turning them on or not is still going to be totally up to them.”

Much of the time, the public does not read these warnings with their own eyes. Rather, they get the information from media outlets. Kramper says how media outlets will pass it along is up to them. Then, it’s up to the public what they do with that information.

See examples of the warnings being tested, with the new language highlighted: