Amazing Tornado Video, Excessive Heat Continues, Reasoning with the Tropics, and Meteors later this week
Good Sunday to you all. The weekend is almost done, probably with not everything completed that you thought you would get done. But you always have to save something for that rainy day (or next weekend), right? Take some time out of your busy schedule and read the numerous goodies we put together for you today, ranging from a very impressive tornado to today’s severe weather threat, the excessive heat gripping the Heartland, today’s Hall of Fame football game forecast, reasoning with our tropical systems, and a meteor shower later this week.
Photo/Video Of The Day: Tornado!
This is certainly the images of the day being passed around. This was a very photogenic tornado Saturday evening up in Wilkin County, MN, caught by Andy Gabrielson. Andy is a chaser associated with Severe Studios and was in the right place last night to catch this tornado from start to finish. This tornado did destroy at least one farm house, which Andy noticed and got the call out for help. Luckily no one was in the home at the time that the tornado hit — apparently the couple was at a neighbors house at the time. Here at WeatherNation we actually have this video on a loop and can’t get enough of the footage. Andy has his own website and has captured at least 60 tornadoes so far this year! You can view the video of this tornado capture on Youtube from start to finish, including the house being destroyed, by clicking here. Amazing footage, and I suggest if you have a couple minutes to check it out and hope you never get this close to one yourself! This was one of at least three tornadoes in the North Dakota/Minnesota/Wisconsin region on Saturday, with a couple others touching town on the east coast in Florida right by the ocean causing a little damage to restaurants and other locals.
Meanwhile, random fact: 70% of the U.S. is not covered by network radar that can “see” a tornado. Surprising when we rely so heavily on radar to see possible areas within a storm that could be rotating and maybe putting down a tornado.
Severe Weather Outlook
This is today’s severe weather outlook. You can see a slight risk of severe storms over a chunk of the upper Midwest, once again clipping Minnesota and down into Nebraska, Kansas, and Iowa. Large hail and damaging winds appear to be the main threats today, but you can’t rule out a couple tornadoes — the Storm Prediction Center as of this morning has the best area for tornadoes today in eastern Nebraska towards the Sioux City, Iowa, and Sioux Falls, South Dakota regions. Looking ahead we will watch another system move into the upper Midwest on Monday and Tuesday, bringing much of the same areas that were under the gun this weekend for severe storms another shot of storms and possibly severe weather.
Excessive Heat
Take a step outside over a good chunk of the nation over the next few days and you will notice that it is very hot and sticky! Many areas, especially in the Midwest, are under either Heat Advisories (Orange) or Excessive Heat Warnings (Pink) through the middle of the week due to temps in the 90s and 100s and dew points in the upper 60s and into the 70s. Combine these and it will feel like it is between 100-115 in many locations from Minnesota southward through Texas and Louisiana. This will move a little eastward as we move toward the middle of the week, and those in Kentucky and Tennessee will be under the heat again. Here are some heat tips:
- Heat can take a toll on the body, so make sure you’re staying indoors if possible with air conditioning. Fans will not cut it as at times they can make it feel worse.
- Drink plenty of water and avoid alcohol or sugary beverages which tend to dehydrate you.
- Wear light-weight, light-colored and loose-fitting clothing.
- Keep an eye on youth, elderly, and your pets too. These three groups tend to be the most prone to the effects of hot weather.
Some cities included in the Excessive Heat Warning include St. Louis, Kansas City, Oklahoma City, Sioux City, and Omaha for the next few days. Stay safe and cool out there!
Hall of Fame Football Game Forecast
Yesterday seven players were inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame including Jerry Rice, Emmitt Smith, and John Randle. As part of the weekend ceremonies there is an annual Hall of Fame game held on Fawcett Stadium in Canton, Ohio. This years game features the Cincinnati Bengals verses the Dallas Cowboys at 8 PM Eastern Time and the forecast is looking very nice. We will look for mainly clear skies at kick off with a temperature around 80 and temps dipping to near 70 by the time the game is over, still with clear skies. No storms look to interrupt the game — you might want some bug spray though if you are heading out for the first game of the NFL Preseason.
Reasoning with the Tropics
Whenever I talk about the tropics, I can’t help but think of the music of Jimmy Buffett. While he had the hits of “Margaritaville” and “Cheeseburger in Paradise” (kind of making me hungry right now!) to name a few, he also had another song entitled “Trying to Reason with Hurricane Season” — a song about a person watching the “squalls out on the gulf stream” moving in towards the beach and the A1A in Florida, and eventually watching the whitecaps and keeping an eye out for waterspouts. It’s a song that always comes to my head when talking about the tropics ever since I found it a few years back, and is quite telling of how everyone, from those living along or near the tropics and even the meteorologists who have to forecast the storms, have to reason with these type of systems — sometimes quite unpredictable.
While an active season is still expected, it is sometimes useful to look at active years in the past for any comparison that can be made — which typically isn’t much. But, we do know that the most active year for tropical weather, 2005, had 9 named storms by August 8th, meanwhile the second active year, 1933, had 5 storms by this date. Not sure much can be gleaned from this, but definitely interesting to look at the past. Again, quite unpredictable and a lot to try and reason with!
Right now out in the tropics as of posting time, in the Atlantic we have a dying Colin and a couple areas to watch, and in the Pacific we have Estelle.
– Atlantic
- Colin:
I’ve come to call Colin the zombie storm; the storm that came back from the dead to continue to be a not-so-impressive storm. Once it regained tropical storm status, wind shear and some drier air quickly started tearing the storm apart once again — the tropics form of killing zombie/any other storm. The storm greatly slowed down its progression yesterday and this morning was downgraded to a Tropical Depression. It is expected to continue to impact Bermuda over the next day or so before finally getting a swift kick in the rear to the north. It is possible this will be a remnant storm once again later tonight or Monday. A Tropical Storm Watch is in effect for Bermuda, just in case Colin tries to restrengthen, which is not anticipated. The good news is that Bermuda is in the middle of a drought and needs the rain — though not quite as much as Colin wants to try and give them at once.
- Invest 93L:
We call systems of interest that don’t have tropical status yet “invest” storms. This designation allows for more focus to be placed on these systems, for better information to be gathered, and signifies an area that the National Hurricane Center is watching for development. We are watching this system in the middle of the Atlantic for that possible development — the National Hurricane Center has a 60% chance of this wave forming into a Tropical Depression within the next 48 hours. Luckily, it looks like this system, whether it forms or not, will quickly curve back off into the Atlantic, posing no threat to the US or Bermuda, and possibly tracking west of the Azores.
- Invest 94L
We are also tracking a new system trying to form off the Florida coast that may try to spin up into something quickly over the next few days. It is so new that the NHC isn’t yet qiving it a percentage of formation before this was posted! This will eventually head into the Gulf coast later this week more than likely and bring a lot of rain to the southeastern portion of the United States.
– Pacific
- Estelle:
We have Tropical Storm Estelle in mainly open water right now in the Pacific. This storm is slowly weakening after reaching top winds of 65 mph yesterday. This storm is expected to head west over the next day or so before south and then back to the east by Tuesday or Wednesday — still posing no threat to land, and likely a Tropical Depression by that time.
Perseid Meteor Shower
To end the post, we have a major meteor shower coming up this Wednesday and Thursday Nights. The Perseid Meteor Shower will peak during this time frame, with up to around 50 meteors per hour visible. The best time to few is in the few hours before dawn once the moon sets looking towards the constellation Perseus. This is one of the most consistent performers and could be the best meteor shower for the year, so if skies are clear I invite you to head out and watch the skies — and here are some tips from NASA on how to view meteor showers. I’m sure the great team here will touch upon the forecast for the Perseids as we get closer to the big show.
And that’s what I got for you! While the weekend may be coming to an end, just remember what Jimmy Buffett sings: “Come Monday, it’ll be all right.” If nothing else, think of that Margaritaville state of mind and remember that the next weekend is only a few days away! Have a great day and a great start to the work week!
D.J. Kayser from WeatherNation
St. Cloud Area Weather 