Good afternoon, everyone. I wanted to drop by for a quick update on the severe weather threat rolling across the state later this evening into early Sunday.
Much of the state is under the Slight Risk from the Storm Prediction Center…
Damaging winds and large hail are the main players to watch for, but a quick spin up can’t be ruled out. The storms will be zipping through very quickly overnight, so stay alert.
Very windy weather will be noted into Sunday as skies become partly sunny. Temps will be in the 65-70 degree range for many.
A chilly rain maker slides in for Tuesday and early Wednesday, with a few days of better weather sliding in behind that. A colder than normal pattern looks to settle in behind that. Ugh.
Here are all your severe weather tracking tools to take you through the event…
Current watches
Possible Watch Areas
Have a good one and take care.
Illinois Mike, check in when you can. Hope the Chicago area isn’t hit too hard with severe weather.
So far, the severe weather has been well downstate in Central and Southern IL, with tornado watches currently covering most of the state except for the Chicago Metro area and far Northern IL.
Here in the SW suburbs of Chicago, we’re just getting general showers, and nothing severe is imminent. They’re still expecting major development of storms between 8 and 11 PM for the Chicago area. We’ll see.
Thanks for your concern. I’ll check in from time to time tonight.
There was a Tornado Warning at Paducah until very recently. At this time, I don’t know of any touchdown there. But the rotation was near the airport and the NWS Paducah office/radar. Brings back memories of November 2013 when NWS Paducah personal could look outside and see powerline flashes just north of their office as that tornado (EF3?) p`a`s`s`e`d by and later crossed into Illinois.
Stay safe everyone.
Flashback to November 17 2013, although the radar and SPC images are not screen shots from 2013 but from now.
https://kyweathercenter.com/?p=7977
My wife and I had been married about a month, visiting her parents in Bowling Green. I vividly remember looking up in the night sky and seeing the impressive directional shear indicated by the clouds at different altitudes going in different directions!
SPC says a intensity will die down as line moves East. No worries mates.
The SPC has now removed the moderate risk of severe thunderstorms completely, though there is an enhanced risk south and southwest of the Chicago area, extending down to Kentucky and Tennessee.
There have been tornado warnings this evening for some counties in NW IL and Western IL, which is where a broken lines of storms are occurring now. Those storms are moving to the NE but will probably weaken to well below severe limits by the time it reaches here in the Chicago area.
It was cloudy all day here in the SW suburbs of Chicago, with a few scattered showers, which really stabilized the atmosphere and lowered the severe threat, something the SPC should have taken into account earlier in the day.
I see that more than half of Kentucky is currently covered by a tornado watch, as is Western Tennessee, so I’ll echo TennMark’s thoughts and hope everyone stays safe tonight!
Perhaps I opened my big mouth too soon about severe weather missing the Chicago area tonight… the SPC has just issued a tornado watch for much of Northern, NE, and Eastern IL until 2 AM local time. This includes my county, Will, but doesn’t include Cook County or the city of Chicago.
The storms in Western IL, some of which are strong, continue to move to the NE. The big question is will those storms maintain their strength. We’ll see.
Well, that was one short-lived tornado watch, as it didn’t even last two hours before being cancelled around 11:30 PM. The scattered line of storms weakened to well below severe limits as they moved through the Chicago area and continue to weaken as they move into Indiana.
I didn’t even get as much as a rumble of thunder as the line moved through Will County, just a few drops of rain.