Severe Weather 2025

[CheeselandSkies]

Locally, the winter of 2010-'11 was notable for the Groundhog Day blizzard (since referred to as 'GHD I' among Chicagoland snow weenies due to a couple of additional significant events for them on that date in the years since) which affected a large swath of the Midwest with double-digit snowfall totals and strong winds. We haven't really had anything like that this year. It was just over the last week that we finally got some decent snows at all, and even then most areas are well behind their seasonal norms. This has actually reminded me more of the winter of '11-'12, which was extremely dry.

 

[Ledian]

Thoughts?

Not completely surprised by the 60% in my area...just surprised Oklahoma's never had one.

And it's kinda scary to think about how much worse April 7th could've been than it already was, if a few things had gone right...and thank goodness they didn't. The wording in that particular outlook to me, is scarier than anything from April 27th.

 

[TheSuckZone]

Not completely surprised by the 60% in my area...just surprised Oklahoma's never had one.

And it's kinda scary to think about how much worse April 7th could've been than it already was, if a few things had gone right...and thank goodness they didn't. The wording in that particular outlook to me, is scarier than anything from April 27th.

Had to go back and look at that disco because that was a little before I was engaged in severe weather. I did have to chuckle a little bit at the 1630 outlook having a 30% hatched area for tornadoes before Broyles comes in Leroy Jenkins style at 20z with the 60#

 

[Cyclonic Paracosm]

Had to go back and look at that disco because that was a little before I was engaged in severe weather. I did have to chuckle a little bit at the 1630 outlook having a 30% hatched area for tornadoes before Broyles comes in Leroy Jenkins style at 20z with the 60#

we all know the true 60s of Ok were prob 5/3/99 and 5/24/11

 

[tennessee storm chaser]

All I can say is starting next week a big pattern change appears likely…. We see what takes place from it

 

[Justin Hindman]

I remember 2011 vividly, or at least April 27th and the one right before, but I don't necessarily remember the climatology and large scale patterns. Outside of the April 27th event which was obviously an extreme outlier, what was the rest of the season actually like?

You had tuscaloosa hit, the southside April 15 by an ef3. Joplin f5 was a month later in May

 

[MoonBaby]

In 2011 we (central Alabama) had snow, a tornado on April 15th, another on April 27th. Joplin happened. The outbreak that happened here on the 15th caused a worse outbreak in the Carolinas on the 16th. It was a bad bad year. Thats just off the top of my head.
Fun side note is I was pregnant with my almost 14 year old and took maternity photos in the snow.

 

[Clancy]

In 2011 we (central Alabama) had snow, a tornado on April 15th, another on April 27th. Joplin happened. The outbreak that happened here on the 15th caused a worse outbreak in the Carolinas on the 16th. It was a bad bad year. Thats just off the top of my head.
Fun side note is I was pregnant with my almost 14 year old and took maternity photos in the snow.

I was still a bit too young to have a really thorough grasp on things at the time like I do now (although I was head-first into weather as soon as I could read), but I'll never forget watching what I'm pretty sure was The Weather Channel's (oh, how times have changed) coverage of the Tuscaloosa EF-4 as it skirted past Downtown Birmingham and having to pick my jaw up off the floor because it looked like Hades itself was scraping across the ground.

 

[JPWX]

I was 16 at the time April 27th happened. Would turn 17 the very next day (yes, my birthday is the day after the 2011 Super Outbreak).

 

[JPWX]

Looking at current pattern:
1. Probably looking at another severe weather threat late month over into first week of March.
2. Probably have more cold and maybe another winter threat to deal with in March. (Especially since Easter is late this year). That, of course, means our final frost/freeze will be late.
3. Spring tornado season officially kicks into high gear late March thru April.

And about that severe threat.... CPC is beginning to give hints

 

[MoonBaby]

I was still a bit too young to have a really thorough grasp on things at the time like I do now (although I was head-first into weather as soon as I could read), but I'll never forget watching what I'm pretty sure was The Weather Channel's (oh, how times have changed) coverage of the Tuscaloosa EF-4 as it skirted past Downtown Birmingham and having to pick my jaw up off the floor because it looked like Hades itself was scraping across the ground.

I was in a bomb shelter on the UA campus in Tuscaloosa that day wirh my 4 week old. My parents were in the mall that you see in that heavily posted video where the tornado is so creepy close to it. It was quite traumatic, especially growing up being really into weather because I knew more about what was happening than some. If you want a good way to watch things from that year, you can YouTube James Spanns weather extreme videos. They are all up from every day in 2011 and I sometimes go back and watch old ones for fun.

 

[JPWX]

Fun Fact: my first time hearing about James Spann was seeing the first post in the old TW thread leading towards April 27th.

 

[Austin Dawg]

Fun Fact: my first time hearing about James Spann was seeing the first post in the old TW thread leading towards April 27th.

I was in Texas trying to find out what happened to my family. All news was my hometown was completely wiped off the map. Anything in East Mississippi and West Alabama was under the gun. I couldn't get word from anyone.

 

[Blountwolf]

The 4 that hit Cordova on the 27th passed about a mile north of my house. I took the Xterra and the chainsaw, but mostly it was rural woods that got hit nearby, so I headed down to Pratt City where I heard it was real bad and volunteered to cut there. We were still clearing roads and freeing people from trees on houses there 2 days later. I never even was in the main damage path (no trees left to cut there), just around the perimeter where the trees all got laid over. I'll never forget this one house 2 days in had an oak that had totally destroyed the porch and you couldn't even see the front of the house for the limbs, and there was another on the back of the house. We cut our way in and found an elderly lady (75+) just sitting at her kitchen table drinking tea. She offered us some and she was so calm and collected. She said "I have a gas stove and the water was still running - I figured someone would get to me eventually." It was a humbling experience, all the way around. We'd start clearing the last tree blocking a road, and before we'd get done, a line of cars of folks who had been trapped further down the road would be on the other side. If you've never volunteered for storm cleanup, I highly recommend it as a weather follower. It will humble you before the power of what you are watching and in the power of people in ways nothing else will.

 

[Clancy]

If you've never volunteered for storm cleanup, I highly recommend it as a weather follower. It will humble you before the power of what you are watching and in the power of people in ways nothing else will.

The first time you see what those monsters can do up close and personal, you'll never look at them the same way again. Any amount of fascination with them for me is metered by the knowledge of the terror they cause, and every time I watch one on radar my heart aches a little.

 

[JPWX]

The 4 that hit Cordova on the 27th passed about a mile north of my house. I took the Xterra and the chainsaw, but mostly it was rural woods that got hit nearby, so I headed down to Pratt City where I heard it was real bad and volunteered to cut there. We were still clearing roads and freeing people from trees on houses there 2 days later. I never even was in the main damage path (no trees left to cut there), just around the perimeter where the trees all got laid over. I'll never forget this one house 2 days in had an oak that had totally destroyed the porch and you couldn't even see the front of the house for the limbs, and there was another on the back of the house. We cut our way in and found an elderly lady (75+) just sitting at her kitchen table drinking tea. She offered us some and she was so calm and collected. She said "I have a gas stove and the water was still running - I figured someone would get to me eventually." It was a humbling experience, all the way around. We'd start clearing the last tree blocking a road, and before we'd get done, a line of cars of folks who had been trapped further down the road would be on the other side. If you've never volunteered for storm cleanup, I highly recommend it as a weather follower. It will humble you before the power of what you are watching and in the power of people in ways nothing else will.

I 100% support this! I've done that twice now. First one of course was the Smithville tornado then more recently the Amory tornado. When I saw on radar Amory getting hit, my heart just sank and it was hard for me to go to sleep that night because I knew what had just happened. One of my cousins house was impacted. Even though her house wasn't totally destroyed, it had to be torn down and rebuilt. She had lost her husband a year or two before around the same day as the tornado. She had no clue what to do and I could tell that she was just in shock because I too was in shock after the Smithville tornado. But I'm glad y'all found that elderly lady and that she was alright. One thing you can always find in a situation like that is hope/peace whether it be in something as little as your favorite book still laying where you left it. The lady found hope/peace in that glass of tea, gas stove, and water.

 

[JPWX]

Also wanted to share this. I went on the IEM site and found the tornado warning graphic chart for each North MS county. Counted all it up to get the total amount of warnings and put all in a spreadsheet. Here's the counties with the highest tornado warnings along with the percentages. I find it very interesting that Marshall County has highest total tornado warnings (141) for all of North MS and that both Monroe/Lee Counties has highest total confirmed tornadoes (55) for all of North MS. Crazy.

COUNTIES WITH HIGHEST TOR WARNING COUNT
Marshall County 141 (7%)
Lafayette County 122 (6.1%)
Itawamba County 114 (5.7%)
Tishomingo County 112 (5.6%)
Prentiss County 108 (5.4%)
Panola County 107 (5.3%)
Tippah County 106 (5.3%)
Union County 104 (5.2%)
Lee County 103 (5.1%)
Monroe County 94 (4.7%)
Benton County 94 (4.7%)
Alcorn County 93 (4.6%)
Tate County 91 (4.5%)

 

[Ledian]

Yikes, Marshall. But i'm not completely surprised...whenever there's any chance of rain, there's always something there it seems like. I usually see some high rainfall accumulation totals up around there

 

[JPWX]

Yikes, Marshall. But i'm not completely surprised...whenever there's any chance of rain, there's always something there it seems like. I usually see some high rainfall accumulation totals up around there

Yeah. Got a cousin who lives close to Holly Springs. They see pretty much everything up there. I knew they got a lot of tornado warnings, but I sure didn't believe it would be that many

 

[MMWX]

Yikes, Marshall. But i'm not completely surprised...whenever there's any chance of rain, there's always something there it seems like. I usually see some high rainfall accumulation totals up around there

Holly Springs is always a magnet.

You can still clearly the scar from the 2015 EF3 on I-22/Highway 78 right outside the Holly Springs exit.