Another Tragic Tornado Outbreak

As mentioned in yesterday's post, the SPC outlooked a significant outbreak of severe thunderstorms to occur. Figure below shows yesterday's severe thunderstorm and tornado reports for the very significant event that has occurred. There appear to have been a number of long-track supercell thunderstorms, that at times were reported to be moving at speeds near 70 mph. There have been a number of fatalities and reports are still incomplete regarding details of this tragic event.

Below is the 1300 UTC SPC Outlook from yesterday with reports superposed, indicating the accuracy of the SPC outlooks.

The radar graphic above (2300 UTC regional plot of base-scan reflectivity from NCAR) shows numerous supercell thunderstorms, especially in Kentucky. The 2235 UTC reflectivity below (from the NWS KLVX radar at Louisville, Kentucky) is centered on a very intense storm that is to the south of the radar (thanks to Mike Luethold for sending this image). Note that the reflectivity color bar has folded from purple back to black in the storm core - this indicates reflectivity of near or more than 80 dBZ! Extending south of the storm is a distinct three-body-scatter spike (sometimes just called a hail spike), indicating the presence of large hail within the storm-core.

More on this event in later posts.