Tornados

Over the past 50 years, it seems that Tornado Alley has shifted South and East. Used to, Kansas, Nebraska, Oklahoma, and the Texas Panhandle was Tornado Alley. Now, Mississippi and Alabama get the worst (and seemingly the most) tornadoes.

 

^Chop, it seems that the climate has created a second Tornado Alley in the Gulf States. The original Tornado Alley is still in place, but now, as you noted, we are seeing a lot more very destructive EF-4 (or worse) in the South.

 

Alabama got smashed by tornadoes again. Miss/Ala is the new ground zero for tornadoes.

 

Not new.

 

Tornado warnings around Eagle Lake, heading toward Sealy. Houston area is expected to have some really bad weather today.

 

Keep alert.

Speaking of which, once I was driving and my cell phone starting going bananas. When I could, I stopped at a stop light, I read what it said (the cell phone was still ringing and buzzing all over the place). Something to the effect of: 'Tornado warning. Location: on your location, immediately overhead.'
!?!?!?!?!
So I opened the sun roof window cover. Just a bunch of low hanging clouds. Watching them you could possibly make out some rotation in there--maybe ... Still, I rapidly hauled a$$ out of there. Fortunately, no tornado actually ever touched down. Probably just some radar-detected rotation. Or the notorious "hook" on the radar...?

 

Many years ago ... probably mid 1990s ... I was driving south on SH 288 between Houston and Angleton when the radio station said there was a radar-indicated tornado approaching the area of SH 288 and FM 518 west of Pearland (this was when there was practically NOTHING out there except for one very new subdivision that was being constructed); of course, I was approaching the SH 288/FM 518 intersection and the people on the radio were telling everyone in that area to take cover immediately ... so I took an exit and parked at the office or HOA building for the new subdivision, hoping I could gain entry (but no, it was locked). So I'm standing there, wondering if I'm about to get clobbered by a tornado, when some local resident pulls up, gets out of his vehicle, and starts complaining to me about the stormwater drainage on his block (I guess he thought I worked for the developer or something). I nodded my head a lot and said yes, m-hmm, we'll get right on it. Then I got in my vehicle and dashed away south. Never saw any tornadoes that day.

 

I've personally seen tornadoes in Galveston (sizable bent-finger waterspout about 2 miles out in the Gulf), in Brazoria County (spindly thin little short-lived tornado--maybe strong enough to turn over a small trailer that wasn't properly strapped down), and in the Arkansas Delta (a Big Bad wall cloud tornado that rapidly sucked in the air from almost a mile away; blew the crap out of some farms and cars) before.

 

Houston area is getting hit hard indeed. First tornadoes over Katy & NW suburbs, now NE of town has warnings...

 

I am at 9 Greenway Plaza (SW Freeway & Edloe); the clouds are zipping by at 45-50 mph, pretty cool to watch.

 

Radar confirmed tornado at Sienna, moving NE toward western Pearland

 

Reports of a large tornado on the ground near Pasadena

 

Deer Park and Baytown

 

They just called a Tornado Emergency

 

Texas tornado track | khou.com



The above Pasadena/Deer Park/Baytown tornado was classified as an EF2--very strong for a tornado so close to the Gulf.

Yesterday has got to be one of the most tornado-ey days Greater Houston has suffered that did not involve a hurricane or a tropical storm.

 

Tornado damage near Houston 'catastrophic,' official says as storm moves eastward | CNN

Catastrophic tornado damage seen near Houston

Tornado in Houston: Damage in Pasadena, Deer Park, Baytown | khou.com

Powerful tornado rips through Pasadena area, damaging buildings and vehicles, police say

 

They were predicting that southern Matagorda and Brazoria counties would get the worst from this line of storms. They were completely off on that.

 

Ha!!!

NBC News execs obviously read Hornfans.com. From today at NBC:

Tornado Alley is creeping into new territory

 

Tornado Alley has been the Panhandle & Oklahoma forever, but if the news people ever did any investigation they would find that for a few decades Jefferson & Orange Counties led the nation in the number of tornadoes. The difference is that 99%+ in Southeast Texas never touched the ground.

 

Btw, the first segment on the 1/27/23 edition of Houston Matters has Matt Lanza of Space City Weather explaining why tornadoes tend to be a rare occurrence in Houston and the Texas Gulf Coast
The rarity of tornadoes in Houston (Jan. 27, 2023) | Houston Public Media

 

It’s coming late afternoon and this evening and it’s big and bad. DFW--North Texas all the way down to Austin. High probability of tornadoes.

Northeast Texas / Ark-La-Tex may bear the worst brunt of it.

 

Tornado on the ground. Winnsboro area.

 

If you want the fastest/most current tornado news, go to the ‘Ryan Hall Y’all’ YouTube channel. He was showing live film of the Woodsboro tornado from a tracker 5-10 minutes before the National Weather Service even issued a tornado warning.

 

Durant has a couple of them. Hope it misses any houses, and the casinos…

 

Another one. A big one is forming near Mt Vernon. Winterfield, Texas???

 

Brad Arnold = superstar storm chaser.

 

A new one. Walkers Mill. Heading towards the Jefferson area. Another one besides that one is developing East of it.

It’s blowing up in the NE Texas area. Be careful over there.

 

This could be the nastiest outbreak in Texas in years. Take care out there.

 

The Brownwood area has one now. Hope it spares Underwood’s Cafeteria.

 

Up to Baseball sized hail along the Red River NW of Paris, Texas.