STORM2K

Dangerous tornadic supercells in progress across eastern parts of Iowa including the immediate Iowa City (home of the Univ of IA) metro area, which is currently seeing a tornado ON THE GROUND.

Severe Thunderstorm Watch #178
Severe Thunderstorm Watch #179
Mesoscale Discussion #492
Mesoscale Discussion #493
Davenport/Quad Cities Radar

I noticed these storms when they fired up and was surprised at the Svr Thunderstorm warning not being upgraded. Many were showing hook echos and 1 was already TOR warned. I guess the watches don't matter so much as long as the warnings are released in decent time... Hope nothing too big is happening there as some of those storms looked really impressive earlier... and they don't look that bad now...

I was at the Cedar Rapids Public Library for about 45 minutes due to a tornado warning. Thankly, no tornado touched down in the metro area. Iowa City was not so lucky.

EDIT: Sorry for really really really late edit.

The storm approaching Muscatine is showing a BWER on all 4 Base Reflectivity tilts. That has to have some serious rotation in that storm....

8 tornado reports so far:

0010 5 NE TOLEDO TAMA IA 4204 9251 (DMX)
0042 MARION LINN IA 4203 9159 PUBLIC REPORT (DVN)
0050 2 W WHITTIER LINN IA 4210 9151 DEBRIS CLOUD OBSERVED (DVN)
0058 NEWHALL BENTON IA 4199 9197 (DVN)
0102 OXFORD JOHNSON IA 4172 9179 (DVN)
0131 5 SE HILLS JOHNSON IA 4152 9147 NEAR HIGHWAY 218 AND JOHNSON/WASHINGTON COUNTY LINE HEADING TOWARD TOWN OF HILLS (DVN)
0133 IOWA CITY JOHNSON IA 4166 9154 TORNADO NEAR THE WAL MART IN SOUTHWEST IOWA CITY (DVN)
0136 TIFFIN JOHNSON IA 4171 9168 (DVN)
0140 IOWA CITY JOHNSON IA 4166 9154 POSSIBLE TORNADO REPORTED AT UNIVERSITY OF IOWA CAMPUS IN IOWA CITY. NO MAJOR INJURIES REPORTED AT THIS TIME. (DVN)
0151 IOWA CITY JOHNSON IA 4166 9154 SPOTTER REPORTED TORNADO HEADED NORTHEAST ABOUT 5 -10 MINUTES AGO. ALSO REPORTED DEBRIS FALLING FROM THE SKY AND QUARTER SIZE HAIL ABOUT THE SAME TIME. (DVN)

**Looks like the tornado may have already hit a walmart and possibly the University of Iowa!**

Reflectivity of current storms in Iowa


On talking tropics they mentioned about baseball sized hail. This could be a reason why. You can even see some purples there at the top of the scale Here is the vertically integrated liquid. I just got grlevel3 and I am addicted to it.

2 injuries have already been reported in Johnson county.

Looks like they were all from the same cell!

Notice the number of hail reports? That probably warranted Moderate Risk if this rate continues...

GRLevel3 is a great program. Splashed out for it and haven't regretted it Hail to softball size has been reported with these storms btw.. 4.25"

wow!

that's a powerful cell

I wouldn't bash the NWS about whether it should have been moderate or not. On a day like today, where breaking the cap was always going to be an issue, you just don't have the ability to forecast a high hail/tor threat, if you think there is, say only a 25% chance of a storm forming at all...

Gorky wrote:The storm approaching Muscatine is showing a BWER on all 4 Base Reflectivity tilts. That has to have some serious rotation in that storm....

Looks like I was right....

0208 MUSCATINE MUSCATINE IA 4142 9107 SPOTTER REPORTED THREE TORNADOS ON THE GROUNF ON THE EAST END OF MUSCATINE...CONFIRMED. (DVN)
0214 MUSCATINE MUSCATINE IA 4142 9107 TORNADO IN SOUTHEAST MUSCATINE HEADING ACROSS THE RIVER. (DVN)

That storm now showing 4(!) TVS's

I wonder if this would have warrented a PDS tornado watch?

PDS Tornado Watch? No. At the most, a normal Tornado Watch.

In fact, I don't disagree with the Severe Thunderstorm Watch - under the knowledge that some severe storms can produce tornadoes.

I was surprised it wasn't a Tor watch as the dynamics are there for Tornadoes. The only issue was that the storms were probably expected to be higher based, reducing TOR threat. Seems like that hasn't been the case. I'm stil lsurprised the new watch in Indiana is a SvrTS and not a Tor as this thing still ha s abit of TOR potential in it, although dimishing as it congeals into on big blob

For the second watch, maybe it should have been a Tornado Watch. However, I would have only issued the SVR for the first watch at the time.

Can a Severe T-Storm Watch be upgraded at any time, or does it have to expire before being upgraded?

question about hooks. I don't know alot of radar and how to determine so maybe you guys can help me out as I'm learning. Does this appear to be an echo?

heck yes! and a pretty darn well-defined one at that!