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Recapping cross-country storms

Tornado warnings stretched through the Midwest

ROANOKE, Va. – Tornado warnings came from National Weather Service offices across the country on Wednesday and Thursday. The same system brought us the clouds and showers we saw on Friday.

The Kansas tornado brought impressive amounts of rain to a rural area.

In Kansas, a particularly well-developed storm saw wind gusts above 100 mph as it traveled through a mostly rural area.

Such bright reds and greens next to each other are an indicator of intense, changing winds.

A separate storm in Ohio moved through a more populated area causing more damage. The storm winds moved intensely in opposite directions, which is one of the best indicators we have of a tornado.

The circled area shows the damage in the rotation with hail causing a similar image further west.

In the same area that had high winds there were signs of debris picked up by the storm. Further west high amounts of hail even made themselves known on the debris tracker.

Tornadoes stretched from parts of Missouri to Ohio.

Damaging wind was a threat across more of the country, but the Storm Predication Center reports ten tornadoes that formed on Thursday.

Hail reports stretched even further than most wind reports.

Hail was a problem for even more people than wind or tornadoes. Some reported hail even grew to four inches in Oklahoma.

High wind gusts can lift even heavy hail high into the atmosphere.

To get hail even two inches across we need winds above 60 mph moving up in the atmosphere. That means the upward winds in Oklahoma were much higher.

March tornadoes are on the low end so far, but we have plenty of the month to go.

While there were plenty of tornadoes already this March we are well behind how many came in 2023. As the month goes on there is a lot of time left for tornadoes to develop.


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