INCREASING RISK OF TORNADOES & DAMAGING WIND GUSTS ON WEDNESDAY… Severe thunderstorms seem increasingly likely to happen on Wednesday, primarily in the afternoon and evening hours, across south Alabama and northwest Florida. ALL of the local area is now involved in the severe weather risk zones valid for Wednesday, with the greatest threat zone setting up across west Alabama. It has been awhile (since early January, specifically) since confidence has been this high in the potential for a significant severe weather setup. I am growing more concerned that a few strong (EF2+) tornadoes may become possible across parts of Louisiana, Mississippi, and perhaps even west Alabama on Wednesday during the daytime hours. The overall risk will spread eastward throughout the afternoon and evening hours on Wednesday. If there is any bit of good news with this, it looks like the core of the event will happen in the DAYTIME hours on Wednesday into the evening hours. I expect to be able to give an “all clear” for the entirety of southwest Alabama and northwest Florida by 9-10PM Wednesday night.
SEVERE WEATHER TIMING – MAINLY P.M. HOURS OF WEDNESDAY… 11AM to 8PM is the nine hour window when strong to severe thunderstorms seem most likely to happen across southwest Alabama and northwest Florida. Storms may be more cellular in nature first, meaning a tornado risk and risk of large hail may develop early in the time frame. Storms may come together in more of a linear way while pushing across the region in the evening hours. That is when tornadoes AND a risk of damaging straight line winds would be more likely. In addition, a risk of flash flooding will develop in the evening hours as 2 to 4 inches of total rainfall is in the forecast through Wednesday night.
MAIN CONCERNS: TORNADOES & DAMAGING WIND GUSTS… All severe weather hazards will be possible on Wednesday across our region, including tornadoes, damaging wind gusts, large hail, and flash flooding. The risk of tornadoes and damaging wind gusts will likely be the main concern. Wednesday will certainly be a time when we all need to have a way to get urgent weather warnings. NOW is the time to start thinking about making sure phones and tablets are charged so you can get alerts and watch our live severe weather coverage, if and when tornado warnings become required.
TORNADO WARNING POLICY… Any time there is an active tornado warning in effect for southwest Alabama or northwest Florida, we provide uninterrupted, live video coverage on Facebook Live and in the RedZone Weather app. Our detailed coverage commitment is outlined at redzoneweather.com/coverage. We are proud to cover all parts of Escambia (AL), Covington, Monroe, Conecuh, Baldwin, Mobile, Clarke, Washington, Butler, Escambia (FL), Santa Rosa, and Okaloosa counties. If you live in any locale in those counties, be sure to tune into our coverage whenever there is an active tornado warning!
SET UP APP ALERTS… We send quite a bit of Low-Level Alerts in our RedZone Weather app. The app is totally free for you! redzoneweather.com/app is the link where you see the download links to your respective app store for iOS and for Android devices. Once you have the app downloaded to your smartphone or tablet device, be sure to visit the Alerts tab to customize the alerts you would like to receive straight from me.
I will have ongoing updates posted throughout the day tomorrow and on Wednesday in the RedZone Weather app. Be sure to join me in the next regularly scheduled forecast video that will be posted by 7:15AM tomorrow morning. We will go into uninterrupted live video coverage on Wednesday if/when tornado warnings are required for our local area. Have a nice Monday evening!
