CAT. 2 FRANCINE COMES ASHORE NEAR HOUMA, LA; TORNADOES POSSIBLE OVERNIGHT INTO THURSDAY LOCALLY… Hurricane Francine has made landfall in the Parish of Terrebonne, Louisiana as a category 2 hurricane with 100 mph maximum winds. The center of the eye of Francine made landfall moments ago just southwest of Houma, Louisiana. High winds, extremely heavy rain, and tornadoes will be possible over the next few hours in parts of eastern Louisiana near New Orleans. Our local tornado threat in Mississippi, Alabama, and northwest Florida is set to ramp up (unfortunately!) overnight into Thursday morning. Please have multiple ways to hear warnings overnight into Thursday. We all need something that will wake us up if a tornado warning is required for our specific location.
TORNADO WATCH LIKELY TO BE ISSUED LATER THIS EVENING… A Tornado Watch is in effect for much of eastern Louisiana and southeast Mississippi valid until 11PM CDT. The coastal waters of Alabama are also involved in this Tornado Watch. For now, no land areas are included in a Tornado Watch in Alabama or Florida due to Francine. I suspect we will have a Tornado Watch issued for coastal counties first (Mobile, Baldwin, potentially Escambia (FL), Santa Rosa, Okaloosa) followed by a new watch late tonight or tomorrow morning for counties farther inland. Spin-up, brief tornadoes are one of the main concerns across south Alabama and northwest Florida in the hours ahead.
SET UP APP ALERTS… If you haven’t already, be sure to download the free RedZone Weather app to keep up with all the latest information on the world of weather in south Alabama and northwest Florida. redzoneweather.com/app is the link for the free download. Once you have the app downloaded to your iOS or Android device, be sure to visit the Alerts tab (lower right corner) and tap the large Alert Settings button to customize the alerts you would like to receive straight from me.
I will have more updates posted throughout the evening in the RedZone Weather app.