Thunderstorms Headed Our Way

A storm front that is presently swinging through the mid-south is headed our way. This first image shows the line of rain and storms. The strongest storms are the pockets of orange/red.

This next image shows the warnings. The red polygons are tornado warnings. The orange polygons are severe thunderstorm warnings. So right now this system is pretty strong.

That said, this storm front will weaken before it gets here. So at this point, I would expect thunderstorms with likely a few strong to severe ones mixed in. When does all this happen? The first wave will blow in Thursday afternoon/evening. The picture below is a rough estimate of what the radar will look like around 3:30 PM on Thursday – green is rain and the most intense storms are yellow and red. It’s important to point out that this an estimate of what the radar will look like and that there’s no way to know exactly where storms will be. But this does give us a glimpse into the fact that there will be storms and some will likely be intense. (Think of it like this. Imagine looking at a large pot of boiling water. You know the water is boiling, but there’s no way to know exactly where the next bubble will come from.)

After this first line of storms goes through, we’ll get a break. Then the second line of storms will push through early on Friday morning. Here’s a rough estimate of what the radar will look like on Friday morning at 6:00 AM. Again, there’s no way to say exactly where the strongest storms will be at this time, but there will very likely be some doozies.

So keep it tuned here to ABC Columbia and we’ll keep you updated.