Severe threat continues but tornado threat decreasing for First Coast

Monday evening April 4, 2011

We have had an amazing 781 storm reports in the last 2 days. The good news is only 14 tornadoes thus far although the straight line wind damage can be in some cases worse than tornadoes. So even though the headline tonight is optimistic we all still need to be on guard for damaging wind gusts on Tuesday morning. Most of the tornadoes today occurred with daytime heating and tonight tornado chances have gone down to less than 2% based on the latest from the Storm Prediction Center. This number is likely to stay low as a line of storms moves our way. Now if this line was coming through tomorrow afternoon I would be more concerned but as of now it is moving too fast and most of the good dynamics with this system are lifting. Areas from North Georgia into the Carolinas have the most instability on Tuesday morning and then Central and Southern Florida during the afternoon. Yes, here comes the famous split that we often see here in North Florida and South Georiga. But, let's not get complacent. There is about a 15% chance of wind damage within 25 miles of a point from Lake City to Folkston to Saint Simons Island. Then I would lower it to 10% south of that line for the rest of the First Coast viewing area. Here is the timing based on the latest RPM model run.

This model is not doing a great job showing the strongest storms tonight lifting into North Georgia and the Carolinas. The timing looks a bit slow as well. Here is a look at when most of us can see the welcome rain and thunderstorms.

Here we are at 11 a.m. Tuesday and what we will watch for is some bowing segment along our squall line and these areas could bring us our damaging wind gusts. Right now I see most of us in the 40 to 50 mph range on wind gusts with only isolated areas near 60 mph. One thing is for sure we will all have our eyes glued to our only Live Doppler radar. Our team is ready. So recapping everything here are the main threat levels one more time.

The hail threat may need to be increased a bit but for now this should do. Let's keep it this way and get some nice heavy downpours. The latest models are still showing a good .50" to 1" of rain and when I see you tomorrow evening I look forward to bringing you the nice beneficial rain totals with hopefully very few severe weather reports. God bless and be safe! Remember some of these storms will move at over 50 mph and may come sooner than later.