Risk for Severe Weather Tonight (4/3/2018)

NOTE: This blog post is pertaining to the severe weather risk for the evening of TUESDAY, APRIL 3rd, 2018.

April is the second most common month for tornadoes in West Tennessee. In fact, it was 12 years ago yesterday, that parts of Dyer, Gibson, Weakley, and Carroll counties had to deal with one of (if not the) longest tracked tornado on record for West Tennessee moving from northeastern Arkansas to southeast Missouri and eventually northwest Tennessee. Today, the main concern is the threat for damaging winds but the threat for tornadoes is becoming a bit more concerning for northwest Tennessee.

Here's a look at the potential threats for tonight...

...and a look at the timeline for those threats...

...most of the bad weather won't be coming until sunset or later. The storms will be moving through quickly too, so by midnight not only is the risk for severe weather over but the rain should be gone for the most part too.

Right now, we're seeing abundant sunshine poke through the clouds and that's leading to a more unstable atmosphere already. We look for 1,000 units of energy in the lower atmosphere for severe storms this time of year and we're already there at 10 a.m. this morning!

A Wind Advisory also just went into effect with a potential for winds to gust between 30 and 40 miles per hour even before the storms arrive this evening.

However, the fact is, not everyone in West Tennessee will get severe weather tonight. We may all get rain, but depending on how the incoming squall line unfolds, we may see some spots get just rain, and other areas get strong thunderstorms. This animated image shows what radar could look like this evening. A big concern is if we get discrete thunderstorms ahead of the main line to form tornadoes before the cold front moves in. That appears to be getting more likely, so the late afternoon hours will be watched closely too.

One parameter we look at for our threat for tornadoes is the "Significant Tornado Parameter". It's on a scale from 0-9, and some of the data has shown that number increasing every time the data gets refreshed. It's now at a 4 in northwest Tennessee at 7pm tonight.

That appears to be where tornadoes will be likeliest before the threat transitions to mostly a damaging wind and large hail threat for areas near the Tennessee River and south of I-40.

SUMMARY

• A Wind Advisory is in effect today with winds gusting between 30 and 40 mph even before rain arrives
• THREAT TIMELINE - 5PM TO 10PM
• Not everyone will see severe weather
• The strongest storms could produce primarily damaging winds and large hail as well as a few tornadoes 
• Northwest Tennessee is where tornadoes are likeliest to occur this evening if any form at all

Make sure you have multiple ways to receive weather information whether that be using your television to watch us on WBBJ or with a NOAA weather radio, or your smart phone. Keep that smartphone charged in case the power goes out! We'll do our best to stream live coverage of the storms on Facebook should we need to.