Excessive Rainfall and Potential Tropical Cyclone in the South; Severe Thunderstorms in the Midwest

Excessive rainfall may produce locally considerable flash flooding over parts of the northwestern Gulf Coast, lower Mississippi River Valley, and Deep South through Thursday. Potential Tropical Cyclone One is forecast to become a tropical storm (Arthur) as it moves along or just off the northwestern Gulf coast through Wednesday. An outbreak of severe weather is forecast in the Midwest Wednesday. Read More >

Shortly after 6 p.m. on 21 August 2002, an F1 tornado touched down in Muscatine County just north of Muscatine on Hwy 38. The tornado had about a 1.6 mile path destroying two sheds and causing roof damage to another shed and a farm house, in addition to scattered tree damage. The synoptic and mesoscale environment that day supported severe weather mainly in the mode of straight-line winds. A non-supercell tornado developed in a non-descending mode as a cell interacted with a convective boundary. The use of high resolution 8-bit velocity data was key to the decision to warn and helped provide a 4 minute lead time before the tornado was reported by a nearby amateur radio operator. See especially the radar data at 2311Z and 2316Z.

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