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This winter’s record warmth provided the key ingredient for a Midwest outbreak of deadly tornadoes and damaging gorilla hail that hit parts of the Midwest Wednesday and Thursday, tornado experts said.
At least three people were killed in Thursday’s tornado outbreak in Ohio, Kentucky, Indiana and Arkansas, which came a day after large hail struck Kansas. It’s a bit early, but not unprecedented, for such a tornado outbreak usually associated with May or April, but that’s also because of the hottest winter in both U.S. and global records, meteorologists said.
“In order to get severe storms this far north this time time of year, it’s got to be warm,” said Northern Illinois University meteorology professor Victor Gensini.
For tornadoes and storms with large hail to form, two key ingredients are needed: wind shear and instability, said Gensini and National Severe Storms Laboratory scientist Harold Brooks.
Wind shear, which is when winds whip around at differing directions and speeds as they rise in altitude, is usually around all winter and much of spring because it’s a function of the normal temperature difference we see across the country, Gensini said.
But instability, which is that juicy warm humid air close to the ground that is the signature of summer, is usually missing this time of year, Gensini and Brooks said.
That’s because normally in the winter and into early spring, Arctic air plunges south, pushing the warm moist air south into the Gulf of Mexico, leaving dry stable cool air in its place, said Matt Elliott, the warning coordination meteorologist for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. And that cool stable air keeps tornadoes and large hail from forming.
But not this year. There was only one real Arctic blast this year and that was two months ago, the meteorologists said.
