Deadly Tornadoes Still Pose Threats Across US
Tornadoes could form across a wide area of the southern Plains and into the U.S. southeast again on Tuesday, including metropolitan Dallas-Fort Worth, the most populous urban area in the threatened area, a government meteorologist said.
“There could be a few more tornadoes again, particularly in northern and central Texas,” said Brynn Kerr, meteorologist at the National Weather Service’s Storm Prediction Center in Norman, Oklahoma.
A massive tornado hit the Oklahoma City suburb of Moore on Monday, flattening a wide area of the town and leaving at least 24 people dead and an dozens injured.
While the threat of tornadoes remained, Kerr said it was not as strong as it had been on Monday. As of 0900 local time on Tuesday, there were no outstanding tornado warnings, which urge residents to take cover immediately.
The risk of cells forming tornadoes would increase around midday west and north of Dallas-Fort Worth in Texas, into the Ozarks of southern Missouri and northern Arkansas and into the northern Gulf states including northern Louisiana, he said.
Kerr said the biggest concern is that a cell will form locally in an urban area, as it did on Monday near Oklahoma City.
“It only takes one to hit the wrong populated location,” he said.
There were preliminary reports of 22 tornadoes on Monday in six states — Oklahoma, Texas, Arkansas, Missouri, Kansas and Colorado, according to the National Weather Service website.
In addition to the massive damage and fatalities in Oklahoma, one person died in Arkansas on Monday night when debris from a severe storm crashed into his vehicle in Springdale, a police dispatcher said.
© 2013 Thomson Reuters. All rights reserved.
