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Atlanta Weather | Wednesday Weather

With all the severe weather that we have seen over the last few days out west everyone  around here wants to know if that system will affect us... The answer is yes, but not in the same tragic way that the folks in Oklahoma dealt with Sunday and Monday.

Tomorrow's Threat

How to help those affected by the Oklahoma tornadoes

(WXIA) -- As Moore, OK recovers from the devastating tornadoes that leveled portions of that community, many people are asking how they can help.

Many organizations are working to marshal resources and help for those directly affected by the disaster. They are accepting donations and other forms of help.

RELATED | Massive tornado slams into Oklahoma town
MORE |
Weather Service: Storm was EF-5 tornado

Habitat for Humanity is working to help those affected in Oklahoma as well as in neighboring Texas, where 60 Habitat homes were damaged by a tornado there.

Severe Weather Threat for Wednesday / Thursday

Severe Weather Threat for Wednesday / Thursday

With all the severe weather that we have seen over the last few days out west everyone  around here wants to know if that system will affect us... The answer is yes, but not in the same tragic way that the folks in Oklahoma dealt with Sunday and Monday.

Tomorrow's Threat

The SPC is forecasting severe storms tomorrow to the NW of the region but there us a chance that they might bring that risk down into our area. I think tomorrow as the energy from out west heads in this direction, most of it will be shunted off to the NE. While I do think we will some t-storms tomorrow across the area, I think that the timing on the upper air support will be lagging behind the storms. In other words, the storms tomorrow will be mainly scattered non-severe storms mainly in the late afternoon! 

Tomorrow Night

Massive Debris Signature From Moore, OK

Massive Debris Signature From Moore, OK

A truly devastating tornado hit Moore, OK Monday at around 4:25 and I was tracking it on Live 11Alive Radar. As it went into the heart of Moore I quickly realized how bad it was going to be. Most of the time when cities get hit by tornadoes the radar signature doesn't change, in other words the hook echo remains the same. In some of the stronger tornadoes you can see a debris ball. What that debris ball is is shingles, 2x4's, windows, trees.... all of that flying around the center of a tornado... In this tornado the debris ball actually expanded as it went into Moore..... The tornado grew and started flinging debris around it as it expanded to 2 miles wide!!!! That is how large the debris ball was, it was 2 miles wide!!!!

Please say a prayer tonight for the folks in Oklahoma who lost everything Monday.

 

More bad weather expected on Monday

SHAWNEE, OK (CNN) -- Tornadoes destroyed homes and tossed trees around like toothpicks as powerful storms ripped through Oklahoma and the Midwest on Sunday and Monday.

And the destructive weather, which killed at least two people, isn't over. Baseball-sized hail, wind gusts and tornadoes could pummel parts of the central Plains and Midwest through Monday.

"Today could be potentially as dangerous as yesterday," CNN meteorologist Indra Petersons said Monday morning, pointing to a wide swath of the country spanning from Texas to Michigan. "We're talking about 500,000 square miles under the gun for severe weather."

As they braced for more possible storms, residents in the hardest-hit areas were combing through rubble where their homes once stood.

"My mind is like, blown, completely blown," said Jessie Alexander, 21, who found that few pieces of her childhood home in Shawnee, Oklahoma, were still standing Monday.

Atlanta Weather | Heavy Rain in 24 Hours

Atlanta Weather | Heavy Rain in 24 Hours

Take a look at the 24 hour rainfall totals from the National Weather Service. Very high amounts of rain, espeically over the Flowery Branch in southern Hall County. According to the digital rain gauage, as much as 6 inches of rain fell in that area. Some of the area road are still washed out.

The Final Step in Tornado Genesis

The Final Step in Tornado Genesis

What you are looking at above is called a RFD, or a rear flank downdraft! It is the sheets of rain that is wrapping around on the right hand side of this tornado. What that is is a burst of rain that is very cold that wraps around on the back side of a rotating wall cloud. It is, essentially, a mini cold front that heps to increase the wind in the inflow to a wall cloud. It is like when you stick your finger over a hose, the area the water has to go through gets smaller so through conservation of mass and momentum you must increase the speed of the stream! Same with a rotating wall cloud and an RFD,t he RFD wraps around and channels the inflow making it go faster to give that final bump in the wind speed that the storm needs to form a tornado. The perfect balance between RFD and inflow is what makes long tracked tornadoes..... When the RFD gets wrapped up, the cold air will choke off the inflow and the tornado will die...