National Tornado Train Continues: Tragedy In Iowa As Ominous Forecasts Continue

Screen grab from a drone video shows the buzz saw
path of the tornado through Greenfield, Iowa.
Click on the photo to make it bigger and easier to see.

 The expected tornado outbreak in and around Iowa materialized Tuesday, with at least 23 new tornadoes reported. 

The biggest crisis was in the town of Greenfield, Iowa, population about 2,000. A powerful tornado chewed a path directly through the town, chewing up everything in its path and leaving little but mutilated rubble behind. 

Worryingly, officials are reporting deaths in that town. KETV confirmed four deaths in Greenfield late this afternoon.  Judging from photos and video from Greenfield, which show some houses swept entirely away, leaving just floor slabs, it's hard to imagine everyone got off unscathed. 

Another death was reported near Corning, Iowa, that of a woman whose car was blown off a road and tossed into a field. Reports are the woman was a storm chaser. 

This despite the fact the National Weather Service office in Des Moines was able to warn Greenfield residents of the tornado 46 minutes before it actually hit. 

Drone view from Reed Timmer shows a massive tornado with numerous sub vortices - tornadoes within the parent tornado - knocking over giant wind turbines in open fields. Some of the collapsed turbines caught fire. 

At one point one of the sub-vortices in the tornado had its own sub-vortice, which is really weird and rare. 

Through yesterday, at least 815 tornadoes have been reported this year in the United States. So far, it's the worst tornado season since 2011, though thankfully the total number of fatalities is well below that of 2011.

There has been at least one tornado daily in the United States since April 25, and I don't see the streak ending immediately. 

For most of that time, the general jet stream flow has been generally been from southwest to northeast over the eastern two thirds of the nation. That has allowed numerous storms to travel from the roughly the central and southern Rocky Mountains to the Great Lakes. 

That's a perfect set-up to send warm, humid air northward across the nation's middle. That air interacts with those storm systems, creating a good environment for severe thunderstorms, giant hail and tornadoes. 

We in Vermont have been mostly spared from worst of that weather pattern because the storms have tended to weaken on approach to New England, or pass too far to our northwest to have much influence. 

Tuesday was the first time this year any severe thunderstorms were reported inVermont, though some strongish thunderstorms appeared on April 28 and May 14. 

Although after tomorrow, the small threat of severe storms in Vermont should disappear for awhile, things look like they might get even worse on other parts of the U.S. 

NOAA's Storm Prediction Center tells us a "concerning pattern is evident on Sunday across broad region of the central U.S."

According to forecasts a strong storm is expected to move from Missouri to Michigan on Sunday. That, and expected shifting winds in the atmosphere and plenty of humid air ahead of the storm, suggests the real risk of a big severe outbreak and tornadoes later Saturday and through much of the day Sunday. 

Early guesses are that the mid-Mississippi and Ohio valleys are most at risk Sunday. 

There is one glimmer of hope.  Next week, a  pattern change could send high pressure into the United States west of the Mississippi River. That will shut off that parade of storms. However, storminess will continue in the East. And it's late enough in the season so that under the right conditions with the new weather pattern, severe thunderstorms and tornadoes can form from the eastern Gulf Coast to New England. 

It's also unclear how long that new weather pattern will last. 

May is thought by many to be the peak tornado month, but they are also very common in June, so the end probably isn't coming anytime soon.