Wikipedia I lived in Oklahoma from 1970 to 1975 and had no idea that the Tulsa race atrocity had occurred. Evidently, that was common. From the Wall Street Journal's coverage, Ms. Cash’s mother, Altamese Marion Scott-Hudson, born 11 years after the massacre, didn’t learn about the family’s history until she was 66 years old.  In fact, I don't think I knew anything about it, even though I've taken a number of American history courses, until the last decade.  I don't have words to describe how terrible this was and how awful it is that Americans have not known about this event until now.  The history of man's humanity to man is long and horrible. Since the Tulsa Race Massacre we've seen the horrific slaughters caused by Lenin, Stalin, Hitler, Mao, Pol Pot and so many others. In the last few weeks, we've observed violence against Americans of Asian descent and a rapid uptick in violence against Jews. These are alarming trends.  We are all children of God: noth

Amazon has a terrific price for Warnings: The True Story of How Science Tamed the Weather . If you would like to read this acclaimed book, now is a great opportunity.

An outstanding article about the type of storm that used to be called an "inland hurricane." Click here . 

A "low precipitation" (LP) supercell in west Texas Sunday produced a feast for the eyes. You can see a couple of extraordinary time-lapse videos here and here .  The first of the videos (red link) really illustrates what we mean by "rotation."

Here is the moisture data across the nation as of May 20 (latest available). Since that time, widespread rains have occurred in the central USA.  While I don't have a ten-day map, below is the 7-day rainfall map. Unfortunately, the data in the West is not complete. Below is the forecast rain for the next five days.

Remember the terrible 2012 drought in Texas? It was supposed to be a precursor to eternal drought in Texas caused by global warming. Showtime even did a one-hour documentary on it. Oops.  Of course, that drought is gone. It was a typical fluctuation of weather. Anthony Watts posted this great graph of Texas rainfall (below) to illustrate. When it was extremely dry it was "climate change." When it got wet it was "weather."  Speaking of oops, there were a number of articles that attempted to tie the Joplin Tornado to global warming. This is what you get when you try to retrieve them today: When it comes Big Climate, an accurate motto would be: Always Certain; Usually Wrong . Final point: absolutely the last thing we should do is install more wind turbines. Still, independent climate scientists continue to point a more positive direction. Short, cogent read  here .

...an important reminder. 

The Blogspot software is not working properly. So, I will not be able to do real-time weather updates at this time. 

 The brown area has a significant tornado risk.  Below is the forecast for damaging wind potential.  The hatched area may have wind gusts to 75 mph or higher.

A number of tornadoes were reported (red) as well as large hail (green) and damaging winds (blue). And, while there were no reports of tornadoes or large hail, wind damage reports were common in the Northeast.  These were reports up to 11:20pm.  Hail hail swaths are up to 11pm. Most of the large hail had ceased by that time.  Finally, the heaviest rains were in Kansas and Nebraska. These are amounts to 11:40pm.

There is an enhanced risk (yellow) in a band from Stillwater, OK to Joplin, MO (yellow). The brown areas has a significant risk of tornadoes. There are indications that the severe thunderstorms and accompanying tornado threat could begin relatively early in the day. 

Let's begin with the headline,  If you live in the red or orange areas, you need to plan for destructive weather -- now.  I'll break weather forecast into its components below, but let's begin with recommendations: Make sure you have three  independent means to get storm warnings. I used to say two but with the failure of both WEA and the sirens during the Selden Tornado Monday, make sure you have three. I would recommend the AccuWeather App, WEA , WeatherCall , or a weather radio. This is especially important since some tornadoes could occur after dark.  Insure your sheltering area is ready to go: clean and clear, a couple of bottles of water, diapers, battery flashlight and radio or television. Wear shoes into your shelter area. If you have a bicycle or similar helmet, take it/them into the shelter area.  Make provisions for infirm friends and relatives now.... Early in the day.  Fully charge your laptop and smartphone but disconnect the charger before thunderstorms arriv

Just like a 'consensus' (which has nothing to do with science or the scientific method) was manufactured for global warming, the same was done to suppress suspicions the Wuhan virus originated at a Chinese government lab in that city. Of course, that lab had/has connections to Dr. Anthony Fauci.  I don't know how the coronavirus began. But Judy's story of how the consensus was manufactured is well worth your time.  Unfortunately, we live in an era where we need to be skeptical about everything. 

Two stories out of China, Inadequate weather forecasts led to tragedy in an "ironman"-type footrace. Twenty-one died. Either inadequate warning or inadequate response -- or both -- causes deaths. The same storm twisted a parked airliner.  Too often, we take America's storm warning program for granted. China, and many nations, have a long way to go. 

Disconnecting Disaster Mitigation From Climate  Day after the 2007 F-5 Greensburg Tornado Photo by Larry Schwarm In part one yesterday, we discussed President Biden's proposal to mitigate weather/climate disasters and how it would work with a National Disaster Review Board .  If President Biden's proposal is to do the most good, I believe  we need to subtract global warming from the equation . I know that may seem counterintuitive, so please allow me to explain.  White House The Futility of Tying Disaster Mitigation to Global Warming The White House's statement rationalizes its already meritorious proposal because of what they call "22 separate weather and climate released disasters" in 2021. Most of those are nonsense as we've explained on numerous occasions. Additionally, the White House's statement cites the February Texas winter storms and record cold as another reason for spending the money. Let's spend a little time on that one.  Please click t

President Biden announced in the last few hours that he is going to redirect $1 billion of federal spending toward disaster mitigation (more money for FEMA plus reinforcing bridges, etc.). He cites global warming as the underlying need for the money. Biden is also requesting an improvement in NASA's earth monitoring from space.  I've read several news articles along with the White House's own description of the plan . My conclusion is that the plan is well-intended but -- typical of Washington -- it is "a little of this and a little of that" and probably won't make much of a difference. After all, there are lots of bridges, ports, sea walls, FEMA staffing, etc., etc., and that amount money will make very little real difference.  Curiously, NOAA isn't even mentioned . The primary agency we rely on to warn us of weather/climate disasters is left out. I draw two conclusions: Sadly, yet another NOAA administrator (awaiting Senate confirmation) who knows nothin

1330 KNSS was kind enough to invite me to appear on their latest podcast during which we discussed a range of topics pertaining to weather and my career. You can listen here . 

In the brown area, there is a significant risk of tornadoes from 1pm through about 10pm. The yellow area has an enhanced  risk of tornadoes, especially this afternoon.  Please closely monitor the weather in these areas. 

After the tornadoes and flooding of last week I thought it would be fun to take a break.  I've always been a Johnny Carson fan and when I saw one of his old (1960's) shows on YouTube, I watched. Among his guests last night was the great Stan Freberg. He was known for his wacky, and highly effective, television commercials (among other things). For those of you who have never seen one, here are a couple of treats. Please note: in that era, 60 second TV commercials were the norm. Meatballs! Soup! A Commercial For Advertising on Radio Stan produced comedy albums, radio comedy serials (who can forget "Chickenman"?) and far more. He passed away in 2015. 

Congratulations on your rebuilding and thank you for all of the kindnesses you showed me when I was addressing your chamber of commerce, when I was interviewing many of you, and when I was there to present When the Sirens Were Silent . I have written so much about the tornado and the unnecessary loss of life it caused I want to keep this fairly short.  JMag  has a number of commemorative stories about the storm.  I hope it is many, many decades before you have to deal with a weather catastrophe again. 

Joplin strip mall pulverized by the tornado The Washington Post's  "Capital Weather Gang" asked me to write a piece about the state of the tornado warning system in the decade after the Joplin Tornado. After considerable research, what I found was extremely troubling. The article is here .  More than ever, I believe America needs a National Disaster Review Board. I make the case for it here . If you agree, please send a brief note to your congressional delegation. 

Yesterday's Joplin Globe  had an extensive article about the tornado warning system the day of the horrific tornado ten years ago and how the warning system has changed since. The article did a thorough interview of a Joplinite who accidentally drove into the tornado. The man, Stan Walters, said, He did not hear the sirens. If he had heard them, he would have stayed put. While sirens should not  be a primary warning method (more below), the fact is he didn't hear the sirens because they were not sounded in a useful manner that day, thus the title of my book about the storm .  The good news is that Joplin has completely changed its siren activation policy. The city has created a siren activation web site, which is here . During a tornado or extreme winds, they will activate the sirens for three minutes, turn them off for three minutes, and repeat until the danger has passed.  Given the advances in technology since 2011, everyone should: Use a tornado watch to tip you off as to w

I don't know if the intelligence community in Washington has picked up on something, or is just extrapolating from the recent Colonial Pipeline terrorist shutdown , but the flurry of articles on the subject of electrical system terrorism continue .  Plus, there is nothing we can do to stop a solar storm from attacking earth.  It is almost impossible to overstate the catastrophe -- far worse than the COVID shortages or last week's gasoline shortages -- that would exist if our electricity was shut off in a large geographic area for any significant amount of time. Possible examples: Stores quickly run out of goods -- including grocery and drug stores Water supplies, at best, are limited.  Hospital generators run out of fuel.  Cell towers and telephone systems fail a few days into the crisis.   That is why I urge my readers to stock up on essentials in a way that could sustain them for at least  two weeks. We have a longer-duration supply in our home. We rotate things out so the s

As "Rocket Boy" Homer Hickham added, "or else." These "loyalty oaths" from scientific societies are disquieting, to put it mildly. Science in the United States has become far too politicized. I resigned from the American Meteorological Society after 51 years of membership because of its political activities.  President Eisenhower warned us of this in his farewell address: Yet, in holding scientific research and discovery in respect, as we should, we must also be alert to the equal and opposite danger that public policy could itself become the captive of a scientific-technological elite. Science only works when there is skepticism. I'll pass on these oaths. 

Ted Fujita was the most amazing meteorologist of my lifetime.  Ted Fujita in 1993 during one of his visits to WeatherData, Inc. He took a forensic approach to studying weather and, among other accomplishments,  Discovered the downburst which stopped what was them the #1 cause of airline crashes Created the Fujita Scale of tornado damage Discovered so much about tornadoes that I can't list all it here Photo of rain "curling" in a downburst Copyright 1978, Michael R Smith AccuWeather published a well-done biographical article Ted this morning. You'll enjoy reading more about him!

This occurred Friday. Wuhan is the city where the coronavirus is believed to have begun.  Daily Mail The tornado was caused by a supercell with a hook echo -- exactly what we would expect to see on American radar.  There were casualties but I don't know a final number. 

Today, we have an enhanced risk of tornadoes in the west Texas High Plains. Updated 11:38am The yellow area is an enhanced  risk. The brown area has a significant risk of tornadoes.  In terms of damage,  The significant threshold is yellow. The hatching = hail larger than 2" in diameter. So, the purple area has a serious risk of destructive hail. 

Saturday, I posted a piece titled " Well, This is Terrifying... " on the extreme danger posted by solar storms to America (especially) and the world.  Meteorologist Roger Edwards brought the article, Racing the Sun to Protect America  to my attention. Posted Friday, it outlines the danger to GPS and to America should a strong solar storm occur.  If you think the COVID shortages of 2020 or the gas shortages of last week were bad, the problems would be far, far worse if a solar storm (CME) should occur.  With a Carrington intensity solar storm there is a chance your car will be dead (literally) along with many appliances that contain chips or are connected to commercial power. This is especially true in more northern locations.  As the article goes on to say,  Government leaders have known about this near-existential risk to America for years. They have promised to to act [since 2004]  but haven't.  This is a far greater risk than global warming or countless other items th

In terms of loss of life it was the worst tornado in 64 years and the worst-ever in the tornado warning era. That was due to a rare failure of the tornado warning system. Only When the Sirens Were Silent  tells the true story of what went wrong that day. Here is the Washington Post's  review . The book also contains three unique sets of tornado safety recommendations: for home, work and school.  The paperback sold out quickly. I priced the ebook so it would be affordable to all: just $2.99. Hope you will consider reading it.