April has been a loud and active month in the weather department with over 350 reports of severe weather damage and tornadoes statewide. Monday looks to continue that trend with one last round of severe storms before the month closes.
SUMMARY
Sunday night will have a round of showers move into Eastern Iowa, a rumble of thunder cannot be ruled out, but the threat for strong to severe storms is minimal. Monday morning will also feature some storms, these are a little stronger, but should stay below severe limits. Once we get to late Monday afternoon to Monday early evening damaging winds, hail, heavy rain, and a couple embedded tornadoes are possible with the final round of storms. “Possible” is the key word in that sentence since there are still many questions that need to be answered to know exactly how impactful the storms will be.
Regardless of the uncertainty the Monday storms have prompted the Storm Prediction Center to issue a level 3 out of 5 risk, with a focus on south eastern portions of our viewing area.
MONDAY MORNING
Once the showers move out of our area Sunday night we will have a brief lull in shower activity throughout the early morning. Once we get to around 7:00am another round of showers and storms will start to move into our western counties and trek eastward. Since this is early in the morning, there is not instability in the atmosphere to have a significant severe threat with these storms. The heaviest of the rain will fall between 7:00 – 11:00 AM before the line of showers and storms cross the Mississippi.
Behind these showers mostly cloudy skies will prevail with some locations seeing peaks of sunshine. Once we get past the mid morning hours, that’s when some uncertainty creeps into the forecast.
MONDAY AFTERNOON *HIGHEST SEVERE POTENTIAL*
Around the midday hours, 11:00 AM – 2:00 PM, a majority of Eastern Iowa will stay dry. However, there is a chance that some isolated storms develop. If they do develop, they will eat away the instability that was reserved for the main line of storms coming later in the afternoon and evening. This will significantly decrease the severe threat if this happens…