NORMAN, Oklahoma — The Storm Prediction Center has issued formal Key Messages for Monday, April 27 — a significant step that signals the agency’s confidence in a major severe weather event across the middle Mississippi and lower Ohio Valleys. Numerous severe storms are expected Monday across this region, and the area is already being monitored for potential upgrades in threat level in later forecast updates.
The formal SPC Key Messages document three things every resident from Iowa to Alabama needs to understand before Monday arrives.
What the SPC Is Officially Saying
The Key Messages are direct and leave little room for interpretation.
Initial storms will be supercells capable of producing strong EF2 or greater tornadoes and very large hail. These are the early afternoon discrete storms that carry the most dangerous tornado potential of the entire event. As the day progresses, those supercells will undergo upscale growth into more extensive lines of storms, which will dramatically increase the threat for swaths of damaging wind gusts across a wide area…