LITTLE ROCK, Arkansas — Two consecutive days of severe weather are taking shape across Arkansas, Mississippi and Texas on Tuesday, May 5 and Wednesday, May 6, 2026, with each day carrying a distinct threat profile and a different primary hazard. Tuesday brings the greatest tornado risk, concentrated in a dashed high-risk zone centered over Little Rock and Memphis. Wednesday shifts the threat south and east toward Shreveport, Jackson and New Orleans, where damaging winds become the dominant concern along a southward-advancing cold front.
Tuesday: The Tornado Day
A Slight Risk covers a wide corridor from Oklahoma City and Dallas northeast through Little Rock, Memphis and toward Nashville, but the most dangerous zone is much more specific. A dashed purple circle on the outlook map marks where forecasters place the greatest risk for tornadoes, perhaps strong, centered directly over northern and central Arkansas near Little Rock and extending east toward Memphis, Tennessee.
Supercells are expected to develop near two separate trigger points Tuesday:
- The intersection of outflow from morning convection and the dryline in the northern Arkansas vicinity, where storms interacting with earlier convective outflow will have the highest tornado potential
- South along the dryline into northeast Texas, where additional supercell development is expected with all severe hazards possible
The outflow interaction in northern and central Arkansas is the critical wildcard. When mature supercells encounter boundaries left by earlier morning storms, tornado probability increases dramatically and storms can produce tornadoes with very little warning.
Wednesday: The Wind and Hail Day
Wednesday’s setup shifts south with a Slight Risk zone dropping from Memphis southwest through Shreveport, Jackson, New Orleans and Houston. The threat profile is meaningfully different from Tuesday.
Damaging winds are the greatest threat as widespread convection fires along a southward-advancing cold front sweeping through Louisiana, Mississippi and Texas. When storms organize into a line along a cold front, individual supercell structure breaks down and the primary hazard shifts to straight-line wind damage across a broad swath rather than concentrated tornado paths…