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U.S. Southeast, Midwest face threat of severe storms, potential tornadoes

Stock photo of a thunderstorm that could produce tornadoes. Courtesy of Pixabay

(Reuters) – A dangerous weather system packing severe thunderstorms was expected to roll through the U.S. Southeast and parts of the Midwest on Wednesday, bringing with it the threat of tornadoes, forecasters said.

The region faced the threat of supercells developing throughout the day as very large hail and damaging straight-line wind appear to be likely, the National Weather Service said in an advisory.

At about 5:30 a.m. local time, a thunderstorm was moving northeast of Anniston, Alabama, at 55 miles (89 km) per hour, bringing with it hail the size of golf balls and 60 mile (98 km) per hour wind gusts, the Weather Service reported.

“For your protection move to an interior room on the lowest floor of a building,” the National Weather Service warned in an advisory.

Kentucky, Tennessee, Alabama, Georgia and South Carolina faced a heightened chance of tornadoes and potential flash flooding during the day.

The 5.7 million people who live in the Atlanta metro area should expect as much as 2-1/2 inches (6 cm) of rain throughout the day and into the evening, the service said.

Dozens of school districts in Alabama and Georgia canceled classes while Alabama Governor Robert Bentley issued a state of emergency ahead of the storm front.

“Alabama is no stranger to the impact severe weather can have on communities and the devastation that can occur when the weather takes a turn for the worse,” Bentley said in a statement.

The severe weather comes days after a powerful storm system in the southeastern U.S. killed four people, including a woman who was swept away by flood waters while she called 911.

(Reporting by Brendan O’Brien; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama)

Storms, tornadoes rake Midwest as high winds fuel prairie fires

By Timothy Mclaughlin

CHICAGO (Reuters) – A line of thunderstorms packing hail and isolated tornadoes rumbled across the Midwest from Oklahoma to Minnesota on Monday as wind-fueled prairie fires forced thousands of people from their homes in Colorado and Kansas.

Police and National Weather Service meteorologists reported some power outages but no initial major damage from the storms carrying winds of 60 miles per hour (96 kph) and hail 2 inches (5 cm) in diameter as they rolled east.

A tornado touched down in Smithville, Missouri, a Kansas City suburb, damaging 10 to 12 homes and displacing a few families but causing no major injuries, Police Chief Jason Lockridge said.

“Rain was minimal, it was just high winds and what was described as a funnel cloud,” he said in a telephone interview.

Areas of eastern Missouri and Iowa and western Illinois were under a tornado watch until early on Tuesday morning, the National Weather Service said.

The storms were largely to the east of an area stretching from the Texas Panhandle into Colorado, Nebraska and western Missouri that was under a “red flag” weather service warning for fires because of high winds, warm temperatures and dry conditions.

Twenty counties in central Kansas reported brush fires on Monday, some more than one, fueled by winds gusting to up 60 mph, said Katie Horner, a spokeswoman for the Kansas Adjutant General’s Department.

Ten towns were forced to evacuate residents because of the fire threat, including 10,000 to 12,000 from the city of Hutchinson, she said.

Helicopters from the Kansas National Guard were being used to dump water on the fires, she said. “It’s just a massive undertaking,” Horner said.

A prairie fire in northeast Colorado had burned about 25,000 acres (10,100 hectares), and officials said about 1,000 people in small farming towns were under evacuation or pre-evacuation orders.

(Reporting by Timothy Mclaughlin in Chicago, Keith Coffman in Denver and Ian Simpson in Washinton; Editing by James Dalgleish and Paul Tait)

Storms move east after killing three in U.S. Midwest

By Brendan O’Brien

MILWAUKEE (Reuters) – Tornadoes and storms that already have killed at least three people and destroyed homes in the U.S. Midwest are moving east on Wednesday, the National Weather Service and media reported.

Tornado watches remained in effect from northeast Arkansas north into Ohio and eastern Pennsylvania for Wednesday morning after the band of storms rolled through the Midwest on Tuesday night, the National Weather Service said.

“Widespread damaging winds can be expected, along with some tornado risk,” the service said in an advisory.

The storm system will continue moving east toward the Atlantic Ocean, according to AccuWeather meteorologists. This is likely to bring severe thunderstorms and possible travel delays later on Wednesday to New York City, Washington, Philadelphia and Boston.

The storm has left tens of thousands of people without electricity and killed at least three people, according to local officials and media reports. One person died while driving on a Missouri freeway after strong winds swept old cars from a nearby junkyard onto the road.

Tornado spotters have already reported at least 23 twisters in Illinois, Missouri, Iowa, Tennessee and Indiana on Tuesday evening, the National Weather Service said.

(Reporting by Brendan O’Brien; Additional reporting by Jonathan Allen in New York; Editing by Lisa Von Ahn)

Construction resumes on Dakota pipeline despite tribe’s challenge

police vehicles monitoring construction of pipeline

By Terray Sylvester and Liz Hampton

CANNON BALL, N.D./HOUSTON (Reuters) – The company building an oil pipeline that has fueled sustained public protests said on Thursday it has started drilling under a North Dakota lake despite a last-ditch legal challenge from a Native American tribe leading the opposition.

Energy Transfer Partners LP <ETP.N> is building the $3.8 billion Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL) to move crude from the Northern Plains to the Midwest and then on to the Gulf of Mexico, now saying it could be operational by early May.

The project had been put on hold under the administration of former Democratic President Barack Obama, but new President Donald Trump, a Republican, helped put it back on track.

The federal government this week cleared way for the project to resume, leading the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe to file a court challenge on Thursday seeking a temporary restraining order to halt construction and drilling for the pipeline.

The court set oral arguments on the legal challenge for Monday.

Legal experts say the tribe faces long odds in convincing any court to halt construction,

Energy Transfer Partners needs only to cross beneath Lake Oahe, part of the Missouri River system, to connect a final 1,100-foot (335 meter) gap in the 1,170-mile (1,885 km) pipeline, which will move oil from the Bakken shale formation to a terminus in Patoka, Illinois.

From there the oil would flow to another pipeline connecting south-central Illinois to the Gulf of Mexico and that region’s numerous oil refineries.

Native American tribes and climate activists have vowed to fight the pipeline, fearing it will desecrate sacred sites and endanger a source of the country’s largest drinking water reservoir.

“This administration (Trump’s) has expressed utter and complete disregard for not only our treaty and water rights, but the environment as a whole,” the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe said on Thursday in a statement on its website.

Supporters say the pipeline will be safer than transporting oil by rail or road, and industry leaders have praised the project for creating high-paying jobs

With work on the final tranche now under way, Energy Transfer Partners expects the Dakota Access Pipeline to begin operations in approximately 83 days, according to a company spokeswoman.

“We have started to drill to go beneath Lake Oahe and expect to be completed in 60 days with another 23 days to fill the line to Patoka,” spokeswoman Vicki Granado said in an email.

She declined to specify when drilling began except that it was after the company received federal permission on Wednesday.

Public opposition drew thousands of people to the North Dakota plains last year including high-profile political and celebrity supporters. Large protest camps popped up near the site, leading to several violent clashes and some 700 arrests.

A few hardy protesters have remained camped out near the lake, braving sub-freezing temperatures.

Among them is Frank Archambault, 45, who has lived in the camp since August when he left his home on the Standing Rock reservation.

“It angers me. It angers me because people are pushing other people around, breaking laws,” Archambault said. “They’re trying to kill us off by contaminating the water. We’ve had enough.”

Ptery Light, 55, of Portland, Oregon, who has lived in the main camp since Oct. 31, said he was not giving up hope.

“I just pray that there’s no oil spill,” Light said. “This is purely about greed.”

For now, their hopes are pinned on the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe winning a legal victory.

To obtain the temporary restraining order, the tribe must convince the judge there will be immediate harm suffered and prove it has a strong overall case should its lawsuit to halt the project result in a full trial.

The U.S. district judge in the case, James Boasberg, previously rejected the tribe’s request to block the project, ruling in September that the Army Corps of Engineers likely complied with the law in permitting the pipeline to go forward.

(Additional reporting by Daniel Wallis in New York)

U.S. East Coast to feel blast of arctic air that chilled Midwest

Pedestrians make their way along the Michigan Avenue in Chicago, Illinois, U.S.

By Timothy Mclaughlin

CHICAGO (Reuters) – Residents of the U.S. East Coast on Thursday felt a blast of arctic air that earlier swept across the Midwest, with a large swath of the country now under a wind-chill advisory and Boston facing possible record-low temperatures on Friday.

The arctic air began blowing south from Canada into the Midwest earlier this week, prompting authorities to warn of the risk of frostbite and hypothermia.

The frigid air spread to the East Coast on Thursday, with the National Weather Service forecasting temperatures in New York City around 25 degrees Fahrenheit (minus-4 degrees Celsius) and similar cold in other cities including Philadelphia, Washington and Boston.

“The coldest of the arctic air is just now arriving onto the East Coast,” meteorologist Patrick Burke of the Weather Prediction Center said in a telephone interview.

Temperatures might drop enough in Boston that on Friday it could approach a record low, Burke said. Other areas along the East Coast as far south as Norfolk, Virginia, will also be unusually cold.

Residents in Chicago faced temperatures in the single digits and a wind chill of minus-16 degrees Fahrenheit (minus-27 degrees Celsius) on Thursday morning, according to the National Weather Service.

Around 150 schools in the Chicago area were closed or scheduled to open late, due to the cold. Chicago Public Schools were in session and opened on time, according to a statement.

“Chicago’s cold goes beyond the physical level of coldness. It pinches your soul,” Twitter user Ivan Korkes wrote.

A woman whose body was found outside in St. Paul, Minnesota, on Monday has been determined to have died of hypothermia, according the Star Tribune newspaper, which cited the medical examiners’ office.

Connecticut Governor Dannel Malloy said in a statement he would activate the state’s severe cold weather protocol beginning on Thursday evening, directing state officials to work with shelters to bring in homeless people.

Cold temperatures in the Midwest were expected to persist on Thursday, with certain areas from North Dakota to western Pennsylvania under wind chill advisories, Burke said.

The heaviest snowfall in the nation on Thursday will be around the Great Lakes in Michigan where up to 10 inches (25 cm) of snow was expected, and in parts of the U.S. West where a storm is pushing inland from the Pacific Coast, Burke said.

The Sierra Nevada mountain range in California and the mountains around Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming could receive more than two feet (61 cm) of snow, Burke said.

(Reporting by Alex Dobuzinskis in Los Angeles and Timothy Mclaughlin in Chicago; Editing by Will Dunham)

Cold persists in U.S. Midwest as Pacific Northwest braces for snow

(Reuters) – Arctic air blowing through Chicago and other parts of the U.S. Midwest was expected to keep the region under a deep freeze on Wednesday, as residents of Oregon were blanketed with snow from a separate weather system, forecasters said.

Temperatures in Chicago, the nation’s third largest city, were expected to plunge to between 13 and 22 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 11 to minus 5 degrees Celsius) with a wind chill factor as low as minus 15 degrees Fahrenheit, the National Weather Service said in an advisory.

Arctic air spreading from Canada across much of the northern United States this week has led authorities to warn people against frostbite.

The Midwest was expected to experience colder weather than on Tuesday, at the outset of the arctic air blast, National Weather Service meteorologist Andrew Orrison of the agency’s Weather Prediction Center said by telephone.

“People certainly, if they’re going to be out and about, need to dress warmly and wear multiple layers of clothes,” Orrison said.

A few inches of snow could fall on areas around the Great Lakes in Michigan and New York state, he said.

But snowfall from another storm coming to the Pacific Northwest and Northern California was likely to cause greater havoc for people’s travel plans than the snow around the Great Lakes, Orrison said.

The snowfall is due to a Pacific low pressure system and expanding moisture, National Weather Service officials said in a national advisory.

Between 4 and 8 inches (10 and 20 cm) of snow could fall in central and eastern Oregon, with the Cascade mountain range in the Pacific Northwest receiving up to 1 foot of snow, Orrison said.

The weather system that will cover parts of the Pacific Northwest with snow was expected to spread eastward later in the week.

Meanwhile, the blast of arctic air that has placed the Midwest under a deep chill will also blow eastward, bringing potentially record low temperatures to parts of the mid-Atlantic region on Thursday, Orrison said.

Cities from Boston to Washington will feel the chill beginning on Thursday and lasting at least until Friday, he said.

“For these areas it will be the coldest air of the season so far,” Orrison said.

(Reporting by Alex Dobuzinskis in Los Angeles; Editing by Alison Williams)

Midwest snow storm grounds hundreds of Chicago flights

(Reuters) – Hundreds of flights into and out of Chicago’s O’Hare and Midway airports were canceled on Sunday as a winter storm system dumped moderate to heavy snow on the Upper Midwest and Lower Great Lakes regions before heading toward the U.S. Northeast.

A winter storm warning was in effect in the Chicago area on Sunday afternoon, with total accumulations of up to 10 inches (25 cm) expected by midnight CST, the National Weather Service said.

It warned of difficult driving conditions in and around the country’s third-biggest metropolitan area, where snow began falling on Saturday afternoon.

As much as 13 inches of snow fell in parts of Michigan and up to 9 inches in parts of Minnesota by 8 a.m. CST on Sunday, according to the National Weather Service.

At O’Hare International Airport, the world’s fourth-busiest airport, United Air Lines and American Airlines have scratched most regional flights and some mainline service, while Southwest Air has canceled most flights out of Midway International on Sunday evening and Monday morning, the airports said.

Passengers took to Twitter to vent their frustrations over one of the first winter storms to snarl air traffic in the region this season.

“To all our fans in Vegas – we are stuck in Chicago from the snow storm, we are so so sorry. Winter weather is (sic) wrecked our plans. This sucks,” wrote the rock band One Republic in a Twitter post. The group had a show scheduled on Sunday night at the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada.

All told, more than 1,200 flights into and out of O’Hare were canceled as of Sunday afternoon, according to the Flightaware tracking service, while nearly 200 Midway flights were scratched.

At Detroit’s Metropolitan Wayne County Airport, a Delta flight arriving from Buffalo, New York, skidded off the runway and came to a stop on a grassy verge around midday on Sunday, but there were no injuries, local media reported.

Representatives of the airport and the airline could not be reached immediately to confirm the reports.

(Reporting By Frank McGurty; Editing by Alan Crosby)

Duo Storms Bring Potential Flooding and Snow to High Plains and Rockies

Duo storm systems over the Midwest and Rockies is likely to produce heavy rainfall capable of flooding, severe thunderstorms, and even snow.

The Weather Channel reports that the High Plains will see severe thunderstorms and even some flooding as the 4-5 day period of rain falls over the area. Some parts of the plains may even set all-time monthly records for April.

Many areas in the Plains from South Dakota to Texas could see at least 3 inches of rainfall through Tuesday evening. Parts of Kansas, Oklahoma, Nebraska, and Texas could see around 5-8 inches of rain over the next few days.

Additionally, this storm could produce severe thunderstorms with large hail, damaging winds, and possibly tornadoes.

And if that weren’t enough, the High Plains may also see snow as Winter Storm Vexo hits the Rockies this weekend.

The National Weather Service has issued winter storm warnings for parts of Utah, Colorado, and Wyoming. So far, The Weather Channel has reported that Nebraska and South Dakota will be the only states in the High Plains to possibly see snow.

Winter Storm Vexo will also bring strong winds that could reach gusting speeds of 30-50 mph and may cause power outages throughout the Rockies and High Plains.

Extreme Storms, Tornadoes Expected in the Heartland by Wednesday

An impressive storm over Alaska’s Aleutian Islands has sent a powerful southward dip in the jet stream which will hit the continental U.S. Tuesday and Wednesday, bringing severe weather, including possible tornado threats.

The Weather Channel reports that the cold air mixed with warmer, humid air in the lower levels of the atmosphere could produce severe thunderstorms. They also state that since this weather prediction is a few days early, that it is uncertain to measure the level of the tornadic threat.

The main threat from severe thunderstorms are gusting winds, hail, flash flooding, and the possibility of tornadoes. The tornadic threat level can range depending on how unstable the air mass becomes, which is something that cannot be easily predicted. Winds are expected to pick up in the midsection late Tuesday, with sustained winds of up to 40mph by Wednesday with gusts at 50 to 60 mph or more.

Regions on the northwestern part of the storm will see high winds and snow. Colorado and Kansas were placed under blizzard watches and high wind watches were issued for Texas, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Colorado, and Kansas, according to ABC News.

November has seen its fair share of severe weather in the past. Nearly two years ago, 72 tornadoes made their way through 7 states.

South Central States to Expect Torrential Storm and Flash Flooding

Accuweather and The Weather Channel reported today that South Central states should expect a bad storm system coming in from the Gulf of Mexico that will bring major rainfall and flooding to the area, leaving more than 10 million people under flash flood watches.

Forecasters expect 4 to 8 inches of rainfall throughout portions of Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Kansas, and Louisiana. Some communities may even see up to a foot of rainfall. Forecasters believe that some of the power and moisture from Hurricane Patricia may contribute to the storm but the main cause of the storm is various sources of moisture are converging in the area.

Accuweather warns that the current dry conditions in Texas may result in worse conditions as a significant amount of rain can run off the dry, hard ground.

As the storm continues moving east, Accuweather states that there will be a greater increase of flooding in urban areas, large rivers, and major highways for Friday, the weekend, and early next week. They expect some communities will have to evacuate due to the flash flooding.

Residents in Midland and Odessa, Texas already experienced flooding early Thursday morning, submerging vehicles in high water and flooding homes.

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