Dan's Wild Wild Science Journal

What a tornado looks like on radar. Radar image showing strong rotation as a tornado hits Albertville Alabama. Courtesy Plymouth College NEXRAD Archive data.

Major damage and some injuries are being reported in Albertville, Alabama and in Geraldine Alabama from a tornado Saturday night. These tornadoes follow the twister that hit Yazoo City in Mississippi on Saturday afternoon. That storm left 10 dead.

First guess tornado track across NE Alabama Saturday night. Google maps.

The image above is showing winds toward and away from the radar. I circled the velocity couplet showing very strong winds toward the radar next to winds in the opposite direction. Early indications are that the tornado was on the ground for many miles. This would be the second long track tornado of the day with Yazoo City being the first.

The severe weather threat is finally beginning to lessen but more tornadoes are still possible in Georgia and South Alabama overnight…

After 13 hours in front of a radar screen, it is time to get some sleep….The rescue squads are just getting started. Let’s hope there were no deaths…

27 May, 2005

I showed some of our first echo id data on air at 10pm Thursday.(See the last blog)
Using ARMOR and it’s dual polarimetric capability, a computer program can be run to analyze the radar echoes using different variables like differential reflectivity and specific differential phase etc. (I have a link at the end that will explain these)

This program can then estimate whether the echo is rain..sleet hail etc. Truly the future of weather radar technology and I just bet I am the first person to ever show it on tv! (Something I care about and no one else!)

Missed it? Here it is (It will make sense when you look at it!)
HYDRO ID

A great web site on how dual polarimetric radar works is at this NSSL web site.

Our next goal is to be able to have this data in real time during severe storms.

Later,
Dan