The 2010 Wisconsin Spring/Summer/Fall Thread

[pitchleague]

knowing that there hadn't been a post in here for quite a while, I half-expected somebody to be posting "it's all over--hello winter."

[NeedMoreFans]

Wow, tornado warnings galore tonight! The NWS issued the tornado warning for Dane County right after the storm went through Middleton. But...the tornado sirens did not go off! So 2 weeks ago, they sound the sirens with no warning, but no sirens tonight with a warning.

 

Edit: The sirens go off 10 minutes after the warning was issued. Wow.

[hawing]

I think at least some of these cells blew up right over south central Wisconsin, which might be why at least some of the timing is off.

Edit: Be careful if you're driving around Madison. Several Beltline exits are closed (Park St, Rimrock at least) due to high water.

[craigharmann]

Stay safe!!

[burniebrewer]

I now have a river in my backyard.

[owbc]

This one caught me off-guard. It looked like the better severe chances were in Illinois, but the thunderstorms here grew stronger than expected. There was some flash flooding in Madison--not nearly as bad as 2006--but still enough to block lots of roads for a little while.

 

As of right now, there were at least 4 tornadoes, and possibly more.

[hawing]

I think it caught the Madison media off guard too. Both Bob Lindmeier and Gary Cannalte were called in for the prime time severe weather coverage.

[Mr QL]

Wow got a friend who just moved back to Milwaukee from Eagle in the last year. His old house apparently got the roof torn of or something. Hope everyone is okay.

[PeaveyFury]

Early reports of tornadoes on the ground last night in Waukesha County and Cross Plains so far.

[hawing]

We've been awakened by a delightful lightning show + tornado watch in effect until 9:00 AM. Sleep is for the weak?

[NeedMoreFans]

I was awake way too much last night. It was relentless last night. We had numerous lightning strikes right next to our house last night, and just tons, and tons of rain. I'm not a big fan of storms that march like a train like that...especially in the middle of the night.

[hawing]

What's more, Bob Lindmeier said on the 10:00 news that the storms wouldn't get here until 4:00. Bob owes me an hour of sleep and I'd like to collect it now!

[adamb100]

Yeah the thunderstorms that rolled in this morning were trying to test my eardrums. Didnt actually sleep till 6am.

[Menotti80]

and my wife left her car windows open last night.

 

ouch

[burniebrewer]

I was awake way too much last night. It was relentless last night. We had numerous lightning strikes right next to our house last night, and just tons, and tons of rain.

I heard one absolute thunder bomb around 3 AM (?) and that is all. I slept right through it and had to make a call this morning to see how bad it got. I was told it was like strobe lights with all of the lightning out there.

 

I hope I can hear a siren go off if the weather gets bad enough.

[PeaveyFury]

I hope I can hear a siren go off if the weather gets bad enough.

 

That was exactly my thought the other night, especially with the house closed up and the air on.

[hawing]

Not to sound like Gary Cannalte or your mom, but PeaveyFury and burniebrewer bring up two good reasons to have a weather radio. We have one downstairs and even on a low volume setting the alarm is enough to wake us up upstairs. We've found it to be more reliable than outdoor sirens. Some are programmable so you only hear about warnings and watches in your county instead of, say, all of southern Wisconsin.

[burniebrewer]

Can these weather radios be set up to only alert me for a tornado warning? I don't need things beeping in the middle of the night over a t-storm.

[hawing]

Can these weather radios be set up to only alert me for a tornado warning? I don't need things beeping in the middle of the night over a t-storm.

As I understand it, the radio will sound for all tornado warnings, severe thunderstorm warnings and flash flood warnings (in the county/counties you specify). You cannot avoid those. You might be able to program out tornado watches and severe thunderstorm watches. I could check our manual at home to verify that. You can program out other hazards, mostly either less immediate ones (like a blizzard warning) or those that don't happen everywhere (like a tsunami warning).

 

If you really truly only want to know about a tornado bearing down on you, Bob Lindmeier will call you, at least as long as you're living in the channel 27 viewing area. But if WKOW has that technology, surely a station in Milwaukeeland must as well.

[adamb100]

Can these weather radios be set up to only alert me for a tornado warning? I don't need things beeping in the middle of the night over a t-storm.

A quick amazon search yielded: http://www.amazon.com/Mid...00-Weather/dp/B00009V2YV

 

One of the best features it has is that it allows you to disable the

audiable alerts for every watch/warning except life threatening ones

like tornado warning, or biological hazard warning, etc. Other brands

and models will only allow you to disable the most harmless events. I

do not wish to be alerted at 3am because of a severe thunderstorm

warning, or tornado watch. With the WR-300, I won't be alerted unless

there is actually a tornado warning.

 

So looks like you can.

[NeedMoreFans]

So 62 out of the 72 counties in WI are under a tornado watch for today. Bring on the severe weather (as long as there isn't much damage and no one gets hurt)!!!

[hawing]

So 62 out of the 72 counties in WI are under a tornado watch for today. Bring on the severe weather (as long as there isn't much damage and no one gets hurt)!!!

Yeah, and 9 of the remaining 10 counties are under either a heat advisory or an air quality alert.

Dane County is the only county with nothing going on. I'm sure a tranquil and uneventful evening is afoot.

[hawing]

Now the watch has shifted to all of southern Wisconsin until 1:00 AM.

The dew point in Madison at 7:00 was 76 degrees. That's just wrong. It's even more wrong in Boscobel (Grant County), where the dewpoint is 79 and the air temp 91. That's a heat index of 107.

[NeedMoreFans]

Yeah, I just checked places west, and Prairie du Chien is 91 with a dew point of 82. Yikes! By comparison, New Orleans has a temp of 89 and a dew point of 74. This is pretty crazy.

[adamb100]

Another evenful day in SE Wisconsin. We got:

 

Flash flood Warning

Tornado Watch

Severe Thunderstorm Warning