The Tulsa Forum by TulsaNow

Based on records this is the stormiest week of the year. Dust the spiders out of your shelters.

Look to the skies tomorrow night overnight especially if you live in the area.

This stormgasm was actually building LAST week. I saw some news station posting that the conditions for a storm next week will be perfect, and had a diagram showing from Dallas to KC as a danger zone. Oh yeah, that's the stuff!

"they" are getting really good at pin-pointing the trouble areas.

I heard the phrases "Historic danger levels" and "Epic storms" this morning.

The Weather Channel said we are on TOR-CON level 5 today.

(http://i.imgur.com/TnxGx0d.jpg)

Looks sunny outside.

5:22PM. I heard rain outside the bunker earlier. Used the opportunity to soak up some rain water to buttress our supplies. Food stocks were somewhat depleted from lunch, ate one of the dogs. Let me know when this is all over.

Jackasses sounding the sirens.....

We generally prefer they do that when there is a tornado warning.

You realize the sirens sound when  when a Tornado is actually forming and or on the ground right which there wasn't....Or are you to busy spamming the board about cops.....

Actually, there were several tornadoes forming and perhaps one on the ground out by Bixby.

Counties are now broken up into zones. If a tornado warning is issued for a portion of that zone the sirens will be sounded. Warning means a tornado has been indicated by radar or actually spotted. As we saw last night, many times radar indicates there "may" be a tornado and a warning is issued. Whether there was a tornado or not in such circumstances is not determined for a couple of days as damage is assessed (obviously larger tornadoes are easier to confirm).

(http://cdn.theatlantic.com/assets/media/img/mt/2014/09/The_More_You_Know/lead_large.png)

Not true.  Tornado sirens are sounded in concert with the NWS and the city emergency management agency.  They will warn for a radar indicated tornado.

And anyone using *outdoor* sirens as their primary means of warning of bad weather deserve to be Darwined.  Get a weather radio people.

This is as helpful as you would expect from a GOV URL.

http://stormaware.mo.gov/alerts/ (http://stormaware.mo.gov/alerts/)

Hence the state motto "Show Me".

I live out South of Bixby and there was a lowering. When it looked like there was a hook echo forming around Mounds we rounded up the kids and headed to the shelter. I kept the door open for a bit watching and could see a lowering, it would come down for a bit and then go back up and did this several times while I was watching. Not sure if it ever came all the way down or not. I finally shut the door when hail began to mix in with the rain.

Yes, if you don't have a weather radio and live around here you likely need your head examined.

I have to give some kudos to the Storm Shield app that KJRH is always pimping. I downloaded in on Monday in prep for this round of storms and it works well. I'm not sure it should cost $2.99, but it does seem to work well and a $3 investment for something that actually works is cheap.

I've seen tornadoes from a distance before, being a native. However, I've never seen one like the one last nite. I was on 51 near Sheridan when the wind blew me over half a lane. The sirens were annoyingly loud. Worked real well. Stuff was flying sideways. Not much rain at that point. I slowed down but most drivers seemed to increase their speed. Then saw multiple transformers start to blow. Very exciting. Then, the smoke from the transformers illuminated a small rotation moving quickly across the road ahead of us. It had been transparent but showed well with the smoke. Just like high school science lab. It wiggled back and forth as it crossed. The straight winds were brutal. Took out some trees over by Wright elementary off 47th and Peoria.

Just another tricky day.

NWS tweeted earlier that their survey did indeed reveal that a tornado touched down about 48th and Riverside.

https://twitter.com/NWStulsa/status/725383340140830720

We got several alerts from NWS on our i-Phones, doesn’t everyone with a smart phone get those now?

yes, but they can also be disabled (except for the alerts noted as "presidential alerts"...I have no idea what fits that criteria.

I would assume so, but if they are like the alerts I receive on my Android device they aren't all that informative. It is nice to be able to pull up an app that shows your exact location and the radar. Really helped us last night on when to come out of the shelter.

Now if I had just remembered to put something down there to entertain the kids like I normally do. Totally forgot about a few comic books or a game.

The Presidential Alerts are for when President Obama finally calls up his sleeper cells of secret Muslim lizard men to enslave us all.



At least that's what is going to happen according to my crazy Uncle Scott.

"The woods are dark and deep--" Oh wait.

NWS is making a preliminary call of an EF1 tornado touching down near Myers-Duren Harley and racing across midtown.

The Night is dark and full of terrors.

Heck, every time a dark cloud passes overhead or a snow flake falls they go totally bananas. To them it's a game of ratings, when a storm starts to fizzle out they even sound dis-appointed. :o