Very slow season for the Great Lakes (MI half)...

Joined
Feb 8, 2004
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Location
Detroit, MI
I am pretty shocked at MI's season so far, it has been one of the slowest years that I have ever seen. We are now going into our "peak" season, and hopefully things will lighten up soon around here. How many tornadoes have we even had this year, like 2 or 3 reported? Not only tornadoes that MI has been slow on this year, but rather severe weather in general, yet WI has seen 28 tornadoes in the past two monthes, lol....
 
It looks like the mega-ridge is going to shut things down most places in C. and E. U.S.... but maybe you can catch something coming over the top of it, or a front hanging up in the north.

It's backdoor cold-fronts and tropical systems from here on out in my region.
 
I've witnessed some pretty cool things this year, which is a first for MI. Seen a gustnado that lasted around :30 - :45 seconds, later witnessed 70MPH winds or so, which pushed down some trees right across the street. Several days ago, went after the tail end of a bow echo that broke off and got blasted by an estimated 70MPH wind gust in Romeo, which broke several large tree branches... My standards aren't too high, as I have only witnessed one MI tornado in the past couple years. I would really like to see a huge derecho to move through during the night hours, so I can get some decent lightning...
 
You've had it better than scentral WI. There hasn't been a tornado in the southern part of the state since March 30th. All the rest of the above-average 28 tornadoes have been in the GRB, ARX or MPX CWAs.

You MI peoples have had a couple good events in the last few weeks:

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Quit yer yappin'. :)

Oh and Nick, doesn't this make you glad you got your Plains trip in this year? :D
 
Yeah, I finally got to get out of the Great Lakes this year for once. I actually got multiple vacations, one from 26-April to 21-May and then one from 2-June to 19-June (just arrived back to Detroit yesterday morning) and lemme tell ya, it was absolutely worth my while.

Next year there will be no vacations, because I graduate from High School by this coming April and will be moving to Norman in the spring, as I will be attending OU. :)

Yeah, and look at that map, MI as usual... Winds! LOL, wow, only two reported tornadoes around here so far. I think last year, we had already seen at least 15-20 reported in the state by this date...
 
Hahaha, Illinois led the US with 125 tornadoes in 2003...was among the top as well in 2004...and now, I doubt if we've had ONE supercell produced tornado. The 5-10 reports this year have all been flukes by some off chance of a weak piddly @$*&^ crossing a boundary or something. Even CA has had more tornadoes than us this year. Talk about going from first to worst in a hurry!! No transition there... Kinda makes it hard to take everyone else's complaining about their area's "horrible year" seriously... While those of you with the horrible 5 to 10 tornadoes this year...a couple of us who can't always get away are still waiting for that lucky #1. [/rant]
 
Geez....your suprised at MI having a slow season? How about 0 tornadoes in OK for the month of May? At the end of May, there had only been 15 tornadoes in Oklahoma in 2005...14 F0 and 1 F1. And there are only 7 preliminary tornadoes for June...and some of these reports were possibly the same tornado at 2 locations.

Man...you think your disappointed in your state this season....
 
Originally posted by Chris Sokol
Geez....your suprised at MI having a slow season? How about 0 tornadoes in OK for the month of May? At the end of May, there had only been 15 tornadoes in Oklahoma in 2005...14 F0 and 1 F1. And there are only 7 preliminary tornadoes for June...and some of these reports were possibly the same tornado at 2 locations.

Man...you think your disappointed in your state this season....

Hahah, yeah, May sucked. But, again...you want depressed? Illinois had it's first classic supercell last Monday. Not even a good one either... March, April, May...nothing. Couple flukes here and there...but...still waiting on our first actual event here, that isnt a stupid mcs from a plains outbreak coming through the next morning.
 
Originally posted by APritchard
Illinois had it's first classic supercell last Monday.

Not quite. It was actually your second. :wink:



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Peoria area March 30th. You know it's been a slow year when the best severe weather event was in March!
 
Originally posted by Andy Wehrle+--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Andy Wehrle)</div>
<!--QuoteBegin-APritchard
Illinois had it's first classic supercell last Monday.

Not quite. It was actually your second. :wink:



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Peoria area March 30th. You know it's been a slow year when the best severe weather event was in March![/b]

Oh yeah, forgot about that elevated crap day :) Actually, that thing did manage to become surface based for a little bit, but, was also moving at 40-60 mph. Take what you can get, right?
 
I'm not expecting MI's bad luck streak for severe weather to lift anytime soon and today is no exception: Maybe some wind, maybe some hail, probably no naders.
 
Maybe July will give Illinois a tornadic supercell or two, or maybe you have to wait until the Autumn. Hey, an F5 did hit the Joliet/Plainfield area on 08/28/90. Second only to the 5/3/99 OKC storm in windspeed.
 
i'm not worried, july, aug, and into the fall can and have produced sig. tornadoes in michigan in the past.

Examples from last 10 years or so provided by the NCDC: http://www4.ncdc.noaa.gov/cgi-win/wwcgi.dl...?wwEvent~Storms

08/25/1998- Edwardsburg F2. on ground 9 miles.

07/2/1997- Several Supercells that produced F-3 tornadoes.

06/21/1996- Frankenmuth F3

07/3/1999- F2, hit the town of comins, destorying much of the town. tornado on the ground for 16 miles. i remember there is a study about this storm on the web somewhere, i'll see if i can find it.

So, anything is possible. Hopefully the upcoming months make up for a lackluster spring. I just hope it isn't 2000 all over again, in which one tornado occured all year in the SE part of the state.
 
I'd like to see that study on the Comins tornado, Jeremy. I hope you can find it.

The one promising Michigan chase day I can think of this season was June 5, and naturally, I'd made a commitment to play at Grand Rapids' annual Festival of the Arts. We were scheduled for 4:00; storms started firing around 1:30. Aaargh! Naturally, a storm blew in during the act preceding ours. Someone mentioned seeing a flying eagle over GR. That sounds about right. The hail fell, the wind threatened to blow the Outer Fringe tent away, the sound system got shut down, and our act got cancelled. And I freakin' KNEW this was going to happen, but I was locked into my commitment. With the best window of time wasted, I sprinted the four blocks to my car with my saxophone in my hands, hopped in, and headed east, but I was too late and got nothing except a lot of rain and high winds. Not even any decent storm structure.

I hope we get a crack at something decent yet this year. The one tornado I've witnessed in Michigan occurred in August, so while I'm not holding my breath, I'm not giving up hope, either.
 
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