Severe Storms and Localized Flash Flooding Threaten Southern Plains and Gulf Coast

Overview

• Active severe thunderstorm watches remain over parts of the southern High Plains with ongoing reports of large hail, damaging gusts and landspouts as clusters and transient supercells continue to develop.
• The Weather Prediction Center says expanding bands and training cells across far eastern Texas into central and southern Louisiana will produce intense rain rates of 2–3 inches per hour with localized totals of 3–5 inches, making flash flooding likely in low-lying and urban areas.
• Slow-moving elevated storms over eastern Oklahoma and adjacent southeast Kansas have produced 1.5–2 inch per hour rates and pockets of 2-inch totals, creating ongoing localized flash-flood risk where flash-flood guidance is low.
• An isolated coastal supercell south of Corpus Christi carried a high hail threat with potential 2–3+ inch stones and a brief tornado could not be ruled out, and a brief tornado was reported Friday southwest of Jackson, Mississippi.
• Forecasters point to steep midlevel lapse rates, very high instability (MLCAPE often into the 2000–4000 J/kg range), and mesoscale boundaries including outflows, drylines and sea breezes as the drivers of both the severe wind/hail risk and the locally extreme rainfall that will determine where impacts occur next.