Overview
- Overnight and early Monday, backbuilding and training storms produced life‑threatening flash flooding across the Ozark Plateau with radar totals near 9 inches and numerous flood reports, prompting WPC flash‑flood warnings.
- The Storm Prediction Center issued Tornado Watch 287 for parts of northern and central Kansas and southern Nebraska and multiple severe thunderstorm watches covering the High Plains that warn of very large hail up to 4 inches, a couple of tornadoes, and damaging winds.
- SPC mesoscale discussions describe extreme instability with MLCAPE commonly 3000–5000 J/kg and 35–40 kt deep‑layer shear, conditions that have supported discrete supercells capable of very large hail and tornadoes.
- As storms matured they have clustered into mesoscale convective systems and bowing segments, shifting the primary hazard to widespread damaging winds with observed gusts of 60–70+ mph and model/forecaster potential for 75–90 mph gusts overnight.
- Forecasters warn that saturated soils from recent heavy rains lower the threshold for flash flooding, local NWS offices and river forecast centers are monitoring downstream impacts, and nocturnal cooling should gradually weaken storms though localized severe and flood threats will persist.