Last week’s tornado outbreak left dozens dead and towns devastated across six states could happen again. The National Weather Service (NWS) warned Wednesday morning that “another historical weather day” is imminent for the Midwest.
NWS said a severe weather threat is slated for later today into tonight across the Mid-Missouri Valley to the Upper Mississippi Valley. “Embedded gusts of 75-100 mph and a strong tornado or two are also possible, particularly from extreme eastern Nebraska across western to northern Iowa and southeastern Minnesota,” the weather agency said.
In a series of tweets, NWS outlines how “another historical weather day is forecast today with two never-before-seen outlooks issued.” First, a moderate risk (4/5 on the severity scale) of life-threatening weather has been declared for parts of Iowa, Minnesota, and Wisconsin. The weather agency said this is the first time that it published such an alert for those states in December.
The highest tornado risk appears to be across much of Iowa. “All of this will likely be occurring AFTER DARK, so make your preparations now and follow severe weather alerts,” NWS said.
“The Central U.S. has never seen a December storm like this,” tweeted MSNBC meteorologist Bill Karins. “Multi-hazard, life-threatening weather today.”
At the same time, Southern and Central Plains states are plagued with the first “extremely critical” fire outlook, the first in NWS’ history for December.
All of this is occurring as temperatures across the U.S. have been mild.
Stay tuned for weather updates this evening and into the overnight.
