Severe weather is forecast this evening in Southeast Nebraska.
The forecast from the National Weather Service, “Widely scattered severe storms capable of hail up to ping-pong ball size and damaging wind gusts of up to 65 to 75 mph are expected between 6 PM and midnight. Locations south of a Columbus, NE to Onawa, IA line are most likely to be affected.”
KLIN News spoke with Channel 8 Chief Meteorologist Rusty Dawkins. “We’re looking at storms starting to fire up sometime after 5PM…Large hail and damaging wind will be the initial concerns. Some areas may see some very large hail…like over golf ball size hail. So that’s your biggest threat. Once these storms get going, then we’ll see the benefits… heavy rain in some spots which we desperately need,” said Dawkins.
The forecast for weather this weekend is also not ideal… After a week full of temperatures in the late 80s and low 90s, in typical Nebraska fashion, we may be looking at snowfall by the end of the week.
Dawkins says, “By Sunday, we’re looking at eventually seeing mostly sunny to partly cloudy skies. That’s after some lingering showers very early Sunday morning. In fact, it’ll be cool enough… with temperatures dropping into the middle 30s late Saturday night into Sunday morning… and if that precipitation is still around, it would not surprise me if we see a couple of snowflakes very early Sunday morning.”
Dawkins gave advice to keep safe tonight with the threat of hail and severe weather, “As we head through tonight… If there is a severe thunderstorm warning that is issued for your area, make sure you stay away from the windows. We’re going to have gusty winds, maybe over 60, then large hail. So that’s like a baseball coming at your windows, and you don’t want that to happen.”
You can always tune in to Channel 8 and here at KLIN for the latest weather updates.
(Photo Courtesy: National Weather Service)