Return to Transcripts main page

Live From...

Storm Concerns Continue to Build Around Atlanta

Aired May 06, 2003 - 15:29   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Let's bring in meteorologist Jacqui Jeras who is watching things very closely for us. Hello, Jacqui.
JACQUI JERAS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Hello, Miles. Well we have our first damage report in. All the tornado warnings we've been telling that have been going on across the northern suburbs and across the east of northern Georgia. We have a report of a tornado that damaged a mobile home and some vehicles near Bowman, which is in Elbert County. It's actually just off of our map here to the south of I-85. It's that warning we told you about for Abbeville and for Elbert County.

Still a couple of tornado warnings in effect. And these are just in for northeastern McCormick County and also Wilkes County. And these are in effect until 3:45. And we're continuing to see the direction of these storms here moving to the east to southeast. So a little bit of a change on a couple of these individual cells, moving a little bit more southeasterly around 35 miles per hour.

We're continuing to get new watches in. We just got one in effect for parts of Missouri. And there you can see the worst of the thunderstorms right now right across northern Georgia, pushing into parts of South Carolina. And we're seeing some development here also to the south of Kansas City. No tornado warnings on that right now, but we have had some severe weather reports and we can expect to see hail the size of quarters easily, and potentially up to three inches in diameter.

Want to show you also Texas. You're under a severe thunderstorm watch right along the I-35 corridor, north of San Antonio and right across the Dallas/Fort Worth area. These storms are pushing up to the northeast. And even though this is a severe thunderstorm watch, we still have a little bit of upper level sheer. So be aware that sometimes, even though it's a severe thunderstorm watch, we can also get a tornado now and then.

Our other big concern is the rainfall amount. They have just been incredible, Miles. This is Doppler Radar estimated rainfall totals from the last 12 hours. And I put some arrows here to indicate. And about the northern third of Georgia here, these dark golds and into the oranges indicates about 3 to 5 inches of rainfall. And then we also have up to six inches of rain into north central parts of Mississippi and into southern parts of Tennessee.

And there you can see a very ominous picture. Boy, all I can see is black there from WXIA. I'm not sure exactly where that point is, but that's from downtown Atlanta. I'm not exactly sure what direction that we're looking in.

But most of the warnings at this time are to the north and east of the Atlanta area. That includes McCormick County until 3:45. A developing tornado likely just north of McCormick, moving east- southeast. And, of course, you want to be in the basement, the lowest level of your home, away from doors and windows during this time.

The skies, boy, really looking very ominous. Take a look at that. Very incredible. Very dark. And these have just been moisture producers. We can get a good 1 to 2 inches of rainfall out of these in a very short period of time, even within about a half an hour or so as these push on off to the east.

That severe weather threat covers a very large portion of the country for today. And we're really dealing with two different areas today. We have what's happening here in the southeast that's going to be very different from what's going on across parts of Missouri into Kansas and into Texas, where we've got that dry line starting to move on through.

So we're going to see more individual supercell-type thunderstorms here across the plains. And then into the southeast we're going to see more cluster-type thunderstorms. So you're going to see storm after storm after storm with lots of lightning across the southeast. And you may have say sunny skies across southwestern parts of Missouri at this hour. And then later on this afternoon we may get one of those supercells developing and that one thing is going to move through very, very quickly -- Miles.

O'BRIEN: Jacqui, looking at that picture from WXIA, which we just took off the screen, when you look at that, if you are faced with that sky, and you don't head for the basement, I don't know what will send you to the basement. That is something.

JERAS: That is something. It's very dark. And it's really very shielded. So I can't really pick out what part of the storm this could possibly be.

But I would be concerned about very heavy rain. I'd be concerned about hail. A lot of lightning at this time. I don't see any rotation right there, and I know we don't have a warning in effect for the Atlanta metro area, but that certainly is a cell that we need to watch over the next half an hour to hour or so.

O'BRIEN: All right, a lot of people watching who aren't in Atlanta would be concerned about the airport. Is it closed right now? Just delays? Do you know what the situation is there right now?

JERAS: I know there have been quite a few delays. In fact, I've got a producer here, Kevin with me. Kevin, if you have a second to get on that computer right there and click on the FAA.

O'BRIEN: Tell you what? While Kevin's doing that, give us a quick, big picture here of the jet stream. Sort of the steering winds that are causing all these problems we're seeing.

JERAS: Right. Well we have very strong upper level winds. And you may be asking yourself, well, we've been watching places like Kansas into Missouri, down into Arkansas, Tennessee, for the last three days. Why is it that the same spots are getting hit over and over and over again?

Well we have a very active jet stream. And here you can see -- what the jet stream is, it's just a very fast-moving winds through the upper levels of the atmosphere. And storm systems generally move within that jet stream. So they kind of follow that track.

Now you can see that there's what we call a trough or kind of a little dip here across parts of the west. And then over here in the east you can see it's what we call ridging out. So it kind of bows on up. And storms tend to develop right within this area. Right where you've got that little kink between the trough and into the ridge. And you can see that kind of causes a little bit of rotation.

So these low pressure cyclones start to develop. They bring in the warm air from the south, since they rotate counterclockwise, pulling in that cooler, dryer air in from the north and then they travel on off to the east. And so that's why we are seeing storm after storm starting to develop here.

And until we see a change in this jet stream, until this flattens out or starts to ridge a little bit more off the west, we're going to see low pressure cyclones develop, probably every three to five days. And right now our long range pattern which goes out seven to 10 days is looking like things aren't going to be changing very much. So we can expect quite some time of very active weather on and off across much of the plains and across much of the southeast.

O'BRIEN: All right, Jacqui, we have a picture of the airport. Let's see if we can get that on the air. It's RX49 for (UNINTELLIGIBLE) in the control room. Let's take a look at that shot. Was Kevin able to pull it up?

(CROSSTALK)

JERAS: ... about an hour delay right now averaging in Atlanta Hartsfield.

(CROSSTALK)

O'BRIEN: That's from -- it's a spectacular image. I'm sputtering here. But as a meteorologist, what did you see there with that bright sky with the dark sky above it?

JERAS: Well -- I can just hear thunder in our studio, by the way, which I've never heard in here before.

You know if we can put that into the telestrator, I could actually point a couple things out to you. But you know that obviously the leading edge of the thunderstorm right there. And when you see clearer skies like that with all that sunshine on the other side, that means there is a lot of heat going on across the atmosphere. And a lot of the energy since this seems so isolated is going to be focused in this one thunderstorm and we're going to have a large updraft going on and a lot of vertical developments. So thunderstorms can certainly develop very rapidly....

(CROSSTALK)

O'BRIEN: Jacqui, I don't think you saw it, but I saw two planes departing. So obviously it's not completely closed down. There must be a break in that weather there.

JERAS: Well, actually, I don't know if one of you guys can reset my computer for me and we can go back to our Atlanta radar picture. it'll show that to the south of Atlanta Hartsfield we've got clear skies. There are no thunderstorms.

And so you know these clouds tops, the thunderstorms can go up 50, 60,000 feet in the atmosphere. But next to them, say, you know, 10 miles away, perhaps, you can have clear skies. So airplanes are actually able to fly around them. And that's why the flights are still able to take off. They can take off to the south and go around these thunderstorms and get to the direction that they're going.

O'BRIEN: All right, Jacqui. Lots of good information. Thank you very much. We appreciate that and we'll try to get that telestrator up and running a little later. We appreciate you being with us.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com






Aired May 6, 2003 - 15:29   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Let's bring in meteorologist Jacqui Jeras who is watching things very closely for us. Hello, Jacqui.
JACQUI JERAS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Hello, Miles. Well we have our first damage report in. All the tornado warnings we've been telling that have been going on across the northern suburbs and across the east of northern Georgia. We have a report of a tornado that damaged a mobile home and some vehicles near Bowman, which is in Elbert County. It's actually just off of our map here to the south of I-85. It's that warning we told you about for Abbeville and for Elbert County.

Still a couple of tornado warnings in effect. And these are just in for northeastern McCormick County and also Wilkes County. And these are in effect until 3:45. And we're continuing to see the direction of these storms here moving to the east to southeast. So a little bit of a change on a couple of these individual cells, moving a little bit more southeasterly around 35 miles per hour.

We're continuing to get new watches in. We just got one in effect for parts of Missouri. And there you can see the worst of the thunderstorms right now right across northern Georgia, pushing into parts of South Carolina. And we're seeing some development here also to the south of Kansas City. No tornado warnings on that right now, but we have had some severe weather reports and we can expect to see hail the size of quarters easily, and potentially up to three inches in diameter.

Want to show you also Texas. You're under a severe thunderstorm watch right along the I-35 corridor, north of San Antonio and right across the Dallas/Fort Worth area. These storms are pushing up to the northeast. And even though this is a severe thunderstorm watch, we still have a little bit of upper level sheer. So be aware that sometimes, even though it's a severe thunderstorm watch, we can also get a tornado now and then.

Our other big concern is the rainfall amount. They have just been incredible, Miles. This is Doppler Radar estimated rainfall totals from the last 12 hours. And I put some arrows here to indicate. And about the northern third of Georgia here, these dark golds and into the oranges indicates about 3 to 5 inches of rainfall. And then we also have up to six inches of rain into north central parts of Mississippi and into southern parts of Tennessee.

And there you can see a very ominous picture. Boy, all I can see is black there from WXIA. I'm not sure exactly where that point is, but that's from downtown Atlanta. I'm not exactly sure what direction that we're looking in.

But most of the warnings at this time are to the north and east of the Atlanta area. That includes McCormick County until 3:45. A developing tornado likely just north of McCormick, moving east- southeast. And, of course, you want to be in the basement, the lowest level of your home, away from doors and windows during this time.

The skies, boy, really looking very ominous. Take a look at that. Very incredible. Very dark. And these have just been moisture producers. We can get a good 1 to 2 inches of rainfall out of these in a very short period of time, even within about a half an hour or so as these push on off to the east.

That severe weather threat covers a very large portion of the country for today. And we're really dealing with two different areas today. We have what's happening here in the southeast that's going to be very different from what's going on across parts of Missouri into Kansas and into Texas, where we've got that dry line starting to move on through.

So we're going to see more individual supercell-type thunderstorms here across the plains. And then into the southeast we're going to see more cluster-type thunderstorms. So you're going to see storm after storm after storm with lots of lightning across the southeast. And you may have say sunny skies across southwestern parts of Missouri at this hour. And then later on this afternoon we may get one of those supercells developing and that one thing is going to move through very, very quickly -- Miles.

O'BRIEN: Jacqui, looking at that picture from WXIA, which we just took off the screen, when you look at that, if you are faced with that sky, and you don't head for the basement, I don't know what will send you to the basement. That is something.

JERAS: That is something. It's very dark. And it's really very shielded. So I can't really pick out what part of the storm this could possibly be.

But I would be concerned about very heavy rain. I'd be concerned about hail. A lot of lightning at this time. I don't see any rotation right there, and I know we don't have a warning in effect for the Atlanta metro area, but that certainly is a cell that we need to watch over the next half an hour to hour or so.

O'BRIEN: All right, a lot of people watching who aren't in Atlanta would be concerned about the airport. Is it closed right now? Just delays? Do you know what the situation is there right now?

JERAS: I know there have been quite a few delays. In fact, I've got a producer here, Kevin with me. Kevin, if you have a second to get on that computer right there and click on the FAA.

O'BRIEN: Tell you what? While Kevin's doing that, give us a quick, big picture here of the jet stream. Sort of the steering winds that are causing all these problems we're seeing.

JERAS: Right. Well we have very strong upper level winds. And you may be asking yourself, well, we've been watching places like Kansas into Missouri, down into Arkansas, Tennessee, for the last three days. Why is it that the same spots are getting hit over and over and over again?

Well we have a very active jet stream. And here you can see -- what the jet stream is, it's just a very fast-moving winds through the upper levels of the atmosphere. And storm systems generally move within that jet stream. So they kind of follow that track.

Now you can see that there's what we call a trough or kind of a little dip here across parts of the west. And then over here in the east you can see it's what we call ridging out. So it kind of bows on up. And storms tend to develop right within this area. Right where you've got that little kink between the trough and into the ridge. And you can see that kind of causes a little bit of rotation.

So these low pressure cyclones start to develop. They bring in the warm air from the south, since they rotate counterclockwise, pulling in that cooler, dryer air in from the north and then they travel on off to the east. And so that's why we are seeing storm after storm starting to develop here.

And until we see a change in this jet stream, until this flattens out or starts to ridge a little bit more off the west, we're going to see low pressure cyclones develop, probably every three to five days. And right now our long range pattern which goes out seven to 10 days is looking like things aren't going to be changing very much. So we can expect quite some time of very active weather on and off across much of the plains and across much of the southeast.

O'BRIEN: All right, Jacqui, we have a picture of the airport. Let's see if we can get that on the air. It's RX49 for (UNINTELLIGIBLE) in the control room. Let's take a look at that shot. Was Kevin able to pull it up?

(CROSSTALK)

JERAS: ... about an hour delay right now averaging in Atlanta Hartsfield.

(CROSSTALK)

O'BRIEN: That's from -- it's a spectacular image. I'm sputtering here. But as a meteorologist, what did you see there with that bright sky with the dark sky above it?

JERAS: Well -- I can just hear thunder in our studio, by the way, which I've never heard in here before.

You know if we can put that into the telestrator, I could actually point a couple things out to you. But you know that obviously the leading edge of the thunderstorm right there. And when you see clearer skies like that with all that sunshine on the other side, that means there is a lot of heat going on across the atmosphere. And a lot of the energy since this seems so isolated is going to be focused in this one thunderstorm and we're going to have a large updraft going on and a lot of vertical developments. So thunderstorms can certainly develop very rapidly....

(CROSSTALK)

O'BRIEN: Jacqui, I don't think you saw it, but I saw two planes departing. So obviously it's not completely closed down. There must be a break in that weather there.

JERAS: Well, actually, I don't know if one of you guys can reset my computer for me and we can go back to our Atlanta radar picture. it'll show that to the south of Atlanta Hartsfield we've got clear skies. There are no thunderstorms.

And so you know these clouds tops, the thunderstorms can go up 50, 60,000 feet in the atmosphere. But next to them, say, you know, 10 miles away, perhaps, you can have clear skies. So airplanes are actually able to fly around them. And that's why the flights are still able to take off. They can take off to the south and go around these thunderstorms and get to the direction that they're going.

O'BRIEN: All right, Jacqui. Lots of good information. Thank you very much. We appreciate that and we'll try to get that telestrator up and running a little later. We appreciate you being with us.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com