Tornado Watch for Central Indiana | 7:30 P.M. UPDATE + RADAR

[00:00:00]Good evening. I'm meteorologist Angela Buckman along with meteorologist uh Shawn Ash and Rob Ellis. We're here to get you through the severe threat over the next several hours. We are under that threat, weather impact alert with a tornado watch until um we think the threat will wind down between 1:00 and 2:00. Technically, the tornado watch until 1:00 a.m. Significant wind gusts, large hail, tornadoes. We've been talking about this for the last couple of days, making sure you know that safety plan and that your cell phone is charged and ready to go. Our updates here on WTHR plus, our streaming app, will start with uh every half hour. So, 7:30, it's 7:30, we'll do another one at 8:00, 8:30. We do anticipate some continuing coverage as we start to get some warnings into central Indiana. There's the highlighted area for the tornado watch until 1:00 a.m. It does include just about all of us in central Indiana. What we're tracking, wave one brought us some heavy rain and some lightning, nothing severe.

[00:00:58]Wave two is on its way in and it has been responsible for at least one tornado across uh parts of central Illinois near Springfield. There was damage to a restaurant, some trees and power lines down. This second wave also responsible for some flash flood warnings. Those are those darker areas of red you see north of Champagne and we have had some severe thunderstorm and tornado warnings. Uh the latest tornado warning comes to the state line just to the west of Terre Haute. So, here we are.

[00:01:29]Here's I-70. Here's Vigo County. That latest tornado warning comes to the state line. Uh this is the Terre Haute media market, so uh we'll let them cover that, but stick with us. We'll be keeping you updated as well. Uh we do have heavy pockets of rain from Lafayette, uh north side of Marion County. Lots of lightning with these cells as well and still the potential that as we get a stronger wind field developing, that some of these storms may rotate. So, that is a threat.

[00:01:58]Again, we are all under that tornado watch. Right now, no warnings, although we do have the very heavy rain across Tippecanoe County. There's Interstate 65. There's I-74.

[00:02:10]Heavy rain from Lafayette over toward Kokomo and at that pocket of heavy rain that's on the north side of Marion County that's impacting the Fishers area and Interstate 69 just to the east of Carmel. And then as you move through parts of Madison County including Pendleton and Lapel at this hour.

[00:02:28]Eastern part of the state again not severe. Hartford City, Muncie, Portland, Winchester, Richmond all dealing with rain and some lightning from Connersville over toward Liberty in the eastern part of the state as well. So, that kind of covers locally what we're dealing with in terms of that threat of severe weather. Now, the warnings, let's come back out a little bit and then we'll take you across the state line and we'll pick up the the radar from the central part of Illinois. And you can see the warnings here. The tornado warning just to the west of Terre Haute.

[00:02:59]A severe thunderstorm warning west of there. And then these are all flash flood warnings. Rob has been keeping a very close eye on the one storm in Illinois. Really large hail associated with that. So, let's put on our hail tracker.

[00:03:15]This will give us an idea of the size of the hail and then the length of this storm or the path of this storm. And you can see there's Springfield, there's Lincoln and Decatur. Sean also mentioned there was a wind gust of 70 78.

[00:03:32]78 78 mph in Decatur, Illinois. That is severe thunderstorm warning and then you can see the tornado warning, but boy, that is some big hail. That is just to the southwest of Champaign and it looks like we've got a new severe thunderstorm warning south of Springfield. So, a lot of the severe weather at least right this minute is just to our west across portions of Illinois. That tornado warned storm is just to the west of Terre Haute and along Interstate 70. So, the National Weather Service out of Indianapolis will at some point have to decide are we going to do a severe thunderstorm warning, are we going to do a tornado warning on this?

[00:04:12]Still some rotation with that, but we expect some new information from our local National Weather Service office in terms of any additional severe warnings and most likely that will be the beginning of an active evening for us.

[00:04:27]We did have wave one move through. We're keeping an eye on wave two and that severe threat that will linger through about 1:00 to 2:00 in the morning. If there's any good news at this point, we don't have any warnings. Flash flooding is going to be a threat.

[00:04:42]We do think damaging wind and tornadoes still in play over the next several hours as well. We've been keeping you updated most of the week on how you can prepare ahead of time in that safe spot.

[00:04:54]Good idea to have some shoes. It was interesting conversation with Anne and Rob at noon today. Shoes not something that you think about if you're at home and in your safe place, but if you would have to exit your home and there's been some damage or debris, might be nice to have a pair of shoes on. Cell phone that's charged, maybe a battery backup, weather radio. We talked about this at 5:00. Those are for weather radios are important because the sirens that we hear, sometimes you can hear them inside, are for outdoor use only. So, weather radio is important along with that cell phone and the streaming app can be very helpful, too, because this is something that you can take on your phone into your safe place if you have to leave your television. A helmet, we always say helmet, sometimes pillows if you don't can't find a helmet and you're in a hurry to get to your safe place, pillows, something to protect your head always a good idea. And And once severe weather has moved on, we have to assume down lines are live, treat uh uh those flashing traffic uh lights as four-way stops, and don't travel in any high water. And all of these hazards become much more difficult to see once we lose um daylight. It is still light out there, only 7:30. Sunset isn't until well after 9:00 tonight. Our weather impact alert will continue for the next several hours. So, stay with us here on the WTHR streaming app and on channel 13 as necessary. We expect these impacts to continue to be widespread.

[00:06:20]As I mentioned, uh tornado watch until 1:00. They have already had some damage and some flash flooding across parts of Illinois. This line of storms making a move east and southeast, so we are targeting the southern half of the state. Think Indianapolis south for the greatest threat of damaging wind, large hail, and tornadoes. But, there's enough spin in the atmosphere, rotation can't be ruled out to the north. And remember, we are all under a tornado watch until 1:00. So, this was just a quick live update. We're going to have another one for you at 8:00 tonight. So, about 25 minutes away or so. Another update here that will be live at 8:00. If necessary, we'll come on before. And as I mentioned, we do expect some continuing coverage as this last second line of storms starts to move our way tonight.