Wednesday Afternoon Radar & Storm Tracking Update (5/6)

Added: 2026-05-07

[00:00:03]I good afternoon everybody meteorologist David Glenn here on a Wednesday afternoon tracking showers and storms out there. It's a bit noisy. Yes, but you'll notice a lot of activity on the radar no warnings at the moment, but with so much talk yesterday the day before and we're weather alert. The reason why there's concern about storms is kind of want to get you updated on what's happening. Of course with this being prime hour when kids being picked up from school many of you are waiting carpool line and here's what's going on. Lot of noisy storms right here northern parts of Walker parts of Catoosa lot of lightning with that. There are no advisories as of yet, but it is still creating heavy downpours and again vivid lightning strikes and loud claps of thunder. So of course this all always dangerous to be outside when I've said so often when thunder roars head indoors. I remember the lightning threat. Farther back here there's lightning but it's mainly just rain. The strongest of the storms locally is right about here. So let's first of all put that in a motion and we're going to zoom in on the area with most activity right now and you can see right near say Chickamauga over to around the Flintstone area quite a bit of heavy rain there. Let me get that moving one more time.

[00:01:16]There we go.

[00:01:19]There we go.

[00:01:21]You can see right there. That's right near Ringgold very heavy rain and lightning.

[00:01:26]Could have a little bit of hail with that one too. So where it's very dark red little bit of hail could be coming down with that one right there near Ringgold.

[00:01:34]A lot of lightning with that that's crossing 75 and crossing Highway 2 where they merge and then now towards 41 down into Whitfield County. So these are moving along to the east quite rapidly.

[00:01:45]But again just below what's considered severe levels although it's pretty loud and pretty uh heavy rain producing storms. You can see right in there. Right You that little purple right there? Little bit of hail could be occurring right there, just south of Ringgold. Let me know in the comments if you are having some of that.

[00:02:04]But again, very heavy rain, a lot of lightning there. Let's pan over to the west just a little bit west of there, and you can see from Chickamauga to about the battlefield, heavy rain. That extends down to about the uh Kensington, Flintstone area down around Cooper Heights. That's uh again, very heavy rain right down 193 right there.

[00:02:21]Uh a lot of lightning with that as well, but it's moving along fairly rapidly. Um again, it's uh in an area where you've got a little bit more heating going out to the south down here. So, this whole area right in here is where we're going to watch for the next couple of hours for any potential development of more storms. So far, so good. Yeah, the earlier round of rain has kind of stabilized things a bit, but if you walked outside, it's still pretty warm and muggy. The temperature and dew point both were in the upper 60s, so that's pretty good fuel. And then in the upper levels, you got a lot of energy there as well. So, you got the energy up above, but if you get any more surface heating down below, that's a little more energy for these to feed off of and become a little bit more uh severe. But for the moment, you know, for the moment that is not happening.

[00:03:06]And no other watches and warnings are out locally. Uh rain does extend farther back to the west in the northern parts of the county parts of Jackson County, but again, uh not that severe at the moment. Just heavy rain atop Sand Mountain all the way back to uh the 72 corridor from Stevenson to Scottsboro, uh Trenton and just got out of that noisy storm. That's moved on into northern Walker County on the other edge of Lookout, uh down to the Cove area near Pigeon Mountain and over toward Ringgold.

[00:03:35]Pretty uh pretty nasty storm there.

[00:03:37]Again, as I mentioned, that one near Ringgold to just approaching Tunnel Hill may have a little bit of small hail with that, a lot of lightning. So, again, best just to stay inside, let that pass by because of lightning threat. Uh elsewhere, there's a lot of lightning, a lot of rain, but for most parts of uh Bradley, most parts of Walker, uh parts of McMinn, uh Rhea Meigs is just rain. That's it.

[00:04:03]That nothing else severe with that, and that of course is very, very good. Uh farther back to the west on the plateau, parts of Grundy County, parts of Marion, yeah, a little lightning there and near South Pittsburg and north to about Jasper and Whitwell, some lightning, but again, it's it's you know, other than making noise, it's uh below severe levels.

[00:04:20]Uh let me show you these severe parameters. They've updated these this afternoon, about an hour ago from the Storm Prediction Center. Nothing changed too much. They kind of pressed a little bit farther south at level two risk, which is kind of what we're seeing now.

[00:04:33]The energy's there. We'll just have to see if the storms uh materialize with that.

[00:04:38]Uh but as you can see, I went to Let me reload this just for a second. It went into uh edit mode. Don't want to do that.

[00:04:50]Uh but as you can see, right here, that level two is south of LaFayette, about Fort Payne and Calhoun. Now, as far as the damaging wind risk with a few storms, again, it's not every storm.

[00:05:02]It's just a few storms. And as you can see right here, there's going to be a little bit of a damaging wind threat on the low end, a little bit higher chance to the south where these storms are starting to form, Fort Payne, Calhoun, Summerville, Trion, Rome, and south of Ellijay.

[00:05:17]Here's what's changed though. The overall tornado threat has kind of shifted to mainly uh just from the Tennessee state line and south. And overall, it's very low end until you get to around, say, southern DeKalb and uh southern parts of Chattooga and most of Gordon County, a 5% chance there.

[00:05:41]And of course, everything north of the state line, your tornado threat is relatively low.

[00:05:45]That's good. So, we're really going to kind of on areas farther down to the south where uh storms are >> [clears throat] >> uh starting to form. And again, we'll go back to the live radar view.

[00:05:54]Uh as I mentioned, we're on this afternoon. Usually, we're on when there are active watches and warnings. No warnings at the moment, although you just see one polygon pop up, and that is an advisory there. And that advisory now is for Catoosa, northern Whitfield, uh northern Murray, and parts of Fannin County. Now, you probably didn't have your alert radio go off or your uh weather app go off. You usually don't. These are just advisories. These are a step below severe thunderstorm, uh but it's still letting you know that there's a pretty nasty strong storm out there just below severe levels. So, let's take a look at that. That's a storm over Ringgold right now.

[00:06:30]And that's now moving on into the northern parts of uh Whitfield near Varnell. But this is a little advisory here for about the next uh go for the next hour. About uh about the next 30 minutes.

[00:06:41]Uh for and I'll read it uh as it's listed here.

[00:06:46]Uh this is for parts of Catoosa, Fannin, Murray, and Whitfield. The northern portion of each county and the western part of Fannin County.

[00:06:54]Um Storm over Ringgold moving east at 45.

[00:06:59]Uh main hazards, of course, cloud-to-ground lightning and even some pea-size hail. That's exactly what we've seen on the radar there. So, maybe having some hail with that. Now, I wanted to see on the the the um comments if you had any hail there.

[00:07:14]See if I missed a comment there.

[00:07:17]I don't see one yet. If you did, post it. Feel free to post again. But again, that advisory is out till 3:15 Eastern Time. Again, that covers the far eastern part of Catoosa, northern Whitfield, northern Murray, and western Fannin County. So, the next half hour it's going to move uh pretty quickly. Let's put a tracker on that for you.

[00:07:37]And we're just going to track that leading edge storm, which is right here in and around Varnell, just east of Ringgold.

[00:07:52]Okay, one more time here.

[00:07:59]There you go. There's an estimated time of arrival for a few communities like Cohutta around 2:48. That's really right now.

[00:08:06]Uh let's see.

[00:08:09]It could be near Copperhill, southern parts of uh um Polk, even southern parts of Cherokee County.

[00:08:16]Crandall, about 3:07.

[00:08:21]And I would say in and around near Blue Ridge about the same time Copperhill. So, Blue Ridge around 3:30.

[00:08:28]So, it may take right at the end of that advisory just 3:15 when the storm's going to be by. But, keep in mind, we're focused on that cell right there.

[00:08:36]There's another cell just to the west near Chickamauga. Again, heavy rain, little bit of hail with that, and a lot of lightning with that. So, uh it is not severe per se, but if you're under it, you're looking to be going, "Yeah, right. It's pretty pretty nasty." And it is. Heavy rain, uh wind gust, and uh quite a bit of lightning with that, making a lot of noise, and making it dangerous to be outside.

[00:09:04]So, again, that's the only advisory out there for that area stretching from Ringgold to about Blue Ridge. Uh let's take a look inside the storm at the winds in here.

[00:09:14]Uh wind gust with that, weren't too strong.

[00:09:22]Gust up to 40 estimated. So, that's still below severe levels.

[00:09:28]You see a little bit of that bright red showing up right in here. So, this is sort of a gust estimate here. Gust up to 30, 30 above the surface. So, 30 to 40 occasional gusts. So, it's pretty windy out there, but uh the threshold for severe is 58. So, thankfully we're staying just below that. That's good. Uh let's check this other cell back here in Walker County. It's kind of an elongated one from Chickamauga to just uh west of Rock Spring down to Kensington.

[00:10:02]Again, we're looking at the velocity, look at the wind uh inside that cell.

[00:10:09]And you can see some of that bright red showing up there, too.

[00:10:12]Probably about the similar gust. Yep, around 26.

[00:10:17]30 so 30 for the most part, a gust up to 40 possible. But, these again are below severe levels, non-severe gusts. But, again, enough to bring down a a limb, make it awfully breezy out there, make the the rain blow in sideways. Okay?

[00:10:34]For the most part, uh uh not severe at the moment. And that is good. And everything north of the Tennessee state line we yeah, there's a lot of lightning popping off there in in in Marion County and again through Sequatchie County.

[00:10:50]Uh and some lightning also in and around portions of southern Bradley, southern Polk, but all of that is non-severe. It it is rain, it is making the streets wet, but it's very welcome rain that we need. Uh but mainly just uh a lot of lightning strikes with that.

[00:11:05]Embedded within the rain.

[00:11:07]The risk for anything being strong is going to be in this area down here to the south and I'll circle it for you.

[00:11:15]This is where you got a little bit of surface heating going on. Upper levels will be uh kind of energized a bit over the next several hours, but uh once we're past early evening, 6:00, 7:00, 8:00, a lot of that presses down in the south. So, it's really just over the next several hours.

[00:11:32]Um uh to see if uh if any of this materializes to the south or gets stronger. Uh any early rain like we've had has helped stabilize things to the north. That is good, but it's areas to the south make a serve for anything severe.

[00:11:47]Uh checking out your comments here.

[00:11:51]Yeah.

[00:11:51]Yes, the sleeves are up.

[00:11:53]There you go.

[00:11:54]Sleeve check. Sleeves are up.

[00:12:07]Someone asking me just about Chattanooga specifically, heaviest rain in the city is on the uh East Ridge side.

[00:12:15]So, south and east east side over to East Ridge and pretty good downpours.

[00:12:19]Occasional lightning but most of that's been to the south. Uh rain around East Brainerd, so I know this is uh pick up time for a lot of kids at school, so it's going to take a little while. Just be careful out there.

[00:12:30]Uh headlights on, windshield wipers on.

[00:12:34]Drive slowly, okay?

[00:12:40]And again, everything else up through northern parts of Hamilton and the Bradley, it is mainly rain and lightning though not severe.

[00:12:48]And the strongest storm locally is going to be these two cells right here.

[00:12:55]That one, two cell now northern Whitfield and then this one back here this elongated one from Kensington around Chickamauga near the battlefield moving east. Primarily it's gust of 30 to 40.

[00:13:06]Uh heavy rain, quite a bit of lightning, but again um it's saying just below severe levels. So, again, it's uh pretty nasty there raining heavily near Fort Oglethorpe to Chickamauga uh to about Rock Spring, but again, other than the rain, the lightning keeping you inside, the other severe parameters have right now are pretty low.

[00:13:23]And we'll continue to watch that for you.

[00:13:25]>> [snorts] >> Checking for Storm Prediction Center update if they have sent out any outlooks or anything.

[00:13:42]Nope.

[00:13:43]Yeah, there are no other watches and warnings currently, which is good. Um, let's take you on a future track update.

[00:13:50]Take you to the evening hours.

[00:13:55]Okay, send it to judiciary passed the map.

[00:13:57]>> So, here we go. What we have over us right now will continue to move off to the east.

[00:14:02]This is around 5:00, 6:00. What you notice something this is around 6:00 p.m.

[00:14:08]Now, this is if this model's right. This model will update every hour based on activity, but it tends to show a lot more activity going on farther south by 6:00.

[00:14:18]And if that happens, then the early evening hours will see a sizable shift of the severe threat farther south and mainly just rain the rest of the evening and overnight hours minus the severe threat. Okay?

[00:14:30]So, have to watch that. So, have to see really over the next several hours um, if any of these storms tap into that energy. If not, then the rain we have now is going to kind of cool and stabilize things just a bit.

[00:14:41]And then the rest of the night is not severe. It's not an all night severe thing. It's mainly through the early evening. And overnight primarily rain through early Thursday before exiting and moving out.

[00:14:53]So, this is just really over the next several hours the the high end higher end chance that any of these storms do become severe.

[00:15:07]And there's a loop over the past hour showing you how how much has been moving. And again, just to give you the skinny on that. North of the state line is primarily rain and lightning.

[00:15:18]Anything strong will be developing south of this line, south and east. So, we'll keep an eye on this for LaFayette, Calhoun, Dalton if anything materializes from that. Otherwise, it's rain, lightning, and gusts at the moment staying below severe levels.

[00:15:30]So, we got comments here. Let's see.

[00:15:31]Heavy rain in Rock Spring. Thank you, Royce.

[00:15:34]Uh Barbara's at the Ringgold Costco area.

[00:15:40]Heavy rain for you there.

[00:15:42]Stay put for a little while. It'll pass on by rather quickly.

[00:15:47]Uh Betty says a lot of lightning in Rock Spring.

[00:15:53]Cindy, uh Dalton's going to have some heavy rain moving in. You got it north of Dalton right now, but that second line is going to bring some heavy rain into Dalton during the 3:00 hour. So, very shortly that second line moving in. And what to expect in Dalton? Heavy rain, lightning, breezy, but the gusts are staying below severe levels. Okay. So, anticipate it getting uh pretty wet, uh pretty loud, with some loud claps of thunder.

[00:16:17]All right?

[00:16:24]Farther south, uh right along the Jackson uh DeKalb County line, mainly just heavy rain there. Same thing from Rising Fawn and south to the southern part of Dade County.

[00:16:35]And same thing around LaFayette. Heavy rain, though not severe.

[00:16:38]Had this rain moving out of Chickamauga, but toward Ringgold, more second little burst of heavy rain, a lot of lightning there.

[00:16:45]And we've had some wind gust estimates 30 to 40 within those two cells. Center of those cells right here and here.

[00:16:53]Aside from the noise, they're saying just below severe levels.

[00:16:57]And again, this advisory I know there are warnings out there, but this advisory's out till 3:15 uh for wind gusts up to 40, some pea-size hail, and very heavy rainfall along with the lightning risk.

[00:17:20]>> All right, my friends. That's an update for now. We'll, of course, be watching everything, provide more updates this afternoon when needed if any other watches and warnings are issued. But, that's the way things stand right now.

[00:17:29]It is loud out there in northern parts of Whitfield and Murray, parts of Walker, Catoosa, but right now they're staying just below severe levels. But, as always with a heavy rain, uh drive carefully with the lightning, stay inside, wait till there's 30 minutes between the last visible lightning strike or last audible clap of thunder before going back outside. All right, just remember when thunder roars, you head indoors and stay there. So, thankfully we're below severe levels at the moment, but we'll keep an eye from where that line is in the south if anything starts getting stronger over the next several hours. We are tracking, we'll keep you updated as always. Thanks for watching this live stream. Stay safe out there.