CLEVELAND — The Power of 5 Weather team is tracking a risk for severe weather on Wednesday afternoon and evening.
Scattered severe storms including supercells are expected to develop and quickly move northeastward. We have enough instability and wind energy for large hail and damaging winds to develop along with the potential for tornadoes occurring near a warm front. A tornado watch and severe thunderstorm watch have been issued for much of Ohio.
A tornado watch has been issued for our SE communities until 10 p.m. A few tornadoes are possible, scattered large hail events to 1.5 inches in diameter likely and isolated damaging wind gusts to 70 mph possible
A Severe Thunderstorm Watch has been issued for western Ohio until 9 p.m. Wednesday evening for western and central Ohio. Scattered large hail events to 1 inch in diameter possible, isolated damaging wind gusts to 65 mph possible and a tornado or two is possible.
Chief Meteorologist Mark Johnson has the latest weather update. Watch it in the player below:
REMEMBER!
REMEMBER: A watch means we have the ingredients that are favorable for severe storms. Anyone in these areas should be on the lookout for threatening weather and watch for possible warnings. A warning means dangerous storms are happening at that moment and you need to take shelter pic.twitter.com/FBcPA8MTYN
— Katie McGraw (@KatieMcGrawx) March 23, 2022
Morning showers rolled through early on Wednesday and NE Ohio has been seeing a lull in the activity and dry time through midday. Even the sun has come out! Gusty southeast winds are helping temps soar and will be well above average for the end of March. Gusts near 40 mph are helping temps jump back into the lower 60s this afternoon. That's warm enough to fuel strong or severe storms. The strongest storms could even be damaging.
The main threat is damaging winds, but large hail and isolated tornadoes are possible as well. Periods of heavy rain and lightning are also likely.
As of 2 p.m. Wednesday, most of the viewing area is dry but storms are starting to flare in central Ohio and will increase over the next few hours.
Plan on a few severe thunderstorm warnings this afternoon into the early evening (roughly 3 p.m. to 9 p.m.) and the severe threat drops off by tonight. Tornado warnings are also possible. Make sure you have a plan and are staying informed. This is our first run-in with spring storms, so don't get caught off guard.
While the entire Power of 5 viewing area has the potential for severe weather today, the best chance for rotating storms looks to be in our southeast and southwestern communities. This includes Mansfield, Wooster, New Philly and Canton. Notice the difference between the tornado risk, wind risk and hail risk for Wednesday below.
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