A rare June severe weather outbreak is expected Wednesday across the Southeast, where destructive winds, damaging hail and strong tornadoes are all possible. The severe storms could even meet the criteria for a widespread damaging-wind event known as a derecho.
Wednesday’s severe weather threat comes after widespread hail fell across Texas and Colorado on Monday – some as large as 4 inches in diameter. One of the hardest-hit areas was Pampa, Texas, where baseball-sized hail fell. Massive hail fell again Tuesday across parts of Texas, while a tornado was spotted in Colorado.
An outbreak of severe thunderstorms is expected across the Southeast on Wednesday, a rarity for June in this region of the U.S. Nearly 23 million people are included in the risk of severe weather, which covers the cities of Jackson in Mississippi, Dothan and Montgomery in Alabama and Albany and Columbus in Georgia.
The threat has been increased to a level 4 on NOAA’s Storm Prediction Center’s 5-point severe thunderstorm risk category scale for northeastern Louisiana, central and southern Mississippi and Alabama and southwestern Georgia.
The intense storms will likely come in multiple rounds and could pack wind gusts of over 80 mph, hail larger than 3 inches in diameter and even a couple of EF-2 or stronger tornadoes. If the swath of wind damage spans at least 400 miles, the severe weather outbreak will meet the criteria for a derecho.