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Current Conditions: Partly Cloudy
Temperature: 82°F Wind: From the W at 10 mph Relative Humidity: 51% |
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Latest entries from the Weather Journal blog
About Kevin
Kevin Myatt grew up in Arkansas to the tune of tornado sirens and the rhythm of hailstones, aspiring to be a meteorologist before his studies and career were turned to journalism instead. Though he often chases storms, he prefers living in the cooler, more tranquil weather of the Blue Ridge. He moved to Roanoke in 1999 to take a job on the copy desk of The Roanoke Times; writing headlines and editing copy is his principal work for the newspaper today.
Each May, Kevin assists Pulaski County High School / Virginia Tech meteorology instructor Dave Carroll in leading college and high school students to the Plains to observe severe weather firsthand. The accounts of many of his storm chases can be found here on the storm chasing page of his weather blog on roanoke.com.
Kevin was an editor for "Hurricanes and the Middle Atlantic States," a book written by D.C.-area weather enthusiast Rick Schwartz and published by Blue Diamond Books that documents hurricanes striking the mid-Atlantic states since colonial times.
The Weather Journal column began in 2003 and appears on Friday's Virginia section front in The Roanoke Times. The Weather Journal blog began in 2006 and follows weather day-by-day between the larger columns.
Blue skies, sunshine cloud the storm story
By Kevin Myatt
The Roanoke Times
The clouds broke and the winds slowly died as we headed west across Tennessee and Arkansas on Sunday. Blue skies and bright sunshine greeted us as our 12-member storm-chasing team traveled through western Arkansas and into Oklahoma on Monday.
The weather we traveled westward through belies the turbulent spring this region has experienced, a pattern of destructive storms that has also spread eastward to include parts of Virginia and the Carolinas. At least 96 people have died in tornadoes nationally since Jan. 1, according to the Storm Prediction Center.
We saw some of the scars. Trees were scattered left and right on both sides of Interstate 40 as we crossed a tornado path near Jackson, Tenn., one of scores of storms in the huge Feb. 5 outbreak over the Southeast that killed 58.
We crossed a similar scene on I-40 near Atkins, Ark., where a tornado started out on a 100-mile-long path Feb. 5 up and over repeated ridges of the seemingly impenetrable Ozarks.
It's been a rough spring, but as we arrived in Oklahoma we found friendly smiles and kind words greeting us, even when they found out we were here to observe the storms they dread. "You just missed them," one man said, heartily not angrily, referring to Saturday's tornado outbreak that killed at least 22.
The winds started picking up in Oklahoma on Monday evening, and the threat of severe weather hung over the region yet again for Tuesday. You can visit my blog to see what, if anything, we found.
Conditions and Storms
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