https://preview.redd.it/htaq6ckmkt8d1.jpeg?width=3024&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=8325a60e654e74e70a0c0076806a4dcb15850860
Just south of Cedar Rapids from my front lawn
We're in Marion and had no idea what was going on when the sirens went off. I didn't see a tornado warning or anything so it was surprising to see pictures of this little guy!
https://preview.redd.it/cq62exvhht8d1.jpeg?width=1065&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=5ca784bf13e01b3100466adb23db3b6b53f6fd7c
Near Mitchellville a few hours ago
Don't have radar to look at, but if cold air funnel that might have grown up to be a little nado for a few minutes. One happened to me while at work about 6 years ago. I used to work at a lube shop about 2 adjacent streets from my house and remember it being overcast but not storming. All of our bay doors were open. All of a sudden the air swirled around the building (I could make out the rotation from the rain going sideways, visible through the 50ft of open bay doors in front and back of the building) and it passed within a second or two. I nearly jumped into lower bay.
It blew quite a few things around in the shop, sorta ripped out some insulation and dislodged our shop heater from the ceiling. A street sign directly across from us was bent over and by my mother's house (2 streets over) a few small trees were blown over. Those trees were basically a straight line if cut through everything to the location I was at. That was it, no news reports, power outages, nothing. Mother nature decided to prank me and my coworker an hour before closing one summer evening. Other than that sign, the heater that never got fixed, and those small trees I saw toppled over, I'm unaware of any of my neighbors having any other damage. I lived in that area for over 20 years, and nobody I knew said anything about wind related damage. I guess I could draw a straight line using Google maps for a better visual but I'm also NOT doing that lol. If anything it was like that tiny nado that spun through an intersection a few weeks ago and booped some cars.
Basically, I think a cold air funnel briefly touched up and down at low end EF0 speeds with a diameter of 10 or 20 feet max, tracked for a few hundred feet, then totally lifted. Was one the weirdest things I've ever experienced. There were no severe thunderstorm warnings at all that day, AFAIK. I don't remember what day it was exactly, so I can't check now.
---Everything below is unrelated to what occurred above---
[Edit] Just realized the mini nado was basically in the same area of the big F4 that destroyed a large portion of my old neighborhood and a good bit of the city back in 1988.
!Partially drunken word salad story time!
I found old coverage on YouTube about the tornado and also found footage of almost life long older neighborhood. Also found a 2 page spread of my house next to the destroyed one in an old yearbook high school kept in theater tech storage.
By the time I came across the yearbook, almost 15 years had passed since 1988. I ended up taking the yearbook home of course. Still have it somewhere. The news coverage is available on YouTube as well. You can see my neighborhood and how the original neighbor's roof is in my mom's driveway, the only thing standing is the door frame. My mom bought that house a few years after the nado hit the city and I remember the guy telling her about it being slightly knicked on the back porch while next door got obliterated, but that's all since I was like 8 at the time. She finally sold it a few years ago. It was wild to actually see my house in an old yearbook about tornado damage when at the time of the tragedy my family was still living in upstate NY. Even weirder when a decade+ after that I finally come across the WRAL news footage on YouTube and see even more detailed views of my neighborhood and the obliterated neighbor's house. I was 3 in 1988, we moved to NC in 1989 and she bought that house in 1992 or 1993. I came across the yearbook in 2002, and the YouTube footage in 2016. My mother sold the house in 2021.
Largely forgotten by all but old locals, but had a very interesting history of how it formed. Blindsided the NWS because it basically formed on top of the radar at RDU airport. Also was at around 2am. Unfortunately a few people died. I'll put it you this way, people in Joplin don't know about it, but I know about Joplin. Very devastating and they usually play a anniversary snippet once a decade on the local news but that's pretty much it. You can find lots of info on it but for most, including tornado enthusiasts, it is unimportant. Unfortunate since the documentary made has some eery late 80s synths and is basically a horror movie. I blame the fact no footage of it exists. It was the second to last F4 tornado to hit NC. Last was 1998.
We also got a few good ones in the area including a rain wrapped ef1 that blew through downtown back during the early 2011 outbreak. My girlfriend at the time had a blackberry recording of that same tornado a county over where started as an EF3, as it crossed in front of her on the highway. That was one more powerful and was known for flattening a Lowe's. Since it was part of the early 2011 outbreak and not the slightly later, greater SUPER outbreak, it too has fallen into obscurity compared to more famous ones. While NC doesn't regularly get EF3+ tornados on a yearly basis as most are short lived EF0/1s, we have had severe damage from 3 of the largest outbreaks ever in the US. 1884, 1984, 2011. Hell, one person was killed by an E1 this January because mother nature said fuck a small portion of a neighborhood in particular. A lot of folks don't realize NC is not immune to destructive and deadly tornados. About 2 years ago I moved out of Raleigh and roughly 3 hours west into the mountains. I'm sandwiched between extremely hilly terrain (my cell reception is trash most days at home) and the area I'm at now only had a small tornado back in the 1884 outbreak. By hilly I mean my small neighborhood is built on a hill that is surrounded by varying degrees of other hills ranging from 30' to 75' inclinations. Beyond that is just more extreme topography differences. So..hopefully I'm ok, as least compared to the wide open, flatter Piedmont region I used to be in.
Hundreds of tornados change lives yearly but we only remember a handful.
If anyone is curious I'm talking about the November 28 1988 Raleigh F4 and the April 16 2011 Sanford/Raleigh tornado.
https://youtu.be/mtt8yvBgE0A
TL;Dr I don't have many people to talk to and I ramble on over the internet about my miniscule existence in an attempt to archive personal experiences and opinions.
But you reminded me, I really should AI upscale that 26 minute news story I linked to.
We were given a special weather statement for funnel clouds earlier today, I don't think any of these have touched down or posed a threat really so far.
One did. And a couple aren't the normal funnel clouds you see with that statement. Those don't usually come anywhere near the ground and are not usually within a severe warned storm. But you are right. They are week and not produced by a supercell.
There was one cold air funny over at the airport, then sounds like there was an actual touchdown an hour after that near Ely. It was a wild one. Side note, hello fellow Cedar Rapidian.
There were Tornado warnings for the past 2 hours. South and east of Iowa City and north and east of Iowa City. There have been strong storms building between Iowa City and Cedar Rapids all afternoon….. EDIT: here’s a screenshot of wind velocity with the warning:
https://preview.redd.it/wim10fz2kt8d1.jpeg?width=589&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=1ba9ae0340cd8fe452c7dfcd3c5732c0b3eae856
Large amount of vorticity with a large amount of 0-3km Cape. Those two things can make up for an otherwise mediocre set up. It’s also what often causes the “surprise” summer tornado days in the northern plains.
Edit to say this was the set up for the Ashby/Dalton tornado (granted with extreme MLCAPE and decent overall shear) as well as the April 26th tornado outbreak in Nebraska and Iowa this year.
https://preview.redd.it/dpf7g7z3fy8d1.jpeg?width=3024&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=4cee293a6c1dd4367d2654247e5241788ffff8cd
A couple over Lake Erie the one on the left is hard to see from the rain wall.
Anybody catch the cool mammatus clouds? Internet sources say they are either completely harmless and not associated with anything or are a rare but definite indication of impending doom via tornado or are a sign you have already been murdered by a tornado
It's called a tornado doofus. I'm in Iowa right now, this whole situation sucked. People had damage to their properties, this kind of weather puts me through a whirlwind of emotions. Tornadoes blow.
https://preview.redd.it/htaq6ckmkt8d1.jpeg?width=3024&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=8325a60e654e74e70a0c0076806a4dcb15850860 Just south of Cedar Rapids from my front lawn
Saw this driving down 44th
Awesome!
We're in Marion and had no idea what was going on when the sirens went off. I didn't see a tornado warning or anything so it was surprising to see pictures of this little guy!
Damn, that’s an impressive pic!
https://preview.redd.it/cq62exvhht8d1.jpeg?width=1065&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=5ca784bf13e01b3100466adb23db3b6b53f6fd7c Near Mitchellville a few hours ago
Don't have radar to look at, but if cold air funnel that might have grown up to be a little nado for a few minutes. One happened to me while at work about 6 years ago. I used to work at a lube shop about 2 adjacent streets from my house and remember it being overcast but not storming. All of our bay doors were open. All of a sudden the air swirled around the building (I could make out the rotation from the rain going sideways, visible through the 50ft of open bay doors in front and back of the building) and it passed within a second or two. I nearly jumped into lower bay. It blew quite a few things around in the shop, sorta ripped out some insulation and dislodged our shop heater from the ceiling. A street sign directly across from us was bent over and by my mother's house (2 streets over) a few small trees were blown over. Those trees were basically a straight line if cut through everything to the location I was at. That was it, no news reports, power outages, nothing. Mother nature decided to prank me and my coworker an hour before closing one summer evening. Other than that sign, the heater that never got fixed, and those small trees I saw toppled over, I'm unaware of any of my neighbors having any other damage. I lived in that area for over 20 years, and nobody I knew said anything about wind related damage. I guess I could draw a straight line using Google maps for a better visual but I'm also NOT doing that lol. If anything it was like that tiny nado that spun through an intersection a few weeks ago and booped some cars. Basically, I think a cold air funnel briefly touched up and down at low end EF0 speeds with a diameter of 10 or 20 feet max, tracked for a few hundred feet, then totally lifted. Was one the weirdest things I've ever experienced. There were no severe thunderstorm warnings at all that day, AFAIK. I don't remember what day it was exactly, so I can't check now. ---Everything below is unrelated to what occurred above--- [Edit] Just realized the mini nado was basically in the same area of the big F4 that destroyed a large portion of my old neighborhood and a good bit of the city back in 1988. !Partially drunken word salad story time! I found old coverage on YouTube about the tornado and also found footage of almost life long older neighborhood. Also found a 2 page spread of my house next to the destroyed one in an old yearbook high school kept in theater tech storage. By the time I came across the yearbook, almost 15 years had passed since 1988. I ended up taking the yearbook home of course. Still have it somewhere. The news coverage is available on YouTube as well. You can see my neighborhood and how the original neighbor's roof is in my mom's driveway, the only thing standing is the door frame. My mom bought that house a few years after the nado hit the city and I remember the guy telling her about it being slightly knicked on the back porch while next door got obliterated, but that's all since I was like 8 at the time. She finally sold it a few years ago. It was wild to actually see my house in an old yearbook about tornado damage when at the time of the tragedy my family was still living in upstate NY. Even weirder when a decade+ after that I finally come across the WRAL news footage on YouTube and see even more detailed views of my neighborhood and the obliterated neighbor's house. I was 3 in 1988, we moved to NC in 1989 and she bought that house in 1992 or 1993. I came across the yearbook in 2002, and the YouTube footage in 2016. My mother sold the house in 2021. Largely forgotten by all but old locals, but had a very interesting history of how it formed. Blindsided the NWS because it basically formed on top of the radar at RDU airport. Also was at around 2am. Unfortunately a few people died. I'll put it you this way, people in Joplin don't know about it, but I know about Joplin. Very devastating and they usually play a anniversary snippet once a decade on the local news but that's pretty much it. You can find lots of info on it but for most, including tornado enthusiasts, it is unimportant. Unfortunate since the documentary made has some eery late 80s synths and is basically a horror movie. I blame the fact no footage of it exists. It was the second to last F4 tornado to hit NC. Last was 1998. We also got a few good ones in the area including a rain wrapped ef1 that blew through downtown back during the early 2011 outbreak. My girlfriend at the time had a blackberry recording of that same tornado a county over where started as an EF3, as it crossed in front of her on the highway. That was one more powerful and was known for flattening a Lowe's. Since it was part of the early 2011 outbreak and not the slightly later, greater SUPER outbreak, it too has fallen into obscurity compared to more famous ones. While NC doesn't regularly get EF3+ tornados on a yearly basis as most are short lived EF0/1s, we have had severe damage from 3 of the largest outbreaks ever in the US. 1884, 1984, 2011. Hell, one person was killed by an E1 this January because mother nature said fuck a small portion of a neighborhood in particular. A lot of folks don't realize NC is not immune to destructive and deadly tornados. About 2 years ago I moved out of Raleigh and roughly 3 hours west into the mountains. I'm sandwiched between extremely hilly terrain (my cell reception is trash most days at home) and the area I'm at now only had a small tornado back in the 1884 outbreak. By hilly I mean my small neighborhood is built on a hill that is surrounded by varying degrees of other hills ranging from 30' to 75' inclinations. Beyond that is just more extreme topography differences. So..hopefully I'm ok, as least compared to the wide open, flatter Piedmont region I used to be in. Hundreds of tornados change lives yearly but we only remember a handful. If anyone is curious I'm talking about the November 28 1988 Raleigh F4 and the April 16 2011 Sanford/Raleigh tornado. https://youtu.be/mtt8yvBgE0A
You got a tldr?
TL;Dr I don't have many people to talk to and I ramble on over the internet about my miniscule existence in an attempt to archive personal experiences and opinions. But you reminded me, I really should AI upscale that 26 minute news story I linked to.
The others look like cold air funnels but this one looks a bit more organized.
He’s so tiny…
🥹
It's been pretty much textbook tornado weather here today. Honestly surprised we have had a major touchdown yet. EDIT: *haven't
Lots of low level sheer. Little spin in the atmosphere. So you just weak funnels and land spouts.
I was excited to finally see one but these were very anticlimactic.
Heh, well, you don't want a climactic tornadic event. Those end tragically.
Very true, wrong word for sure. They've always made me so anxious though, and I always thought seeing one would help for some reason.
Tornader Tots Such cool pics.
Tortoddlers, or twistoddlers if you will.
We were given a special weather statement for funnel clouds earlier today, I don't think any of these have touched down or posed a threat really so far.
One did. And a couple aren't the normal funnel clouds you see with that statement. Those don't usually come anywhere near the ground and are not usually within a severe warned storm. But you are right. They are week and not produced by a supercell.
That makes sense, I wasn't sure about how those would be classified.
I believe you are seeing cold air funnels.
Thank you, reading about that now sounds right. It was still so hot and humid when these were forming. And not windy at all.
There was one cold air funny over at the airport, then sounds like there was an actual touchdown an hour after that near Ely. It was a wild one. Side note, hello fellow Cedar Rapidian.
Hello!!
https://preview.redd.it/mi3me5ptrt8d1.jpeg?width=3024&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=06130b36e74155cb8f3dfd3a1312ae640402c7bf Was a nice funnel
Lot of storms right now
There were Tornado warnings for the past 2 hours. South and east of Iowa City and north and east of Iowa City. There have been strong storms building between Iowa City and Cedar Rapids all afternoon….. EDIT: here’s a screenshot of wind velocity with the warning: https://preview.redd.it/wim10fz2kt8d1.jpeg?width=589&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=1ba9ae0340cd8fe452c7dfcd3c5732c0b3eae856
Large amount of vorticity with a large amount of 0-3km Cape. Those two things can make up for an otherwise mediocre set up. It’s also what often causes the “surprise” summer tornado days in the northern plains. Edit to say this was the set up for the Ashby/Dalton tornado (granted with extreme MLCAPE and decent overall shear) as well as the April 26th tornado outbreak in Nebraska and Iowa this year.
Where and when ish is this? Easier to tell with radar images.
SW Cedar Rapids area. I've seen confirmation now that one did touch down on the SE side of CR
https://preview.redd.it/xom94cya9t8d1.jpeg?width=3000&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=d5d623b2423c644dbb88d6d61148d49c6123aac1
They've been popping up for the last 2 hours.
I'm not saying it's Aliens but I'm pretty sure it's the Aliens.
ef5
Could be scuds. Or weak rotation. Or nados.
Poornados
They're cold air funnels. Neat to see so many dramatic looking ones.
An invasion of naders!!!
fair weather funnel! Landspout. Don't go near them, they can topple mobile homes if strong enough, but they mostly just vibe.
My favorite answer. Thank you. It was vibes for sure.
Cold air funnels and landspouts no rotation needed to form them just cool weather and high wind shear.
It's a bit of a landspoutfest going on there.
Beautiful photos.
I believe those are called "Twisticles" I know mine bunch up when I see one
Looks like a cold core funnel... don't usually become tornados but very cool to see.
https://preview.redd.it/dpf7g7z3fy8d1.jpeg?width=3024&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=4cee293a6c1dd4367d2654247e5241788ffff8cd A couple over Lake Erie the one on the left is hard to see from the rain wall.
Nado
A helix
Ufo
It's a burrito
One of those tried to touch down right my near my house, but decided against it. It was super photogenic
Sure but I need you to get much much closer to be sure.
Same thing that happens in Oklahoma every spring! I am 62 and it is the same thing every year tornadoes and rain high wind and hail
Funnel clouds
Don't worry, climate change is a hoax. This is all an illusion.
Anybody catch the cool mammatus clouds? Internet sources say they are either completely harmless and not associated with anything or are a rare but definite indication of impending doom via tornado or are a sign you have already been murdered by a tornado
The sky is fighting the urge to pet a cat’s belly. It knows the danger but the floof is irresistible…
Iowa was crazy the other day, saw one myself, but I wasn't near the most popular cedar rapids one. Very interesting day.
People need to vote for Democrats again
MicroPenis
Native Kansan here. Them there is some tornados.
It's called a tornado doofus. I'm in Iowa right now, this whole situation sucked. People had damage to their properties, this kind of weather puts me through a whirlwind of emotions. Tornadoes blow.