Major Tornado Plows Through Mississippi During High Risk

A major long-track tornado crossed the state of Mississippi today under a "High Risk" from both the government's Storm Prediction Center and AccuWeather.com. A radar image (with a "hook echo" shown after storm caused major damage moving through Yazoo City) and loop of the storm are shown below:

This tornado was responsible for most of the (over 3 dozen as of 4 PM Central Time) tornado reports today though there were additional twisters spotted north and south of the main behemoth. We have more details and video of the damage in our news story.

To give some perspective on the rarity of a High Risk tornado day, only two were issued in 2009, with 3-5 in years prior.

The severe thunderstorms are not restricted to Mississippi; lightning was widespread today according to 2-hour lightning strike images from AccuWeather.com MapSpace shown below. Over 75 Tornado Warnings and 250 Severe Thunderstorm Warnings have been issued today.

Over 85 tornado reports have been submitted to the National Weather Service spotter network this week, add in hail and wind and the number increases to 400.