Alert archive / Alabama / Severe Thunderstorm Warnings in 1998

Severe Thunderstorm Warning 250, NWS Birmingham, AL

April 17, 1998Barbour County, Alabama

NWS Birmingham, AL issued this severe thunderstorm warning at Apr 17, 1998, 6:08 PM CDT for Barbour County, Alabama. It was in force for 47 min. No storm report in the archive falls inside the area while it was in force.

The area

The counties it named.

The facts

Issued: Apr 17, 1998, 6:08 PM CDT (23:08 UTC)
Expired: Apr 17, 1998, 6:55 PM CDT
In force: 47 min
Issued by: NWS Birmingham, AL
Area: Whole counties

County Barbour County, AL

The radar

The Ft Rucker radar (KEOX), 46 km from the middle of the area, began a volume at 23:07 UTC, the scan nearest the moment this went out.

Open the radar archive at this moment

The archived warnings, watches and discussions in force at that minute are drawn over the scan, this one among them.

The watch it was issued in

The SPC watch in force over the same counties when this warning went out.

Issued	Product	Office	Lasted
Apr 17, 5:30 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Watch	SPC	6 hr

The nearest sounding before it

Peachtre/Fal Fld, GA (KFFC), launched 12:00Z, 11.1 hours before the alert went out and 187 km from the middle of its area. This is the routine balloon launch nearest before it, the air the forecaster had in hand, not a measurement taken for the alert.

Skew-T log-p

Temperature in red, dew point in green, the mixed-layer parcel dashed.

Hodograph

The wind turning with height, colored by layer: ground to 1 km, 1 to 3 km, 3 to 6 km, 6 to 10 km.

Mixed-layer CAPE: 1255 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN: -2 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL: 526 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear: 54 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity: 165 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity: 227 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter: 1.8
Supercell composite: 6.5

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The text

The text of this product is not in the archive. The NWS text archive before 2002 is incomplete.

What forecasters said that day

The local office's own words before this severe thunderstorm warning went out, as it sent them, from the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service text.

In the hours before

Special weather statement, Apr 17, 3:00 PM CDT, 3 hours 8 minutes before

ALZ001>064-FLZ001>015-172300-

SPECIAL WEATHER STATEMENT
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE BIRMINGHAM AL
300 PM CDT FRI APR 17 1998

...SEVERE WEATHER TO AFFECT THE GULF COAST STATES THIS WEEKEND...

...HEAVY RAINFALL POSSIBLE ACROSS NORTH ALABAMA SATURDAY AND SATURDAY
NIGHT...

A COOL FRONT ACROSS SOUTH ALABAMA IS EXPECTED TO MOVE BACK NORTHWARD
ON SATURDAY AS A SURFACE LOW DEVELOPS NEAR THE ALABAMA AND MISSISSIPPI
BORDER.  SOUTHERLY WINDS WILL INCREASE AS THE WARM FRONT ADVANCES
NORTHWARD...BRINGING MOIST AND UNSTABLE AIR RAPIDLY BACK INTO THE
REGION. THE STORM PREDICTION CENTER HAS OUTLOOKED ALL OF ALABAMA AND
NORTHWEST FLORIDA FOR A MODERATE RISK OF SEVERE THUNDERSTORMS FOR
SATURDAY THROUGH SUNDAY MORNING.  STRONG TO SEVERE THUNDERSTORMS WILL
DEVELOP OVER SOUTHERN ALABAMA AND NORTHWEST FLORIDA DURING THE LATE
MORNING AND EARLY AFTERNOON HOURS.  THE STORMS WILL THEN SPREAD
INTO NORTH ALABAMA AND WEST-CENTRAL GEORGIA DURING THE AFTERNOON AND
EVENING HOURS.

FURTHER NORTH...ACROSS THE TENNESSEE VALLEY REGION...HEAVY RAINFALL IS
POSSIBLE SATURDAY AFTERNOON AND NIGHT AS THIS AREA WILL STAY NORTH OF
THE WARM FRONT.

STAY TUNED TO NOAA WEATHER RADIO...RADIO OR TELEVISION FOR LATER
UPDATES ON THIS DEVELOPING WEATHER SITUATION.

Special weather statement, Apr 17, 4:19 PM CDT, 1 hour 49 minutes before

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The office that day

Everything else NWS Birmingham, AL issued on the same UTC day.

Issued	Product	Office	Counties	Lasted
Apr 16, 7:01 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	BMX	Lawrence	49 min
Apr 16, 7:01 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	BMX	Colbert	34 min
Apr 16, 7:11 PM CDT	Tornado Warning	BMX	Lamar	49 min
Apr 16, 7:14 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	BMX	Lauderdale	51 min
Apr 16, 7:35 PM CDT	Tornado Warning	BMX	Fayette	45 min
Apr 16, 7:48 PM CDT	Tornado Warning	BMX	Limestone	47 min
Apr 16, 8:03 PM CDT	Tornado Warning	BMX	Walker	47 min
Apr 16, 8:14 PM CDT	Tornado Warning	BMX	Madison	66 min
Apr 16, 8:29 PM CDT	Tornado Warning	BMX	Jackson	61 min
Apr 16, 8:32 PM CDT	Tornado Warning	BMX	Winston	48 min
Apr 16, 8:35 PM CDT	Tornado Warning	BMX	Cullman	65 min
Apr 16, 8:36 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	BMX	Limestone	34 min
Apr 16, 9:05 PM CDT	Tornado Warning	BMX	Blount	60 min
Apr 16, 9:32 PM CDT	Tornado Warning	BMX	Etowah	63 min
Apr 16, 9:34 PM CDT	Tornado Warning	BMX	Jackson	36 min
Apr 16, 9:40 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	BMX	Marshall	50 min
Apr 16, 9:43 PM CDT	Tornado Warning	BMX	St. Clair	32 min
Apr 16, 10:05 PM CDT	Tornado Warning	BMX	Marshall	35 min
Apr 16, 10:06 PM CDT	Tornado Warning	BMX	DeKalb	64 min
Apr 16, 10:13 PM CDT	Tornado Warning	BMX	Cherokee	47 min
Apr 16, 10:38 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	BMX	Marshall	32 min
Apr 16, 11:07 PM CDT	Tornado Warning	BMX	DeKalb	48 min
Apr 16, 11:25 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	BMX	Cherokee	50 min
Apr 17, 12:22 AM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	BMX	Jefferson	48 min
Apr 17, 12:26 AM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	BMX	Cherokee	44 min
Apr 17, 3:10 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	BMX	Barbour	50 min
Apr 17, 6:15 AM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	BMX	Chattahoochee	20 min
Apr 17, 3:18 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	BMX	Chattahoochee	47 min

Nearby

Severe Thunderstorm Warnings in Alabama, 1998 Every severe thunderstorm warning in 1998

Sources

The product and its follow-ups from the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service and Storm Prediction Center text; the sounding from the Mesonet's radiosonde archive; radar from the NEXRAD Level II archive.