Alert archive / Michigan

Weather alerts in Michigan, 2018

2,814 weather alerts in 2018, from the National Weather Service and the Storm Prediction Center. An alert counts here when it covered any part of the state, so the counties below add up to more than the state.

Weather alerts by county

Each county as a circle sized by its count in 2018. Tap one for its archive.

Alerts
2,814
Warnings
842
Watches
144
Advisories
888
Busiest month
August463 alerts
Busiest day
July 1, 201873 alerts

Over time

By month

Warning verification

How often warnings here had a storm report inside them, and how much warning the reports had.

4 of 14 tornado warnings covering Michigan in 2018 had a tornado report inside them; 5 of 14 tornado reports fell inside a warning, on average 10 minutes after it went out.

Michigan, 2018

WarningsWith a reportFalse alarm ratioReportsInside a warningMean lead time
Tornado warnings14471%1436%10 min
Severe thunderstorm warnings25313845%36571%21 min
Flash flood warnings18572%3284%218 min

Each office's whole area, 2018

WarningsWith a reportFalse alarm ratioReportsInside a warningMean lead time
NWS Green Bay, WI: tornado warnings9278%450%4 min
NWS Green Bay, WI: severe thunderstorm warnings734242%13068%22 min
NWS Green Bay, WI: flash flood warnings3233%367%41 min
NWS Grand Rapids, MI: tornado warnings3167%617%12 min
NWS Grand Rapids, MI: severe thunderstorm warnings583540%11271%22 min
NWS Northern Indiana: tornado warnings6267%633%2 min
NWS Northern Indiana: severe thunderstorm warnings933463%18741%19 min
NWS Northern Indiana: flash flood warnings9278%475%59 min
NWS Detroit, MI: tornado warnings6267%3100%12 min
NWS Detroit, MI: severe thunderstorm warnings543437%8076%18 min
NWS Detroit, MI: flash flood warnings20100%0
NWS Marquette, MI: tornado warnings20100%0
NWS Marquette, MI: severe thunderstorm warnings652365%7569%22 min
NWS Marquette, MI: flash flood warnings10550%3187%218 min
NWS Gaylord, MI: tornado warnings3167%520%1 min
NWS Gaylord, MI: severe thunderstorm warnings453033%7079%22 min
NWS Gaylord, MI: flash flood warnings40100%0

An office's figures cover every county it serves, including across state lines.

Verified by the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's Cow, which matches each storm-based warning with the local storm reports inside its polygon while it was in force, within 15 km of its edge: a tornado warning counts as verified on a tornado report, a severe thunderstorm warning on hail of 1 inch or more, a gust of 58 mph or more, or wind damage, a flash flood warning on a flash flood report. The false alarm ratio is the share of warnings with no such report; "inside a warning" is the probability of detection, the share of reports that fell inside one; lead time runs from the warning's issue to each report inside it, counting zero for a report that came first. A warning with no report is not proof nothing happened: reports come from spotters, the public and damage surveys, and are thin where few people live.

The alerts

2,814 alerts are too many to list on one page. Narrow it to a product above, to a month in the chart, or to a county.

By product

Every kind of product issued here, grouped by hazard. Each opens the same place narrowed to that product.

By county

Every county with at least one alert. A county page lists each alert that covered it.

43 more counties

The busiest days

Days with the most alerts issued, by UTC date.

Nearby

Alerts in force nowTornadoes on recordThe radar archive20172019

Sources

National Weather Service watches, warnings, advisories and statements from the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's VTEC archive, which reconstructs tornado, severe thunderstorm, flash flood and marine warnings back to 1986 from the NWS text archive. Storm Prediction Center watches and mesoscale discussions from SPC's archive through the Mesonet. County centers from the US Census Bureau. Warning verification from the Mesonet's Cow. Rebuilt daily.