Quote:
Originally posted by Ziroc:
Nerull, it was actually a super cell! I watched it on radar, and it came in from the west--a long tightly band of storms, and the strongest part went over our house (dark pink in color for the radar). Now when radar 'detects' a tornado, it is guessing somewhat. It computes that the 'hook shape', and calculates the wind patterns. So it might have just been VERY bad winds. crazy...BTW, Tornados do jump--by that, I mean go back into the clouds kinda, and come back down. You ever see tornado damaged neighborhoods, where some folks houses are fine, then 1 block away theres total devastation?. I think it was forming over us or maybe trying too.. Today, no one in Highlands city saw a Tornado, but got some BAD wind too.
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Yep, the super cell is simply an extremely strong thunderstorm that has the potential for hail/damaging winds/tornado. That's why a good number of times hail will precede a tornado. However, you are right that they are just guessing; they look for the signature rotation on the radar, then throw out the warning. They really aren't sure if it is on the ground or not (and you figure after Helen Hunt and company threw a bunch of sensors up there they'd have a better time tracking tornadoes...
). And I've actually been around a jump before; I left a grocery store because of the warning issued in the area (and supposedly heading towards the store), went up the street, realized I left something back at the store, so went back. The tornado had hit the store, and had vanished right afterwards. I got back to the store, just to hear that it had touched back down right on the road where I was when I turned around. It literally missed me in both places (lucky I turned around).