Homes battered to splinters, trees stripped bare, cars crushed like cans, and people weeping over lost loved ones. The weather in the central United States has the potential to wreak that kind of tragedy before Sunday morning.
Two giant weather systems will be colliding there violently on Saturday.
Frigid, dry air covering the northwest is butting into an even larger mass of warm air rising up from the Gulf of Mexico laden with unstable moisture, CNN meteorologist Derek Van Dam said.
On one side, overnight lows plunge into the low 20s, where it’s snowing in some places; on the other, daytime highs push into the 80s, while thunderstorms rumble by. A low pressure area is churning in between them.
“That gives us the perfect playing field for severe weather across the central Plains States,” Van Dam said. Expect tornadoes — some life-threatening and long-lasting. Also, expect flash floods.
The sun’s heat on top of clouds energizes thunderstorms, Van Dam said. The National Weather Service warns that tornadoes on Saturday are most likely from mid-afternoon to early evening.
On Saturday afternoon, the weather service issued a tornado watch for eastern Colorado, western Kansas and southwestern Nebraska until 9 p.m. (11 p.m. ET). Tornadoes are likely, along with hail up to 2 inches in diameter and isolated wind gusts up to 70 mph, NWS said.
A tornado watch was also issed for portions of central and southern Oklahoma and northern and central Texas, effective until 9 p.m. (10 p.m. ET) Saturday.
Scattered severe thunderstorms capable of very large hail, tornadoes and damaging winds are expected in the watch area through this evening, the weather service said.
A tornado watch means conditions are favorable for tornadoes and severe thunderstorms in and close to the watch area.
Earlier this week, super cells in the air mass collision zone spun out dozens of tornadoes, according to reports coming into the weather service. Thunderstorms doused Oklahoma and pelted it with hailstones the size of baseballs. The governor declared a state of emergency.
And the state is in the cross hairs again over the weekend.
About 24 million Americans are under varying degrees of risk of extreme weather, and the tornado risk stretches from southern Texas into Nebraska. Thunderstorms are possible over about half of the country.