Tornado threat for Twin Cities on Wednesday

But here's the deal. I mean, that severe threat, it was interesting. It really does seem the Storm Prediction Center today highlighting the Twin Cities for what could be maybe an interesting afternoon. We got some low-level moisture. I know that they're saying just a degree or two could make a huge difference because we might not have a ton of instability. Yeah, it's true. And I know Britta was talking about it. A lot of times, I actually really liked her phrase, if it's crazy upstairs, it's often crazy downstairs. That's kind of the difference with this particular setup is that the upstairs is crazy, but we're not quite sure if that's going to translate to the downstairs where we live here on ground level. So you've got the moisture levels certainly are quite high for this time of the year. I mean, we're talking dew points into the 50s and 60s or low 60s. And so that gives us the moisture. So that's component number one. You have a crazy upstairs. You have a lot of strong winds in the mid and upper levels of the atmosphere. So that's component number two. You typically need three. The one that we may be missing is what our relative heat or our warmth. Now, our average high this time of year is 51, 52. So when we're talking temperatures in the upper 60s, that's pretty warm for the Twin Cities this time of the year. So that may be enough to get some severe weather going. Now, if we can get a little warmer than that, if we crack 70, if we crack a 72 or 73, that's when things could get real interesting because now we're adding that quote heat element and so we have all three of those components to potentially tap in to some of the severe weather I was actually talking to the National Weather Service here in Chanhassen in this Twin Cities suburb and they were kind of pointing to a day we call it analogs where we look back in climate we look back in history has something similar happened before and what did we see on those days and if you look at October 26th 1996 that's when we had a similar setup that day we had 26 tornadoes reported in the Dakotas as well as Minnesota five uh f uh two uh tornadoes on that day and they were F scale and not the EF scale at that point so there is a history of a similar setup producing in that case more than a two dozen tornadoes is that going to happen this time around probably not but it gives you kind of that indicator of like hey this this is something we need to be aware of and so all the components come together it's a recipe for um some isolated tornadoes so it's one of the reasons why Storm Prediction Center put us in a level two and if we can get that um sunshine component we can get that warmth component there's already some sun appearing in southern Minnesota the clouds are starting to uh dwindle a bit then that is certainly a sign that there may be some severe weather components later on this afternoon and potentially uh the opportunity for some stronger tornadoes again if all the ingredients come together we'd love to talk about um here in the metro you spoke of uh the food aspect we're a big food station here so i compare it to a lot to baking we have all the ingredients involved um so think of like baking a cake okay so we have all the ingredients we put them in a and mixed them all together put them in a cake pan but we don't know what to set the oven to is it 250 is it 300 is it 350 is it going to be warm enough to physically bake the cake that remains to be seen and that's kind of where mother nature's landing is like hey if we can get warm enough we're going to bake a cake in this case the cake is tornadoes and hopefully we don't have that but something certainly we're keeping our eye on and watching closely and of course uh we'll see what happens and how that unfolds later on this afternoon yeah it's not a tasty cake but it is it is something that we'll have to watch Cody, before we let you go, you were born and raised in Minnesota, right? You're a Minnesotan. Correct. So weird that we're in the 60s for late October. Is it something from your childhood that you remember? I just can't get over the fact that a lot of these spots through the upper Midwest, the Great Lakes, the first freeze has just been absent. It has been absent. We're very late. We actually had, I want to say it was 2016. We had our latest first freeze on record, which I want to say is November 16th. So we have done this before, but it's not that common. And the sheer fact that over the next week, we're likely not going to get a freeze in the metro. It will be top five latest first freeze on record here in the Twin Cities. When we average the first snowfall of the season, first one inch snowfall is November 10th. So we're just not that far away. So it's going to be a lot of ups and downs moving forward. Well, since you're a Minnesotan, we'll have to have a watch party. And when that happens, shorts and T-shirt, outside, and we'll mark that occasion. How about that? Sold. Love it. Cody Matz, meteorologist with Fox 9 in Minneapolis. Appreciate you joining us. And, yeah, keep an eye to the sky today because we could have some storms. Thanks, Cody. Yep.