Kevin Schneider

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It is that time of year again—when millions of Americans hit the road or the skies to connect with friends and family. AAA is expecting a record number of travelers this year, surpassing the record-breaking 2024. Most travelers will be hitting the road vs flying.<div data-youtube-video=""><iframe width="640" height="480" allowfullscreen="false" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/o78PUXSJCJU" start="0"></iframe></div><img src="https://media.weathernationtv.com/app/uploads/2025/11/Screenshot 2025-11-17 104347-1763401813998.png">With millions hitting the roads, traffic will be hard to avoid, no matter where you are heading. However, there will be some better times to do your traveling. AAA suggests starting the journey early, but with a reasonable night of sleep the night prior.<img src="https://media.weathernationtv.com/app/uploads/2025/11/Screenshot 2025-11-17 105052-1763401888415.png">With so many traveling over the holidays, there are some favored destinations. Besides New York City, the other nine top destinations favor warm weather in late November.<img src="https://media.weathernationtv.com/app/uploads/2025/11/Screenshot 2025-11-17 110215-1763402544204.png">How does this compare to previous years? With more than 6 million people expected to fly, that's a 2% increase compared to last year, but it's a more than 10% jump compared to pre-pandemic levels!<img src="https://media.weathernationtv.com/app/uploads/2025/11/Screenshot 2025-11-17 105653-1763402231681.png">

Alana Cameron

A Record Breaking Thanksgiving Travel Week Expected

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Taban Sharifi grew up in Southern California between Los Angeles and San Diego. She is a Certified Broadcast Meteorologist (CBM) with the American Meteorological Society (AMS). She has a B.S. in Atmospheric, Oceanic, and Environmental Sciences with a minor in Environmental Systems and Society from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). Go Bruins! While in school, Taban was a meteorology intern with NBC LA. There she helped forecast daily weather for the greater Los Angeles region and created a playbook to deploy weather sensors for NBC owned-and-operated stations across the country. Her first on-air job took her to San Angelo, Texas, where she was a morning meteorologist and co-anchor. Working in West Texas gave her knowledge and experience covering severe storms. From there, she moved to Palm Springs, California. People think forecasting in California is sunshine all the time, but with temperatures in the 120’s, wildfires, damaging winds, floodings, and earthquakes, the forecasting kept her very busy! She also worked there as a general assignment reporter and told community stories. Taban is excited for the challenge and opportunity to forecast nationally with WeatherNation. She also looks forward to exploring all that Colorado has to offer!

Taban Sharifi

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Severe weather is in the forecast for the South, from Texas through Georgia. The Storm Prediction Center has issued severe weather outlooks as a frontal boundary swiftly moves through.<h2>Monday</h2>The severe weather threat continues to push east along the cold front today. Areas from northern Mississippi to central Texas will see the chance for severe weather. The Storm Prediction Center has us under a SLIGHT (level 2 out of 5) risk for severe storms across Texas and the lower Mississippi River Valley.<img src="https://media.weathernationtv.com/app/uploads/2025/11/Screenshot 2025-11-24 110321-1764007409116.png">The tornado threat continues through tonight and into Tuesday morning across portions of Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, and surrounding states.<img src="https://media.weathernationtv.com/app/uploads/2025/11/Screenshot 2025-11-24 110340-1764007425941.png"><h2>Tuesday</h2>The threat moves east on Tuesday to include more of the South. Isolated severe storms are likely to develop across portions of the southeast and Deep south. The SPC has issued a SLIGHT (level 2 out of 5) risk for Mississippi and Alabama.<img src="https://media.weathernationtv.com/app/uploads/2025/11/Screenshot 2025-11-24 111109-1764007875043.png"><h2>Storm Timing</h2><video src="https://media.weathernationtv.com/app/uploads/2025/11/11-24_RSC RSE-1764027007885.mp4" controls="true" width="100%"></video><h2>Rainfall</h2>Watch for pockets of heavy rain that could lead to flooding. The Weather Prediction Center (WPC) has a Marginal to Slight risk for flooding through Tuesday.<img src="https://media.weathernationtv.com/app/uploads/2025/11/Web1-1763985104994.png">

Severe Weather Slides Through the South

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As the most recent windy system moves northeast, we wait on our next. Unfortunately, it looks like it might move through around a time that could complicate holiday plans.<img src="https://media.weathernationtv.com/app/uploads/2025/11/Screenshot 2025-11-23 112422-1763922444302.png">As this system <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow" href="https://www.weathernationtv.com/news/windy-system-blows-through-upper-midwest-this-week">spins it's way into the Great Lakes</a>, widespread rain will build by Tuesday into Wednesday. If you're holding a balloon in the parade, the winds are what concern you. It doesn't look like it will be windy enough to affect much of the parade, but balloons might have to be lowered to help offset winds funneling between buildings.<video src="https://media.weathernationtv.com/app/uploads/2025/11/11-24 RNE-1764027129709.mp4" controls="true" width="100%"></video>All of this to say - Thanksgiving parades are probably alright in the northeast. Unless they're in the western New York area. Those winds will be breezy at times, but the direction is most important! A westerly wind will carry warmer air temperatures from the lake waters into much cooler air temperatures behind all of this. The result? Thanksgiving Lake Effect Snow! Impressive bands have been noted on some longer-range models around Erie and Buffalo.<video src="https://media.weathernationtv.com/app/uploads/2025/11/11-24 RNE BAMS3K-1764027183709.mp4" controls="true" width="100%"></video>

More Moisture For The Northeast This Week

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Alana Cameron was born and raised in Canada in the city of Mississauga, just outside of Toronto. Alana is the oldest of 4 siblings, all close in age, and grew up playing outside with them in all types of weather. After graduating high school, Alana moved to study at the University of British Columbia in Kelowna for a year before transferring to Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia where she completed a Bachelor of Science in Physics and Atmospheric Science. Upon completion, Alana moved back to Toronto where she completed a post-grad degree in Meteorology at York University. After her post-grad, she went on to complete another post-grad in Broadcast Journalism - TV News at Fanshawe College in London, Ontario. During her final year of studies she had the privilege of interning with the best in the business in Canada at The Weather Network. Once she finished her internship, she got the call from small-town Denison, Texas where she accepted a job as an on-air meteorologist at KTEN-TV, right in tornado alley, covering severe weather from Sherman/Denison (North Texas) to Ada (Southern Oklahoma). After the most active tornado season Oklahoma had seen in May 2019 (105 tornadoes!) Alana is excited to join WeatherNation to cover weather all across the nation. If you're interested in following her on social media she can be found @alanacameronwx!

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The Upper Midwest has been fairly quiet recently. Naturally, when everyone is trying to travel back home, that trend breaks. A strong trough will kick out a windy area of low-pressure. That could bring some wintry weather back to the Dakotas and into the Great Lakes.<h1>Wind</h1>A strong system with a lot of wind energy will drive up the wind speeds tonight and into Tuesday. By Tuesday morning, areas around the Black Hills could be talking about wind gusts in the 50-60 mph range! Would it be enough to knock out power? Potentially. With travel starting to ramp up throughout the week, the bigger concern might have to be higher-profile vehicles on plenty of east-west facing interstates.<video src="https://media.weathernationtv.com/app/uploads/2025/11/11-24_RNC RNE WINDS-1764025556128.mp4" controls="true" width="100%"></video><h1>Snow</h1>Widespread winter weather alerts have been issued from Montana to Michigan as this low pressure system drops in. Some models have snowfall totals surpassing a foot into the Upper Midwest, but generally between 3-7" of snow will come down in these regions. However, where winter storm warnings (pink) are in effect we can expect 12" of snowfall.<img src="https://media.weathernationtv.com/app/uploads/2025/11/Screenshot 2025-11-24 160431-1764025664998.png">Since this system is fast-moving, totals across North Dakota and Minnesota are around that half a foot mark, but across the Great Lakes from now through the eve of Thanksgiving, we could see upwards of one foot.<img src="https://media.weathernationtv.com/app/uploads/2025/11/Screenshot 2025-11-24 160436-1764025671077.png"><h1>Timing</h1>Snowfall has started today in Montana and will continue to move east with this system across the northern Plains and Upper Midwest into Tuesday and Wednesday. Eventually, this moisture will work into the Northeast.<video src="https://media.weathernationtv.com/app/uploads/2025/11/11-24_rnc bams3k-1764025757405.mp4" controls="true" width="100%"></video><h1>Temperatures</h1>Expect a significant cool down. Low temperatures take a dive into the teens and single digits by Thanksgiving morning.<img src="https://media.weathernationtv.com/app/uploads/2025/11/Screenshot 2025-11-24 160935-1764025783153.png">For more details, tune in to your Central Regional Forecast :30 past the hour.

Windy System Blows Through Upper Midwest This Week

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Rob grew up in South Florida, where daily afternoon storms and hurricanes piqued his interest in meteorology early on. That interest was fostered by his teachers and his father, who one time brought him onto the roof of their home to watch a funnel cloud move through the Everglades several miles away. Years of filmmaking and tv production in high school gradually pushed him toward broadcast meteorology at Florida State University, where he joined and eventually led the student run daily weather show. After graduating with a Bachelors of Science in Meteorology, he began his career at KESQ in Palm Springs, California before heading to KFSN in Fresno and WLOS in Asheville, North Carolina. He has covered a diverse array of extreme weather events, including haboobs and flash flooding in the desert, extreme snow in the Sierra, hurricanes, and Appalachian ice storms. He also enjoys telling stories and reporting about weather issues.

Connect with Rob on <a href="https://twitter.com/WxRobBradley">Twitter</a>

Rob Bradley

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Hurricane Melissa was a devastating category 5 storm that made landfall in Jamaica as one of the strongest systems on record in the Atlantic Basin.A dropsonde recorded a wind gust of 252 mph shortly before landfall, which was verified this week by NSF NCAR (U.S. National Science Foundation National Center for Atmospheric Research) to be accurate, making it the strongest gust ever recorded in a tropical cyclone.WeatherNation Meteorologist Rob Bradley discusses the data and Melissa's intense winds with hurricane researcher Andy Hazelton, who was working the data position on the reconnaissance flight that recorded the record gust.<div data-youtube-video=""><iframe width="640" height="480" allowfullscreen="false" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/n8DyYwpvi0w" start="0"></iframe></div>What are meso-vortices? These are smaller scale circulations in the atmosphere that are essentially miniature low pressure systems. These can be observed within clusters of thunderstorms, but they also appear within the eye and eye wall of intense hurricanes. Melissa produced some of the most visually stunning meso-vortices in the satellite era (below).<div class="twitter-tweet" style="display: flex; justify-content: center" data-twitt-post-id="1983738129581301844" src="https://x.com/WeatherNation/status/1983738129581301844"></div>

Hurricane Melissa Produces Strongest Gust Recorded in a Hurricane

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Brittany Lockley

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A cut-off low will be moving out of southern California, bringing a surge of deep moisture to the Four Corners this weekend through next week. This low will bring rounds of showers and thunderstorms.&nbsp;Communities across northwest New Mexico, southeast Utah, southwest Colorado, and northeast Arizona could an abundant amount of rain, with some areas picking up over an inch of rain by the end of the weekend.&nbsp;<video src="https://media.weathernationtv.com/app/uploads/2025/11/2025-11-22 08-09-43-1763824217158.mp4" controls="true" width="100%"></video>In the mountains, snow has been piling up with 2-9" of snow reported across multiple states on Friday. Higher elevations are cold enough for accumulating mountain snow once again, which may create tricky travel conditions over passes and high-country roadways throughout a busy week for travel.&nbsp;<img src="https://media.weathernationtv.com/app/uploads/2025/11/Screenshot 2025-11-22 081034-1763824255136.png"><h2>Forecast</h2>Rain and snow chances will persist throughout the weekend, as the system moves to the Northeast. Heavy snow will return to the mountains, with difficult travel, especially on I-70 in Colorado. The rain and snow will mostly clear out by the beginning of next week.<video src="https://media.weathernationtv.com/app/uploads/2025/11/New Baron Video 3-1763867781581.mp4" controls="true" width="100%"></video>Isolated rain totals through Sunday could top an inch or two in some areas of Arizona. Some ponding on the roadways and street flooding will be possible. Expect heavy snow in the mountains, upwards of 6"+ in many locations. Ski resorts in Colorado could see more than a foot.<img src="https://media.weathernationtv.com/app/uploads/2025/11/1-1763867831465.png">Denver is preparing for a noticeably colder and more unsettled stretch of weather. a flurry might fall down in the Denver metro Saturday into Sunday as a stronger push of colder air drops into the Front Range.<video src="https://media.weathernationtv.com/app/uploads/2025/11/2025-11-22 08-20-04-1763824846586.mp4" controls="true" width="100%"></video>While totals will depend on how quickly temperatures fall and how long the moisture stays in place, it just might be too warm in the metro to see snow.<img src="https://media.weathernationtv.com/app/uploads/2025/11/1-1763867877561.png">&nbsp;

Jesse Kelley

Four Corners Expecting More Flooding Rain, Mountain Snow

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A strong storm system that brought severe storms and flooding rain to Texas and Oklahoma is on the move. The trough is moving east with more impactful weather before it heads into the Atlantic Saturday afternoon.Severe storms are possible along the cold front tonight through Saturday morning from Kentucky into Mississippi. Wind damage is expected to be the primary hazard, so be sure to secure any loose objects outdoors.<img src="https://media.weathernationtv.com/app/uploads/2025/11/1-1763781379997.png">Scattered heavy downpours are expected to persist north of the low across the Midwest and Ohio Valley tonight. Severe storms could form into the overnight hours. Our high-resolution forecast model shows supercell thunderstorms developing late in the evening in West Tennessee, before tracking east overnight into the Deep South.<video src="https://media.weathernationtv.com/app/uploads/2025/11/New Baron Video 3-1763781681080.mp4" controls="true" width="100%"></video>Rainfall totals don't look too impressive thanks to the progressive movement of this system. 1-2 inches is expected for most areas that see thunderstorms.<img src="https://media.weathernationtv.com/app/uploads/2025/11/1-1763781727696.png">

Trough Shifts East, Severe Storms & Flooding Possible

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Right now meteorologists across Iowa are combing through Wednesday's weather data, video footage, and ground surveys in order to come up with a complete analysis of exactly what happened. As of Thursday evening, there were at least three dozen separate reports of tornadoes. Not every one of those reports will be a separate, confirmed tornado. Sometimes it's the same tornado. Here are some of the images to catch you up to speed, in case you missed it.

https://twitter.com/WeatherNation/status/1415483595813175296

In the video above, Scott Peake captures the evolution of a tornado in Stratford, Iowa which can be seen swirling briskly across open corn fields. At one point in the video, the tornado moves right over the road in front of him, causing power poles and utility lines to swing in reaction.

https://twitter.com/WeatherNation/status/1415461112766599177

In this video above Lake City, Iowa took a hit from a tornado and unfortunately sustained damage. Video courtesy Brian Emfinger (LSM).

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There were so many tornadoes from individual National Weather Service offices that we had to break it down by region. Let's take a look at the County Warning Area (or CWA) for NWS Quad Cities.

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A preliminary report has been released regarding the Lake City, Iowa tornado from Wednesday, July 14th. The National Weather Service in Des Moines rated the twister an EF-3 with max winds (estimated) up to 145 mph!

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We continue to gather more information on the tornadoes across Iowa on Wednesday. In the meantime, check out our latest article regarding what to expect (severe weather-wise) for the rest of this week.

<a href="https://media.weathernationtv.com/news/plains-severe-threat-ramps-up/">Related Article: Where The Severe Weather Goes The Rest of This Week</a>

At Least 36 Reports of Tornadoes in Iowa Wednesday

A Record Breaking Thanksgiving Travel Week Expected

It is that time of year again—when millions o

Severe Weather Slides Through the South

Severe weather is in the forecast for the Sou

More Moisture For The Northeast This Week

As the most recent windy system moves northea

Windy System Blows Through Upper Midwest This Week

The Upper Midwest has been fairly quiet recen

Hurricane Melissa Produces Strongest Gust Recorded in a Hurricane

Hurricane Melissa was a devastating category

Four Corners Expecting More Flooding Rain, Mountain Snow

A cut-off low will be moving out of southern

Trough Shifts East, Severe Storms & Flooding Possible

A strong storm system that brought severe sto