Block Party... is it still on?
Written by Dan
10:45 AM - 9 hours and 15 minutes away
The sky is a nice grayish green with tendrils of lightning along the horizon. The National Weather Service upgraded their warning from "severe weather watch" to "EXPLOSIVE severe weather watch." If there's two things you don't want upgraded to explosive, it's extreme weather and diarrhea.
As you can see, a giant blog of mighty percipitation is headed our way (see Springfield up in the top right corner). Storm systems move NE out of Texas and Oklahoma, which puts us right in line to get hit by this one later in the evening. I'll make the final call at 4:00 pm, but it doesn't look like this storm is getting any smaller.
Stay tuned for more updates throughout the day.
11:55 AM - 8 hours and 5 minutes away
Still crappy outside. I think the first storm, of what looks like many, is about to hit. Maybe if they all go through this afternoon, they'll be done by the evening...
2:15 PM - 5 hours and 45 minutes away
Well, we're being blanketed with a slow, steady layer of rain. According to the radar, the current system is on it's way out, but the big stuff hasn't happened yet. See here:
Looks promising, doesn't it! Then I read this bulletin from the News-Leader: Stronger thunderstorms are expected to develop quickly late this afternoon over eastern Kansas and Oklahoma. The weather service predicts this line of storms will move across the Kansas-Missouri state line between 5 and 9 p.m., crossing the U.S. 65 corridor [ That's Springfield ] between 7 and midnight and reaching Rolla and West Plains around 9 to midnight. The thunderstorms will move quickly across the Ozarks tonight and leave the area by around midnight, although strong to severe thunderstorms also are possible Friday afternoon, the weather service said."
So, what should I do? The rain is starting to let up, which gives me a false hope. I know as soon as I call everything off, the clouds will part, the wind will die down, a beach will instantly appear in our parking lot, and it will be amazingly beautiful. If I cancel this thing, I want to see some really crappy weather to validate the decision.
Damn Missouri weather. I'm going to give it one more hour before we make the final call.
4:00 PM - 4 hours away
Sure enough... as soon as it clears up and starts to look promising, another crop of storms EXPLODES in Eastern OK and KS. Damn Missouri weather in April! So, we're going to go ahead and call it off. We can't run the risk of having all kinds of electrical equipment sitting outside, along with a large group of people standing around outside when a storm decides to blow in. With as fast as these storms move, we'd barely have time to get everyone inside... if we could even FIT everyone inside. I'm mad! Budweiser was going to have a promotional girl drop by to give away free t-shirts and everything.
I guess we can try again in May... have a delayed block party. Tornado or not, the show is still running at 10:00 pm for $5.00 per person, and it will continue to run once a day for the next five days. Sorry we had to cancel, guys... we'd rather be safe than sorry, right?
I'll give another update later in the evening and let you know if anything actually happens.
6:30 PM - 1 hour and 30 minutes away
If we were still having the event, we would be building the stage right now. Currently the sky is filled with gray clouds, and the temperature is dropping quickly as the wind picks up. Oklahoma is quickly filling up a full brew of storms that I imagine will hit here sometime between 8:00 and 9:00 tonight. I think the crappy weather is going to kill our attendance today, but that'll be okay as long as we're vindicated for canceling the block party. More later.
12:00 AM - well past the time
It looks like the killer storm passed us by. I've said it once, and I'll say it again: damn Missouri weather!