Storm Report For Temple, Bell County, Texas (130 mi. South Dallas, Texas)
for Friday, March 10, 2000
Central Texans experienced their second bout with severe weather this year
as a severe thunderstorm moved through the area shortly after 6 p.m. This
year's storm season got off to an early February 22 start.
A Severe Thunderstorm Watch was issued for Bell and surround counties
effective from 10 a.m until 3 p.m. The watch box was 80 statue miles east
and west of a line from 65 miles SW of Temple, Texas to 75 miles SE of
Dallas, Texas. Most of the weather during this period occurred in the
Dallas/Fort Worth area.
A second Severe Thunderstorm Watch was issued for Bell and surround
counties effective from 4 p.m. until 10 p.m. This watch box was 100 statue
miles east and west of a line from 45 miles east of San Antonio, Texas to
65 miles NNE of Waco, Texas.
Around 5:30 p.m., two groups of thunderstorms began to form, one to the
east of the area and one to the west. The storms to the east were no threat
as they were moving off to the east but a Tornado Watch was issued until
midnight for a large part of Southeast Texas.
At 6:22 p.m. , the NWS issued a Tornado Warning for Bell County. Doppler
Radar had detected a severe thunderstorm with a tornado circulation 6 miles
west of Morgan's Point Resort (15 miles W of my location). About this same
time, ham radio operators near the Lake Belton area began report a wall
cloud with circulation.
I was on my way home from work and pulled into the west parking lot of
Scott and White Hospital to begin spotting for this storm. There were
several low hanging clouds from the approaching storm but none could be
classified as wall clouds and there was no rotation noted.
The storm hit my location about 6:40 p.m. with heavy rain and intermittent
pea and marble sized hail. Wind was not a problem as the peak wind gust
during the storm on my home weather station was 20 mph. The rain and
intermittent hail continued for about 20 minutes resulting in some minor
street flooding in the usual locations. By shortly after 7 p.m., the storm
had left the area and skies cleared briefly before low clouds moved back
in.
There have been no official storm damage report released by the NWS as of
10 p.m. One of the skycams for KWTX Channel 10 picked up a nice lowering
out of a wall cloud near Killeen. KWTX also reported a roof blown off a
building 8 miles south of Belton and power lines down in Kosse and
Rockdale. A ham operator reported the electricity out at 9th and Adams in
downtown Temple during the height of the storm.
A cold front moved in behind the line of storms dropping the temperature
from 80 degrees at 6 p.m. to 57 degrees at 10 p.m. with a 33 mph wind gust
from the NW at 9:30 p.m.
Photos of the approaching storm can be viewed at
http://www.vvm.com/~rprcin/storm.htm
Ronnie
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Live Home Weather Station:
http://www.vvm.com/~rprcin/livewx.htm
My Photo Album:
http://albums.photopoint.com/j/AlbumList?u=13364
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