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Office of Emergency Management


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Weather Terminology

  • Watch - a National Weather Service product indicating that conditions are favorable for the development of a particular severe weather event.  A watch is normally issued for several hours and indicates a need for planning, preparation, and an increased awareness of changing weather conditions.  Typical watches include: tornado watch, severe thunderstorm watch, flash flood/flood watch, winter storm watch.
  • Warning - a product issued by NWS local offices indicating that a particular weather hazard is either imminent or is occurring.  A warning indicates the need to take action immediately to protect life and property.  Typical warnings include: tornado warning, severe thunderstorm warning, flash flood/flood warning, winter storm warning.
  • Thunderstorm - in general, a local storm produced by a cumulonimbus cloud, and always accompanied by lightning, thunder, gusty winds, possibly heavy rain, and sometimes hail.
  • Severe Thunderstorm - a thunderstorm producing damaging winds of 58 mph or greater, a tornado, flooding, and/or hail 3/4 of an inch in diameter or larger.
  • Squall Lines - any lines or narrow bands of thunderstorms.  These lines may be of considerable length, extending across multiple states.
  • Lightning - generally, any and all of the various forms of electrical discharge produced by thunderstorms.
  • Flood - the condition that occurs when water overflows the natural or artificial confines of a stream or body of water, or accumulates by drainage over low lying areas.
  • Flash Flood - a flood that rises and falls quite rapidly.  Flash floods occur as the result of intense rainfall over a relatively small area in a short period of time.
  • Gust Front - the leading edge of a mass of cool, gusty air that flows from the base of a thunderstorm (downburst) and spreads along the ground in advance of a thunderstorm.
  • Downburst - an exceptionally energetic downdraft that exits the base of a thunderstorm and spreads out at the Earth's surface in the form of strong and gusty horizontal winds that may cause property damage.  Downbursts are much more common than you think and are much more likely than tornadoes in West Virginia.
  • Straight Line Winds - typically used to describe thunderstorm wind damage that exhibits little rotational patterns to differentiate from the winds in a tornado that produce damage that exhibits rotational characteristics.  Damage after a tornado could also appear to be from straight line winds, depending on speed of movement, size, & strength.  Straight line winds are most often found with a gust front, originating from a downburst.
  • Funnel Cloud - a violently rotating column of air not in contact with the ground.  A tornado goes through the funnel cloud stage during its development and dissipation.
  • Tornado - a violently rotating column of air in contact with the ground, descending from the base of a severe thunderstorm.  They are usually funnel-shaped, with the narrow end nearest the ground.  In West Virginia, most tornadoes are obscured by hills, trees and rain until they are directly upon you.  One rule of thumb used by tornado spotters is, if the visible funnel extends more than halfway from the cloud to the ground, consider it a tornado - you may not see the visible funnel near the ground if it is weak or disorganized.