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Overview

A warm front was moving up from the south on Monday, March 21st bringing in a moist and unstable airmass. A strong low level jet stretched across the Southern Plains, enhancing this moisture advection and bringing strong wind gusts to Southeast Texas. Long track supercells initiated along the dryline near Austin around 4 PM CDT and these discrete cells progressed further east and into our northwestern counties after sunset. Multiple, strong tornadoes were produced across south-central Texas from San Antonio up through Jarrel from these supercells. 

The tornadic activity continued as it moved into Southeast Texas. A long lived supercell that tracked from Burleson County northeastward through Houston County produced five tornadoes: 

  • EF0 tornado in Snook, Burleson County at 8:35pm CDT 
  • EF0 tornado 4 miles NNE of Snook near the Burleson/Brazos county line at 8:40pm CDT
  • EF1 tornado 7 miles east of Wixon Valley near the Brazos/Grimes county line west of Iola at 9:05pm CDT
  • EF1 tornado in Madisonville, Madison County that was on the ground for about two and half miles between 9:35pm to 9:42pm CDT
  • EF2 tornado in Houston County that was on the ground for 19 miles along Highway 21 before lifting a few miles north of Crockett between 10:10pm to 10:30pm CDT - moving with a forward motion of around 50 mph

The storm that produced the five tornadoes above went on to produce additional tornadoes downstream in Shreveport's County Warning Area.

A line of thunderstorms then passed through the region during the early morning hours of March 22nd that produced a couple of brief tornadoes along the bowing segment of the line (QLCS tornadoes):

  • EF1 tornado near Bealsey in Fort Bend County at 5:37am CDT
  • EF0 tornado near Danbury at 7:21am CDT

The tornadoes listed above resulted in significant damage to homes, businesses, vegetation, and other structures resulting in a total of 14 injuries (10 in the Houston County tornado, and 4 in the Beasley tornado). 

 

Information is still currently preliminary and may be subject to change.

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Overview of all the tornadoes from this event.    

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MRMS of the prefrontal supercells.    

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Overview of all the severe warnings from this event.    

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