A seasonal-scale climatological analysis correlating spring tornadic activity with antecedent fall–winter drought in the southeastern United States
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Abstract
Using rain gauge and satellite-based rainfall climatologies and the NOAA Storm Prediction
Center tornado database (1952–2007), this study found a statistically significant tendency for
fall–winter drought conditions to be correlated with below-normal tornado days the following
spring in north Georgia (i.e. 93% of the years) and other regions of the Southeast. Non-drought
years had nearly twice as many tornado days in the study area as drought years and were also
five to six times more likely to have multiple tornado days. Individual tornadic events are
largely a function of the convective-mesoscale thermodynamic and dynamic environments, thus
the study does not attempt to overstate predictability. Yet, the results may provide seasonal
guidance in an analogous manner to the well known Sahelian rainfall and Cape Verde hurricane
activity relationships
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