The central U.S. faces more rounds of thunderstorms on Friday and into the weekend that once again may unleash damaging winds, hail and possible tornadoes across the storm-weary region, much of which is still reeling from weeks of severe weather that spun up deadly twisters and inflicted immense damage.
Over 25 million people from southern Texas and New Mexico to Kansas and Colorado were at risk from the storms, according to the National Weather Service’s Storm Prediction Center. Among the dangerous conditions were strong wind gusts, hail larger than 2 inches in diameter and, in west Texas, an isolated tornado. The cities in the storm’s crosshairs include San Antonio, Texas; Little Rock, Arkansas; and Pueblo, Colorado.
“There’s still plenty of uncertainty as to where exactly storms will initiate and be most impactful,” the weather service noted.
Early Friday morning, meteorologists issued flood and thunderstorm advisories across central and eastern Texas as some rivers approached their flood stages. The weather service placed parts of the Mississippi Valley under flash flood advisories citing the rolling storms forecast to develop over the area.
A piece of hail 2.75 inches wide was recorded in Matagorda County, in southeast Texas, along the Gulf Coast. In the same area, wind speeds reached 72 mph, according to the weather service.
More than 230,000 homes and businesses throughout eastern Texas were without power, down from Wednesday’s peak of nearly 400,000 outages, according to a USA TODAY tracker. Over 28,000 outages were reported in western Louisiana and more than 11,000 utility customers were in the dark in Arkansas.
At Dallas Fort Worth International Airport, delays continued to pile up from earlier in the week. As of Friday afternoon, more than 100 flights had been canceled and over 300 were delayed, according to FlightAware, a flight tracking website.
