In addition to learning what is the best course of action when severe weather hits, Wisconsin Tornado and Severe Weather Awareness Week is a chance for people to learn more about what risk there is for different types of severe weather.
Wisconsin does gets its fair share of tornadoes. There are 23 that occur during an average year in the Badger State, and there were 20 in 2020.
However, that is not the most common severe weather event in Wisconsin. “The most common type of severe weather that we get here in Wisconsin is from damaging winds,” says Tim Halbach, Warning Coordination Meteorologist at the National Weather Service office in Sullivan.
Halbach remembers the high wind event that took place back in July of 2019 that occurred in the northeast part of the state as one of the more extreme recent events. “There was widespread 80 to 110 mile per hour winds over a large area that knocked down hundreds of thousands of trees,” says Halbach. “Tornadoes and hail storms and flash flooding; we call all that to some degree every year,. It’s just a matter of how frequent it is and where that actually ends up happening.”
Ready Wisconsin spokesperson Andrew Beckett adds the wide variety of severe weather events during the spring and summer is not unusual for the state. “We have extremely cold temperatures some times and snow and blizzard like conditions. We also have extreme heat in the summer months. Flooding is a constant concern throughout the year when you have snow melting or heavy rains moving through an area.
“Then, of course, we have severe thunderstorms and tornadoes that can be produced by storm systems that move through the state, and can sometimes pop up quite quickly and cause a great deal of damage when those winds pick up.”
To get a sense of the overall dangers that severe weather events can bring to Wisconsin, click on the various links below that showcase some of the worst events to happen in Wisconsin.
NWS Office in Milwaukee/Sullivan
NWS Office in La Crosse (includes events in Minnesota and Iowa)
NWS Office in Twin Cities (includes events in Minnesota)
NWS Office in Duluth (includes events in Minnesota)
