Environment and Climate Change Canada (ECCC) is making another update to severe weather alerts. The organization introduced colour-coded watches and warnings several months ago. Now, they’re getting set to roll out targeted severe thunderstorm and tornado warnings. The new system will be similar to what the National Weather Service in the U.S. does and will provide more precision with the warnings while limiting “false warnings.” Currently, severe thunderstorm and tornado warnings are issued using large forecast zones. Often, a storm will develop in a small part of that zone and pose no threat to areas “behind” the storm or outside the storm’s path. The new targeted warnings will draw a polygon around the specific area being hit by the storm and the area the storm is heading towards. As the storm moves, ECCC forecasters will redraw the polygon and update the warnings. This change will only impact severe thunderstorm and tornado warnings. All other severe weather alerts will continue to be issued using the larger forecast zones, although that may change in the future.
