Metro Detroit was under a Tornado Watch late Monday as a severe weather system moved east from Wisconsin, crossing Lake Michigan after already triggering severe thunderstorms and tornado warnings in Illinois and Wisconsin. The National Weather Service issued the watch at 8:55 p.m. and kept it in place until 4 a.m. for the entire southern half of Michigan, including all of Metro Detroit.
The system was expected to reach the Southeast Michigan area around 11 p.m., with forecasters warning that wind gusts over 60 mph, large hail and torrential downpours were all possible. There was also a low but non-zero chance of an isolated tornado, along with flooding concerns in spots where the ground was already damp.
The danger is sharper because the storms were arriving late at night, when many people are already home and less likely to be watching the sky or checking alerts. The weather system was moving from the West across Lake Michigan from Wisconsin, and FOX 2 Detroit said it was entering the west side of Michigan through Muskegon after a day of high temperatures and sunny weather.
That rapid shift from calm to severe weather left little time for warning fatigue to set in. For Metro Detroit, the question was not whether the storm line would arrive, but how hard it would hit once it did.
