I guess it will be an early-starting tornado season this year.  Last evening we had a tornado warning for about an hour.  We ended up dodging the bullet here, but weather spotters were out and we had one period of about 5 minutes where the rain rate on the gauge was registering a hefty 6.5 inches of rain per hour!

We didn't get the hail, but had 50-60 mph winds.  Our wind gauge always registers low, as it is only mounted 8 feet up instead of the required 30 feet, and has a little wind blockage from the north with some trees nearby.  The wind gauge, even where it is placed, was registering 35-40 mph.  It was quite a night, and right around sunset where we couldn't really assess any damage until this morning (we didn't have any ... all trees on the property seem to be intact).

It has been a rough winter, but on the positive side the weather station has provided us with a great deal of interesting data to examine while being stuck indoors due to the numerous snow storms that have passed our way. Spring weather around here is always exciting (we're in the midwest tornado belt) and that's when the weather station and our local weather spotting network really comes in handy.  

We hope you enjoy this website if you are local to our area, or if you are a weather enthusiast from elsewhere.  We'll try to keep it up to date with some good weather information.