Xcel preps crews ahead of potential for strong storms in MN
MN weather: Scattered storms on Thursday
A cold front will likely trigger scattered storms and showers across Minnesota on Thursday afternoon. The Twin Cities metro area is under a level 2 slight risk of severe weather.
(FOX 9) - Xcel Energy says it has crews prepared to deal with any outages ahead of storms expected Thursday in Minnesota.
Xcel stages crews to respond to storms
What we know:
Xcel says it has 150 crews ready to respond to resolve any outages in central and southern Minnesota.
What they're saying:
The company says: "The company is tracking these forecasts and will stage additional crews as needed to respond to any outages, attending to the largest outages first to quickly get the most customers back online as soon as possible."
The forecast
What's next:
A severe thunderstorm watch has been issued covering much of central and southern Minnesota.
A cold front moving through will likely trigger scattered showers and thunderstorms. The best chance for storms runs from early afternoon into the evening hours.
Isolated storms begin to fire up not long after the lunch hour. These first storm cells will hold a short-lived hail threat. But as storms become more widespread, they'll congeal into small lines and clusters that will switch the main severe threat to gusty winds and a very small chance of a tornado.
There is a large amount of moisture in the atmosphere for this time of year, so some very heavy downpours will accompany the strongest storms that could lead to some minor and short-lived street flooding.
The metro and areas to the south are under a level 2 slight risk of severe weather. Much of central and northern Minnesota is under a level 1 marginal risk. The main threats include brief heavy downpours, gusty winds over 60 mph and possible hail. An isolated tornado also can’t be ruled out.
Showers may linger into the evening, but the severe weather threat will likely diminish after sunset. Overnight lows will drop into the 40s.