Before last week, severe weather in the United States was nearly nonexistent. Tornado, hail and wind reports were lower than they'd ever been at this point.
Last week doubled all of those numbers, but twice as few is still only a little bit more. The amount of severe weather we're seeing this year has been abysmal.
Now, Mother Nature seems to be trying to change that. Since April began, only two days have been without severe weather.
That busy trend is continuing this week with a couple of slight risks for severe thunderstorms across the country on Tuesday. This brought a lot of hail to the St. Louis area.
Wednesday is upping the ante with an enhanced risk for bad weather across Kansas, Oklahoma and Missouri. This means more hail, possibly damaging winds, a tornado, or a combination of all three.
Thursday, that threat of nasty storms moves to the north and east across Illinois and eastern Missouri. That'll be another chance for hail, wind, and tornadoes.
Severe weather season has been slow to start, but it seems as if things are on a roll if these last two weeks are any indication.
Part of the reason things have been picking up is because of the overall pattern shift.
Temperatures are finally beginning to warm up in the eastern half of the country where it's been unseasonably chilly for a long time now. The added warmth may feel nice compared to winter, but it will also create the instability necessary for thunderstorm development.