05/19/2026
Let's talk a bit about last night. Based on reports i'm seeing, it appears a tornado most likely touched down a couple miles west of Holton. There are some lingering questions i've seen and i'll try to address a few of them best I can. Remember i'm not associated in any way with the City of Holton, the National Weather Service in Topeka, or any agency within NE Kansas so this is just my opinion and analysis of the situation.
1: Why was a tornado warning not issued ahead of the touchdown west of town? The storms last night were what we call a "QLCS" which stands for Quasi-linear convective system. We talk about "Discrete" storms and "linear" storms. Typically, discrete storms have stronger updrafts and aren't competing for the same air and so typically are higher risk of tornadoes and large hail. Linear storms are all fighting over the same air and energy, and usually don't have as high of a chance for large hail/tornadoes and typically come with high winds.
With that being said, QLCS spin-up tornadoes are some of the hardest to warn because they happen so quickly. Forecasters have to balance between warning the entire line and causing false alarms/cry wolf scenarios. So that's what happened last night. Something spun up so quickly, by the time the radar refreshed and the tornado had touched the ground, it was already over.
2: Shouldn't the radar have caught this? Again, I don't speak for the NWS in Topeka, but due to the nature of these storms, and the quality of the radar data, it was really challenging to know what was going on on the ground. I've attached two photos that showed what the radar looked like at 7:16pm and then 7:18pm. The purple area of the radar is "Range Folding" which is basically bad data that the radar isn't picking up accurate enough data. Because of this, it was really only seeing one side of the storm and the winds. On the second image, there is a localized area of high winds just north of the "BCSC" Marker that correlates with the tornado location. The warning was issued at 7:22pm, after forecasters were confident the area of localized high winds was rotation, and not just high winds. At this point the rotation was north of Holton and heading towards the Whiting area, which leads to the next question...
3: Why weren't sirens sounded in Holton? The explanation I saw in PPA was that due to the location of the rotation north of town by the time the warning was issued, they chose not to sound the sirens in Holton. Was this the right decision? From a meteorological standpoint, yes. From a general public opinion standpoint, it probably caused a lot of confusion after phones blew up but no sirens sounded. Which leads to my next point...
4: Should sirens still be relied on? Absolutely not. Sirens are designed to be an OUTDOOR warning system. Due to the nature of modern homes full of insulation and other ambient noises (TVs, speakers, phones, etc) it can be very very hard to hear sirens inside. Phones today will send out an EAS alert for Tornado warnings (as long as they are not disabled on your phone settings) and multiple apps exist to send targeted warnings. Finally, the NOAA Weather Radio is your best warning source, as it will go off based on radio frequencies and not reliant on cell signal/internet, etc. If you are interested in a NOAA Weather Radio and have questions, let me know.
Hopefully this helps with some of the confusion regarding last night. Forecasters did a great job with placing our area under a Moderate Risk for tornadoes and we are incredibly lucky none of the tornadoes that did spawn were violent or long tracked like they could have been.
