Active Weather
Two separate risks overlap this region this morning, and they are not the same hazard.
The first is severe storms. The Storm Prediction Center's Day 1 outlook, issued at 7:40 PM Central Sunday and valid through 7 AM Central today, places a slight risk of severe thunderstorms over a small part of the lower Missouri Valley. The population centers named inside that risk area are Kansas City, Missouri, Overland Park, Kansas, Kansas City, Kansas, Olathe, Kansas, and Independence, Missouri. Slight is the second of five categorical levels and means scattered severe storms are expected somewhere inside the area.
The forecaster discussion describes widely scattered strong to severe storms already underway over southeast Nebraska, northeast Kansas, and northwest Missouri, organizing along outflow boundaries and a front. The named hazards are large hail and locally damaging wind gusts. Hail is the primary one. Two inches is the size the discussion references for the Montana half of the outlook, and the Kansas City area is described as supporting episodic supercell structures with large hail and damaging gusts.
The second risk is rainfall. The Weather Prediction Center's excessive rainfall discussion, issued at 12:58 AM Eastern today, holds a slight risk of excessive rainfall over Iowa and northward through this morning, on soils the discussion describes as already saturated. For Tuesday it extends a marginal risk into northeast Nebraska.
The National Weather Service public alert feed, read at about 1 AM Eastern, counts four active alerts in Kansas and two in Missouri.
One timing note that matters for how you read all of this: the Storm Prediction Center outlook quoted above covers the overnight window only. The daytime update for Monday issues later this morning and may look different. If you are making a decision about the afternoon, check the current outlook rather than this one.
Infrastructure
No large wildfires are burning in Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, or Nebraska, according to the National Interagency Fire Center situation report dated Sunday September 6 at 7:30 AM Mountain time.
That report puts the national wildfire preparedness level is 4 on a five-step scale, according to the National Interagency Fire Center situation report dated Sunday September 6 at 7:30 AM Mountain time. That report counts 75 uncontained large fires nationally, with 53,165 fires and 8,302,657 acres burned so far this year, running at 125 percent and 158 percent of the ten-year average.
No grid emergencies or water system disruptions are reported. Storms carrying two-inch hail and damaging wind gusts are the kind that take down distribution lines, so localized outages around the Kansas City metro would not be surprising this morning. None are being reported as of this writing. The Federal Emergency Management Agency's declarations page could not be read this run.
Public Health
No air quality alerts or boil-water advisories were identified across the four states.
The alert types behind the Kansas and Missouri counts were not resolved this run, so this brief makes no claim about active heat products in either state. Entering your county at weather.gov gives you that answer directly.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Health Alert Network archive could not be read this run, so this brief makes no claim about national health advisories in either direction.
Watch Item
The forecaster discussion offers one detail worth carrying past today. A tornado was reported with a slow-moving supercell over McKenzie County, North Dakota, north of this region, and the discussion expects the tornado threat to fade overnight as the inflow air dries out and the atmosphere caps. That is the ordinary evolution of a September evening in the Plains, and it is the reason the risk area covers hail rather than tornadoes here.
Hail is the hazard to plan around this morning, and the useful thing about hail is that the preparation is quick and finishes before the storm arrives. Vehicles under cover if cover exists. Anything on the deck or patio that will not survive being hit, brought in. Blinds closed on the windward side, which does nothing about the glass but keeps fragments out of the room if a pane goes.
Once the storm is on you, stay inside and away from windows. Two-inch hail moves fast enough to injure someone caught outside, and the interval where it is worth going out to move a car has already closed by the time you can hear it hitting the roof.
The rainfall side asks for a different habit. Iowa's saturated soils mean water is running off rather than soaking in, and the roads that flood are the ones that always flood. Do not drive into water across a road. That is the National Weather Service's Turn Around, Don't Drown guidance, and it holds regardless of how well you know the road.
Looking to the back half of the week, the Weather Prediction Center places a marginal risk of excessive rainfall across the Central Plains for Thursday and Friday. Low-end, four days out, and worth nothing more than a note today.
Explore Today
What the risk categories mean, what hail and straight-line wind actually do, and the ten minutes of preparation that matter.
What goes down when a distribution line comes down, and how to cover the first day without it.
Why saturated ground turns an ordinary rain into a road problem, and how to route around it.