Tornado Alley—historically referring to parts of the Great Plains, Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, and Nebraska—has been slowly shifting eastward over the past few years and will again in 2025, forecasters say.
“We’ve noticed over time the precipitation line shifting east… so the western Great Plains, western Kansas, western Nebraska and western Oklahoma are running a bit drier,” noted Joe Strus, a meteorologist for the National Weather Service (NWS) in a 2024 report. “We’ve also seen a higher frequency of tornadoes,” he added.
According to Accuweather, the arrival of spring has brought with it the peak of the severe weather season across the United States, with forecasters saying the worst of the storms and tornadoes might occur outside of the traditional Tornado Alley.
In 2024, the hot zones, or at least the hottest of zones, moved from Oklahoma, Kansas and north Texas to Mississippi, Louisiana, Alabama, Tennessee and Kentucky, the so-called “Dixie Alley.”
A 2024 study published in the Journal of Applied Meteorology and Climatology also found that tornadoes have trended away from the warm season, especially the summer, and toward the cold season.
Already this winter, tornadoes killed two in Texas and Mississippi (Dec. 29); two in eastern Tennessee (Feb. 7); and wreaked havoc in North Carolina (March 5).
In addition, according to the National Weather Service, a changing climate is leading to warmer and wetter nights, which raise the odds for nocturnal tornadoes.
How Tornadoes Form & How to Protect Your Group
During March, April and May, conditions align to create severe weather. Cold air from Canada collides with warm, moist air from the Gulf of Mexico, providing the fuel and energy for life-threatening thunderstorms to develop across the central and eastern United States.
“If you’re in an area where severe weather is something you’ve experienced before, it can and it will happen again,” Strus says.
If a tornado is approaching, the NWS recommends sheltering in an interior room on the lowest floor of whatever structure you’re in.
For planners who might have to navigate hurricanes and tornadoes during their respective seasons (hurricane season is June 1-Dec. 1), you’re advised to choose hotels with defined emergency procedures. Ask if the hotel and/or convention center has a storm response team; many do. And if they also have an alarm system to warn about approaching tornadoes, so much the better.
When it comes to hurricanes, you have at least days, if not weeks, for contingency plans. Tornadoes, on the other hand, form quickly and take unexpected turns. It’s good to know when and where they might appear.
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Reports from the Associated Press contributed to this story.
