ALBERTA: Severe Thunderstorm Risk This Afternoon, Evening, and Overnight (Fri, July 2, 2021)

Friday, July 2nd, 2021:

We’re closely watching for the likely development of severe thunderstorms this afternoon, evening, and into the overnight hours. There is a fairly strong environment in place and we could see hail up to 6cm in size, 120km/h+ damaging wind gusts, frequent lightning, and perhaps even some isolated flooding. There is also the risk for tornadoes to develop with these storms and if Environment Canada does end up issuing a Tornado Warning, we’ll of course be posting it to our Facebook and Twitter accounts automatically and sending it out instantly on our free app; Instant Weather.

Environment Canada has issued a Severe Thunderstorm Watch for some of the areas with potential:

Severe thunderstorm watch for CALGARY, RED DEER, and surrounding areas (click the image for further details)

Environment Canada also issued an experimental forecast map with similar locations highlighted to the watch regions and they have mentioned the risk for 1-5cm hail, 120km/h wind gusts, and the risk for a tornado:

Environment Canada’s experimental forecast map

PLEASE READ: For those wondering, these "prototype" maps are not yet available on EC's website. However, they will become operational soon and shared directly on their site. These forecasts and maps are issued by the same Environment Canada Meteorologists that issue all Watches and Warnings for the Alberta. They're also shared on Environment Canada's Twitter account and you can find it by searching for @ECCCWeatherAB.

Environment Canada's disclaimer says:

"Disclaimer: These products are part of an experimental initiative at Environment and Climate Change Canada (ECCC). These are not official ECCC products and therefore may not be available on a daily basis. Please continue to monitor weather forecasts as well as watches and warnings via http://www.weather.gc.ca/. Please address any questions, concerns and/or feedback regarding these products to the Decision Support Meteorologists at the Prairie and Arctic Storm Prediction Centre, available by email at ec.soutienmeteoouest-weathersupportwest.ec@canada.ca."

Long story short, please keep an eye out this afternoon, evening, and into the overnight for any alerts from Environment Canada and once again, you can get notified instantly of these alerts by downloading our free app; Instant Weather. Thank you so much to those who have downloaded it and a huge thank you to those who have subscribed to remove ads and upgrade to have 5 hours of future radar as you’re the reason that we’re able to offer our app for free to everyone else. Thank you! More details, ASAP.