Michigan's deadly EF-3 tornado among state's earliest and strongest on record; plus, when does winter cold really end in your city?; and NASA ruled out lunar asteroid impact in 2032

0:00From AccuWeather.com, this is AccuWeather Daily, a brief host red article, its weather news and a nutshell. Well folks in the lower peninsula of Michigan are still reeling after several deadly tornadoes last Friday, including an EF3 tornado in Union City and another one near Edwardsburg that killed a child. The outbreak marked an unprecedented early start to tornado season for the Great Lakes State.

1:02AccuWeather's Jesse Farrell said that while Michigan ranks in the middle of the U.S. for average tornadoes per year, March tornadoes are rare. Michigan averages about 13 tornadoes per year based on data from 1995 through 2024, only five of the past 30 years recorded any tornadoes in March in the state. On Friday, at least three confirmed tornadoes touched down across the lower peninsula of Michigan, causing damage in three counties and resulting in four deaths, including a sixth grade student in Cass County. National Weather Service survey teams from Northern Indiana determined that the Union City tornado was an EF3 on the enhanced Fugida scale. According to AccuWeather experts with estimated peak winds of 160 miles per hour, it is the strongest tornado to strike Michigan since April 1977. It is also the earliest EF3 tornado on record in Michigan, surpassing the previous benchmark of March 15th of 2022 when an EF3 hit near Ann Arbor.

2:11Before the March 6th tornado, the most recent EF3 in the state occurred in Gaylord in May of 2022. The timing and severity of the outbreak caught many residents off guard. The areas that experienced tornadoes were under a level one out of five or some risk on AccuWeather's severe weather scale. This level indicates that severe storms are possible in parts of the region and can include tornadoes, even though it is not the highest alert level. Despite the relatively low risk designation, the necessary ingredients for severe weather came together. The outbreak underscores the importance of staying weather aware and having multiple ways to receive watches and warnings year round, even in the early spring months in the Great Lakes region. AccuWeather meteorologists are tracking another round of potent severe weather for Tuesday night for some of the same areas impacted by last week's storms with the greatest risk for tornadoes happening after dark from Missouri to Indiana.

3:20Well, if winter feels like it's hanging on forever in some places, it is not just in your head. Cold stretches can persist later in some parts of the country than others. Meteorological winter for the U.S. is defined for historical purposes as starting December 1st and running through the end of February. However, the actual three-month period of the lowest temperatures varies from city to city and from year to year. AccuWeather meteorologists have calculated the 30-year historical average dates of winter's end for 49 major cities. Historically speaking, all the cities examined have their end of winter dates by March 8th, the earliest end of winter date is in Spokane, Washington, where the coldest weather ends on February 19th. The latest end of winter date is in Boston on March 8th, which is two-and-a-half weeks later than Spokane. This winter, many spots in the western U.S. had very little winter weather, which has caused significant issues with low snowpack in the Rockies.

4:24AccuWeather's Dan de Podwin said that in the southeast, warm weather has returned over the last few weeks, but the chill is lingering in the northeast. This relatively slower transition to spring in the northeast is typical compared to other parts of the country, which end their coldest three-month period earlier. Unfortunately for fans of warmer weather, after a warm-up this weekend and early next week, tillier air can filter back into the northeast during the middle and end of March. NASA has walked back a prediction that an asteroid had a small but notable chance of impacting Earth or the Moon in 2032 based on newly analyzed data. Scientists said that near-Earth asteroid 2024YR4 is expected to pass by the lunar surface from more than 13,000 miles away, after previous concerns that it was destined for an impact with Earth's Moon, the update which comes as the asteroid has been unobservable from nearly all Earth and space-based observatories since spring of last year is based on where the asteroid is expected to be in 2032 rather than a shift in its orbital path.

5:40Over time, with more observations collected by observatories around the world, NASA concluded the object poses no significant risk to Earth on December 20, 2032. Now, it is typical to have initial observations and risk models updated once additional observational data is gathered and models are able to be refined. The asteroid, which NASA said is 174 to 220 feet in size, roughly the size of a 15-story building, was discovered in late 2024 by NASA's asteroid terrestrial impact last alert system in Chile. Based on available data, the agency initially thought the asteroid posed a potential threat to Earth in 2032, but by early last year, NASA had lowered that risk of an Earth impact to near zero. With that announcement, however, scientists said the risk for a lunar impact sometime in 2032 had increased from 1.7% to 3.8%, which was later updated to a 4.3% chance of hitting the Moon on December 22, 2032.

6:54The new analyses are of observations and data gathered by the James Webb Space Telescope on February 18 and 26, which researchers at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory said increased the certainty of where the asteroid will be in the future and decreased the range of possible locations. This use of the JSWT is among the faintest ever observations of an asteroid. With this new data, the asteroid is expected to pass by the Moon at a distance of 13,200 miles, and lunar impact is no longer a possibility. That's all for now. You can find more regional forecasts and science-based articles at acuether.com, and for your local forecast at your fingertips, download the Acuether app. Enjoy the rest of your day. Be safe. I'll be back tomorrow with more from Acuether. It's tax season, and at LifeLock, we know you're tired of numbers. But here's a big one you need to hear. Billions. That's the amount of money and refunds the IRS has flagged for possible identity fraud.

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