Millions Under Tornado Watch as Severe Storms Hit Northeast

That corridor encompasses the New York City metropolitan area along with large portions of New Jersey and eastern Pennsylvania.

Rudy Blalock

Published: 7/21/2026, 8:19:29 PM EDT

Millions Under Tornado Watch as Severe Storms Hit Northeast — A tornado crosses a highway in Enid, Okla., on April 23, 2026. (KWTV/KOTV via AP)

Millions of people across the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic remained under a tornado watch Tuesday evening.

A fast-moving line of severe thunderstorms threatened destructive winds, hail, and a handful of tornadoes, according to the National Weather Service Storm Prediction Center.

The Storm Prediction Center issued Tornado Watch Number 507 at 2:05 p.m. Eastern Time on Tuesday, covering western Connecticut, northern Delaware, New Jersey, central and southern New York, western Pennsylvania, and adjacent coastal waters. The watch is set to remain in effect until 9 p.m. Eastern Time on Tuesday.

Forecasters said the watch zone runs roughly 60 miles on either side of a line stretching from 30 miles northwest of Albany, New York, to about 20 miles south-southwest of Wilmington, Delaware. That corridor encompasses the New York City metropolitan area along with large portions of New Jersey and eastern Pennsylvania.

What Forecasters Expect

The center said the primary threats include a couple of possible tornadoes, scattered damaging wind gusts up to 70 mph, and scattered large hail up to 1.5 inches in diameter. The agency noted that thunderstorm intensity had already increased from central New York into eastern Pennsylvania near a warm front pushing northward and northeastward through the region.

Forecasters attributed the escalating threat to increasing deep-layer wind shear paired with strengthening low- to mid-level winds, conditions they said could produce more organized storm structures capable of spinning up tornadoes as the storms track eastward. The center added that a second wave of storms carrying its own severe threat was possible later Tuesday evening.

Farther west, forecasters said a broken line of storms tracking ahead of a cold front through West Virginia, southwestern Pennsylvania, and into southern Indiana, Ohio, and northern Kentucky could produce a mix of supercells and clustered storms capable of large hail and a few tornadoes.

Flooding Threat Compounds Storm Risk

Beyond the tornado and wind threat, the Weather Prediction Center in College Park, Maryland, separately flagged a slight risk of excessive rainfall stretching from the Ohio and Tennessee valleys into the Northeast on Tuesday, warning of pockets of heavier rain and hourly rates likely to raise flash-flooding concerns from eastern North Carolina and Virginia into southeastern Maryland and Delaware. The agency tied that rainfall threat to a strong cold front pulling moisture northeastward from Tropical Storm Bertha in the Gulf, moisture that forecasters said was also fueling the thunderstorm activity feeding Tuesday's severe weather.

The Storm Prediction Center urged residents within the watch area to remain alert. "A Tornado Watch means conditions are favorable for tornadoes and severe thunderstorms in and close to the watch area. Persons in these areas should be on the lookout for threatening weather conditions and listen for later statements and possible warnings," the agency said in a statement.