All East Texas eyes are on tonight's severe weather threat.  The latest forecast from the National Weather Service in Shreveport as well as advisories from the Storm Prediction Center in Norman, Oklahoma show some rough weather ahead during the overnight hours and into the early hours of Tuesday morning.

When I say rough weather that means damage from straight-line winds, damage from large hail, flooding from the possibility of over 5 inches of rain, and the threat of destructive tornadoes.  They are all in play, especially between the hours of 7 p.m. and 5 a.m.  Why does it always seem that East Texas gets hit with the bad stuff when the sun has gone down?

This intimidating forecast has caused several East Texas school districts to take the precautionary measure of delaying the start of classes on Tuesday by two hours.  In my own opinion, I believe that to be an extremely smart move to make.

The worst of these storms are supposed to hit after midnight.  Some of the Pineywoods may get the brunt of the severe weather just before sunrise.  With the recent time change, our sunrise doesn't take place until 7:20 a.m.  That means that many cars and buses will be on the road picking up kids and heading to school.  If the forecast bears out to what they are predicting, there will be a good chance that some area roads will have limbs and/or floodwaters across them.

That would be hard to see in the pre-dawn hours.  That would be very dangerous during the pre-dawn hours.  I applaud the decision to wait until the sun sheds some light on what damage the storm brought.

Here is a list of schools that are delaying the start of classes:

  • Alto ISD - 10 a.m. start
  • Apple Springs ISD - 2 hour late start
  • Big Sandy ISD (Dallardsville) - Classes canceled for Tuesday
  • Center ISD - Classes canceled for Tuesday
  • Centerville ISD (Trinity County) - 10 a.m. start
  • Central ISD - 2 hour delayed start
  • Chester - 2 hour delayed start
  • Corrigan-Camden ISD - 2 hour delayed start
  • Cushing ISD - Classes Canceled for Tuesday due to tornado damage
  • Groveton ISD - 2 hour delayed start
  • Jasper ISD - 10 a.m. start
  • Kennard ISD - Classes start at 10
  • Livingston ISD - 2 hour delayed start
  • Onalaska ISD - 2 hour delayed start
  • San Augustine ISD - 2 hour delayed start
  • Trinity ISD - 10 a.m. start
  • Woodville ISD - 10 a.m. start

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