The National Weather Service let a tornado warning for Osage and Lyon counties expire at 11:45 p.m., ending a late-night alert that had covered communities in the path of a severe thunderstorm capable of producing a tornado.
At 11:17 p.m., that storm was located 4 miles south of Allen and moving east at 45 mph. The weather service said Reading, Allen and Admire were among the locations impacted while the warning was in effect.
The warning’s expiration marked the end of the immediate tornado threat for the two-county area, but it did not answer the question many residents would have wanted most: whether a tornado actually formed or whether the storm left damage behind. Those details were not provided in the alert information available late Tuesday night.
What was clear is that the system remained capable of turning dangerous quickly. Even as the warning ran out, the storm itself had already been tracked at tornado-producing strength four miles south of Allen, with an eastward push of 45 mph through a part of Kansas where seconds can matter.
For people in Osage and Lyon counties, the next step was to wait for any follow-up from forecasters or local officials on whether the storm produced damage before the warning expired. Until then, the late-night alert stood as the last confirmed update: the warning was over, but the storm that prompted it had been close enough to keep the region on edge.
