Meteorlogists at the National Weather Service, including the Tulsa office, have been adding to their bag of tricks with a new technology called Dual Polarization Radar, or "Dual Pol" for short.
The radar will be installed in Tulsa in September.
[ Here's more information on the schedule of the installations around the nation. ]
The new technology alternates between scanning horizontally and vertically and is so sensitive it can distinguish between a large raindrop and a hailstone.
"Perhaps most importantly, it's going to tell us if we have debris within the radar beam, which can confirm the existence of a tornado," said National Weather Service meteorologist Steve Piltz.
The radar at the Tulsa site will be offline for a couple of weeks while the Dual Pol system is installed, but Piltz says they've got plenty of backup radars from neighboring sites at their disposal to fill in the gaps.