Big Severe Outbreak Friday?

Severe weather is starting to ramp up Today and will steadily increase through this coming Friday. As an active northwest flow sets up aloft with very warm and humid weather tries to fight northward. This Friday these really collide in the Ohio Valley with severe weather including tornadoes. So if you live in and around the Ohio Valley expect the severe weather to continue and peak on Friday. I'll have more on this in the coming days but wanted to give a heads to people that not beware of. When I say severe outbreak I'm talking about more than 300 reports of severe weather. This set up on Friday has the possibility of producing over two dozens tornadoes. Stay Tuned!

SPC Outlook for Thursday and Friday


*Still working on Pictures from chase 2009 I'll have them up this weekend.

End of Chase 2009

Nothing really exciting to report unfortunately as yesterdays storm were pretty lame. They kept becoming outflowed and when they didn't they split. So no meso could really become anchored and get wrapped up to produce a tornado. So observed some blowing dust from radar and observed 80mph winds, possible gustnado and some exploding towers from the backside. I'll have pictures from the chase up in a couple days. Probably some decent shots mixed in but definitely not the shots I was hoping for. Have a great Sunday everyone!

From Colorado Springs- Moderate risk Today!

Well It looks like my afternoon post didn't post so that pisses me off a little. =( Anyways sitting in Colorado Springs currently looking at the beautiful snow capped mountains. Looking to head south within the half hour and race southeast to the Texas Panhandle. Where SPC has upgraded to a moderate risk with 5% tornado risk but 45% hatched for severe hail. They look like slow movers and will mature into HP supercells or mergers. So that sucks but hopefully they'll hold off till around 5 or 6 when we actually get there. First 45 mins of the storms will be the best to watch and max tornado potential. Well I need to get packed up and head south on the highway.

Yesterday was a pretty fun day with three seperate storm intercepts. Got pounded by pea to dime size hail that accumulated up to 3 inches on the roadway. Beautiful structure and a couple nice size wall clouds. However they're kinda higher base and never rotated. Hopefully today will be a good day and that moisture axis rides up the lee side of the Rockies. Later!

Target Location- Far NE New Mexico and Nw Texas Panhandle

Morning From Amarillio

It was a long day 1 of traveling with mostly sunny skies and a capped atmosphere. We headed south from Lawton just before noon. Taking the highway south through Wichita Falls to Seymour to eventually Haskel, Texas. Things were very unstable by then with 5,000 joules of Cape nosing north as a weak low was forming in the panhandle. So we decided to head west from there as our target was around Dickens county. Before towers to our southeast exploded and was later tornado warned across south central Texas. For us as we entered our target area we could see pretty nice towers trying to go up. Well we continued to watched this towers go up and down for the next three hours. As the cap kept things knocked down and we couldn't take advantage of the moderate instability in our area. So day 1 was a bust but I enjoyed every second of it. Its so great to spend this time with my niece and it doesn't help that I just love chasing. Driving across this country is so amazing and a lot of people have no clue how pretty the Texas panhandle can be. Well hopefully Internet issues won't be that big of deal today. Yesterday I had very limited Internet for a good portion of the afternoon. So I was able to update and tweet as much. I'll have another update on our plans are later this morning. For now I might try to catch some more zzzz or starting forecasting. Hmm if anyone knows me I think they'll know the answer to that one....haha Let the forecasting begin! Have a great morning everyone from Amarillo, Texas.

Mini Chase 2009 has started!

Analysis-

Greetings from the highway heading through Wichita Falls on our way southwest. Looking at current surface analysis I'm glad I went with my hunch this morning. As low pressure has set up over the Lubbock area. This has turned winds south/southeast across central and now across north central Texas. As the moisture continues to be pulled northwest toward the Texas panhandle. Instability has soared across the region with dewpoints climbing into lower 60s. Surface based CAPE across the I-20 corridor at Noon were already topping out over 4,500 joules. Skies were mainly sunny with some flat cu starting to develop with the advancing low level moisture.



Target Area-

Plan on heading south to Seymour, Texas then west towards Lubbock. I'm thinking currently the we might not get the first one or two storms that form down along I-20. As I want to play the better backing winds to the northwest, not only at the surface but at the 850 level. These per the models increase towards sunset especially the 850 level. Current 4 county play area is thinking to be Crosby, Dicken, Garza and Kent. Another update later when things start to fire up.

Night before the chase

Greetings Everyone! This will short and sweet as I'm about to head to the airport to pick up becky. As her flight got delayed due to the MCS going through north Texas heading towards where she came from Dallas.

Forecast- Lots of rain this evening with a complex of severe t'storms that has a pretty nice cold pool behind it. Notice though that things have rebounded a little over the Texas panhandle with main short wave. As a new low pressure has deepened over Oklahoma Panhandle. This might be a saving factor for tomorrow as dry air has not come surging in behind the first shortwave. Water vapor does show some energy still left in the southwest flow that will move across tomorrow afternoon. Models have done horrible the last two days with placement of fronts, low pressure and convection. So I think its a crap shoot on tomorrow but think we'll see some supercells from Oklahoma panhandle southeast to near Dallas along a stalled front. We'll see what overnight models and upper air soundings have to say. For now i'll leave you with the current day2 outlook from SPC. I'll have a full pre chase day 1 analysis tomorrow morning.