loadedgunchasing.com Blog

I can’t forecast tonight. I have to run some final checks on my video streaming and take care of some other stuff. I did just glance over the European and GFS though. The GFS looks slightly better by 00Z Saturday and is showing a decent severe threat over central Oklahoma, which I would agree with should the current trend of the GFS continue. The European is pretty similiar with it’s kinematics and tilt of the shortwave, which is literally all you can see with the ECMWF on COD. I never have understood that. Where in the hell is all the model data for the European? 850mb winds were backed immediately ahead of the dryline with the GFS as well, which is a sharp change from past runs. It makes more sens with a tight negatively tilted shortwave so I’m backing off the idea of veering 850mb flow. Moisture advection is still going to be the biggest problem. The GFS has mid 50’s to the threat area centered near OKC by 00Z, but I’m not sure I’m 100% buying that. This is based on dramatically fast moisture advection during the day Saturday. If I remember right the models did a fairly good job with moisture advection on the last system, but on last Monday’s setup you had a screaming low level jet to pump that moisture up here. With this setup you have a respectable LLJ, but it only has a good fetch for less than 24 hours.

If I just set the model data aside, which changes every day anyway and look at climatology, then what is probably going to happen? We are going to have a decent shear low moisture/CAPE severe threat that will likely be maximized between the mid level low and the more favorable moisture to the south. This should be some place over Oklahoma. If the GFS is right and low to 55td’s make it all the way up close to the surface low there may be a severe threat up here too. I haven’t done any forecasting and I could very well make an ass out of myself saying this, but you always have to watch low topped storms directly under a mid level low. They have a habit of producing a weak tornado or two, which I won’t even consider chasing because I get my ass handed to me every time I do lol. I’m serious when I say that.

I want to wait and see what SPC does tomorrow. I imagine they’ll circle the I35 corridor over Oklahoma and possibly overlap the threat area into Kansas and Texas slightly and bring it back in to the severe weather discussion on the 4-8 day outlook, but we’ll have to wait and see. Unless something amazing happens I won’t be chasing this one. I have plenty of equipment and business stuff to be working on.

BTW thanks for the emails lately from a few of you that actually read this. It’s nice to know that a few people actually get something out of it and I’m glad I can help out. I know I’ve been getting lazy with the quality and frequency of my forecasts lately, but it’s just because it’s tough to stay focus and dedicate the time to it when I’m busy with preseason preperations and there isn’t anything serious weatherwise to talk about. When there is something worth talking about, trust me I will be keeping a close eye on it and posting regularly. I am really pumped about getting the season started. I’ll post something tomorrow. How much I post just depends on the time I have available tomorrow.

I was to busy again today to work on my forecasting. I apologize for that to the two or three people that actually read this lol. I did just look over the GFS on RAP and COD for about 20 minutes (getting ready to go to bed). I still don’t like the setup very much for Saturday. I got 00Z data on RAP because it updates faster and 12Z data on COD because it takes an eternity to update. COD is so much better though for looking at details. On the 12Z the moist tounge makes a miracle lunge forward in the 18Z-00Z time frame. With surface winds under 20kts and 850mb winds veering at 30kts, that is physically impossible IMO.

It is still early in the season and I think we are going to be dealing with the same problems you usually do this time of year. I don’t think there is going to be adequate instability or moisture for a good severe weather threat.
As I mentioned in my previous forecast this wave train pattern we’re in doesn’t allow for much recovery over the gulf or moisture advection northward. We are in a progressive pattern (wave after wave) with mid amplitude waves and short wave lengths (distance between short waves). This acts to shove the better moisture into the far southern gulf with the pass of the first wave and there simply isn’t enough time for good moisture advection to draw good moisture back northward before the arrival of the next shortwave. Decent moisture will probably make it to southern Texas with this system on Saturday, but that is too far away from the upper level support. Given the projected instability and shear I think you’ll get a lower end severe threat, but the tornado potential just isn’t there.The kinematics look really good with this system on if you are just looking for severe weather, but the lack of instability and moisture take away from that. Regardless I do think you will get an overlay of adequate moisture and upper level support in the area SPC has highlighted over the eastern half of Oklahoma and northeast Texas. This may wrap into far southern Kansas too.
To be honest I haven’t spent nearly enough time looking at this. I did read over SPC”s outlook and they mentioned…

“PROBABILITY OF ROBUST WARM SECTOR RETURN FLOW AND FAVORABLE OVERLYING WINDS WITH SUCH A PATTERN BY
DAY-6/SATURDAY/4TH-5TH…INDICATES POTENTIAL SVR OUTBREAK OVER PORTIONS S-CENTRAL CONUS THIS COMING WEEKEND.”

I just don’t see a “robust” warm sector developing except for over the southern portions of Texas which is too far south of the good kinematics and steep lapse rates. This was Edwards forecast though and I think he is one of the better forecasters at SPC. He certainly knows a lot more than I do. And like I said I haven’t spent much time on this. Even if we do get decent moisture I’ll agree there will be a severe threat given good deep layer shear, but the tornado threat won’t be good regardless given the veering 850mb flow. Some times people will point out that this yeilds major directional shear in the lowest 1km, but I can’t remember a single good tornado day with veering 850mb winds.

Well that’s it for now. Time for bed. I’ll do some more forecasting tomorrow. Don’t know how much. Just depends on how busy I am, but I’ll at least get some degree of a forecast up and it will be earlier in the day. I want to look a little further ahead and see if there is anything on the horizon to look forward too. I need a good tornado day.

I spent some more time on the GFS, but did go check out the European as promised. I’ve been very busy these last couple weeks and will continue to be really busy for probably another week or two. Until I finish getting all my equipment ordered, hooked up and running I’m probably not going to have time to post quality in-depth forecasts. If there is a good chase day coming up I will certainly find a way to do some proper forecasting, but for these long range forecasts where nothing major is showing up well on the radar I’ll probably just do a brief overview of the forecast.

Well the fundamental problem we have over the next ten days is that one trough after another dives into the southern plains and is quickly followed 2-3 days later by another trough. The pattern is too progressive. You need a break in between troughs for the dewpoints to recover and for moisture to be advected back northward so that these troughs have some good juice to tap in to. Keep in mind we are looking out 240 hours, so the models are FAR from accurate at these ranges. The good news is that there is an active jet stream. The bad news is that it’s a little too active and fast moving.

There are two days that stick out right now as potential severe weather days for the plains. The first is this Saturday which SPC mentioned in their 4-8 day outlook. They have the same concerns that I do in that moisture recovery will be very difficult with this trough riding right on the heels of the previous one. I shouldn’t be discussing mesoscale details this far out, but the models (and these types of situations in the past) favor veering 850mb winds, which will kill a tornado threat quicker than anything else in my opinion. That being said, my guess is that the eastern and southeastern portions of Texas will see some severe weather on Saturday, but the tornado threat won’t be there.

Attention then turns to next Wednesday when another fast moving waver dives into the central plains. This one my have a slightly better chance of drawing in decent moisture, especially if it can slow down and take on a negative tilt. If this can happen then this will be something to watch, but there is no way of knowing what will happen this far out.

On the backside of Wednesday’s trough the jet stream angles northwestward. I am horrible and know very little about synoptic scale meteorology, but I would think that there is a fair chance that after next Wednesday’s trough passes we may return to a more zonal type flow for a period of time. I actually think this is a good thing. We won’t get any weather during the zonal flow pattern, but that is what allows good moisture to build over the gulf and typically when the zonal flow breaks you get several deep slower moving troughs coming through which are usually associated with major tornado outbreaks. The timing on this would be in the later part of April. This is some serious wishcasting so don’t take it seriously at all. It is just my best guess at what to look forward to. A lot can change before now and then though. I will probably post again tomorrow with updates on the forecast and I have a few other announcements to make as well in regards to this upcoming chasing season. thanks for stopping by

I just spent about twenty minutes going over the GFS so I don’t know much, but the April 4th time fram (next saturday) looks like our next possible chase day. Obviously we are a long ways off, but the GFS looks like it might be out to lunch on this one. 850 winds are veering badly, 700mb are backing and then 500mb are veering nicely. Not sure what that is all about.

It shows dewpoints in the low 60’s stacking up against the dryline over Texas and possibly far southern Oklahoma, but moisture concern will certainly be a concern with the previous trough shoving quality moisture southward and keeping northerly winds over the gulf until shortly before the arrival of the short wave on Saturday. ON the positive side the gfs did want to show decent CAPE over the eastern portion of Texas.

After that a potent LITTLE short wave ejects out into Kansas with a negative tilt, but moisture will almost certainly be a problem if the GFS is righ and we have this rapid waive train with one after another. The problem is that troughs rotate counter clockwise so on the backside of them (where the cold front would be) you get northerly winds. This usually shoves the quality moisture way down to the southern gulf of Mexico (depending on where the trough is). When you have one wave quickly followed by another there isn’t much time for air mass recovery (pulling moisture back up from the gulf) and you end up with sub par moisture, which is obviously critical to a tornado threat.

A lot can happen between now and then and I didn’t forecast much so we at least got something to look forward to with next Saturday’s setup over central into eastern Texas. I will post some more tomorrow after I see the morning’s GFS and the European.

I should have known better. I don’t know how many more snow storms it is going to take before I learn that Wichita always gets hosed. The sleet to snow transition line was literally off the west side of Wichita and sat there all god damn day and night. We got 2 maybe 3 inches of sleet in Wichita, while Kingman county that borders us to the west got well over a foot of snow. Pratt got 29 inches of snow with 10 foot drifts. They shut down highway 54 just west of Wichita because it’s fine over here where we got screwed, but it’s a snow disasater if you go west of here ten miles. WE may have gotten an inch or two of snow late this morning when we finally changed over to snow, but it wasn’t much. This will be the sharpest gradient for snow amounts I’ve ever seen on a Kansas snow storm. There will be 25 mile wide areas that seperate snow amounts of 2 feet to 2 inches. This was an epic snow storm for central Kansas. We never get tw0 feet of snow (up to 30″ in places). It’s unheard of in this part of the country and we just got hosed on what will probably be the biggest snow storm I will ever see in my life (living in Wichita). If I knew this was going to happen I would have drove to western Kingman county and camped there so I could watch the snow.

That’s what I get for not working on my forecasting. All I did was check the basic model plots from the GFS and NAM. Forecast soundings are HUGE when forecasting winter weather and I never bothered to check them because none of the forecasts were mentioning the possibility of sleet and I have been burried working on other things for storm chasing. It’s my fault and I’m extremely depressed about missing out on this.

Well this weekend is dedicated to forecasting, updating a few things on my website, getting my video stream running, and organizing and working on the rest of my equipment. I should make a lot of progress and get a good forecast up tonight so check back later if you’re interested.

As usual Wichita is getting screwed on this monster of a winter storm. There is a warm layer in the 850mb layer that lays over Wichita. West of this line everybody is getting snow. Along and east of this line everybody is getting sleet. Sleet is the most worthless waste of precipitation known to man. I hate that stuff. I should have spent some time doing my own forecasting for this because the forecast soundings from 00Z last night clearly show a sleet sounding and not a snow sounding for Wichita. I don’t know why nobody was saying anything about this at the weather service or on TV. It’s pretty important. West of here about 25 miles they’ll get over a foot of snow and we’ll probably be lucky to get four inches now. Well that just ruined my weekend. Wichita is cursed when it comes to storms. We never get snow and we never get good severe storms (which is probably a good thing).
I’ll try to post a long range forecast tonight or tomorrow.

A huge winter storm will affect the area Friday and Saturday. The models show snow accumulations near two feet in places. The National Weather Service mentioned this morning that one of their models showed 38 inches of snow in Kingman county. That is absolutely unbelievable for this part of the country. I don’t think we’ll get that much, but there will be a swath of snow over a foot and isolated locations that get around two feet of snow. The problem is that the temperature will be slightly too warm so a lot of the snow won’t stick and will melt quickly.
I will post more on this later.

Well it’s time to be looking ahead to our next chase opportunity, but I was too lazy and busy today to do it. I will check the models tonight and in the morning though to try to get an idea of what is coming up.
After look at storm reports and talking to several people I believe there were four weak spinup tornadoes with that storm yesterday. I only witnessed one, but the location of all four make perfect sense and are in pretty much a straight line. I know the report by Winfield is accurate because I could see the lowering very close to the ground occluding as the rain curtain wrapped around it. I would have been surprised if there was circulation at the ground then, but we were too far away to confirm it. I’m sure that is what produced the spinup by Strother Field though. It was a weak storm so nobody missed a whole lot if you weren’t there. It was just a stat padder day where you get to add a tornado to your tally. It was fun to get out though.
I will post in the morning. later

I’m too tired to talk right now, but we got one tornado on the tornado warned storm that tracked from north central Oklahoma up towards Ark City and on northeast from there. It was a weak tornado so it’s nothing more than a stat padder, but I’ll take it. This chase just goes to show you how unpredictable mother nature is, especially on these early season setups where you have to weight high shear and low CAPE. Any odd ball combination like that could go either way. I have a few idea of why we didn’t get more tornadoes, but I’m not even getting into that.

I will post a long range forecast tomorrow morning to see what we have coming up over the next couple weeks.

we broke off the severe warned storm by Hutchinson. Earlier by Kingman it had a nice low updraft base with a good lowering, but as it moved north into the lower dewpoints the base became elevated so we said screw it.

Now we are on I35 heading south through wichita and will stop near the KS-OK border to watch storms developing in Oklahoma. I believe you are going to have to be in the quality moisture tounge if you want a good tornado today and that moist tounge is nosing up on the KS border area.
we will hang out near I35 until a storm becomes dominant or gets organized and then move in. I want a storm tracking through the Wichita to Wellington area around 00Z. Conditions become quite favorable for tornadoes around and just after 00Z. The area I”ve been showing on my map for the highest tornado probability is still the area I favor.

We just left town and are heading east. I plan on getting to the OK-KS border area south of Harper. There are storms trying to get going now near the border, but I want to wait for something going up farther south from there later today so that it will be tracking through the best environment when the moisture tounge reaches the southernn Kansas area and low level shear gets cranking. The best tornado probability area I hifhligted on the maps in my latest posts still applies and my objective is to get a storm in the middle of that in the 00Z time frame. Game on and good luck to everybody.

The low level jet has been pumping moisture northward overnight and the tounge of the better moisture (>55 td) is now well into southern Oklahoma. Upper 50 degree dewpoints are right behind this in the moisture tounge and it is approaching the Red River as of 12Z. Last night’s GFS has dewpoints reaching 58 degrees along the KS-OK border. I think we will be close to hitting that. I’m thinking 57-58 is very reasonable. Morning soundings will be revealing about the depth of the moisture being advected into Texas and Oklahoma. I don’t think we’ll have as much of a problem with dewpoints mixing down as we did yesterday, but we’ll just have to wait and see because as I mentioned before I’m not really knowledgable about vertical mixing and it’s effect on dewpoints.

My target is still the same general area. I am a little worried about the cap now, so I am thinking I’ll stay towards the northern end of my target which would be the border area just south of Medicine Lodge. Once we get closer to initiation time the models and satellite data should reveal the best areas of convergence along the dryline so I can move into place then.

Other than that everything looks pretty much the same. Moisture return is the story with this setup and I will be keeping a very close eye on moisture advection throughout the morning. I think SPC needs to scoot their tornado probability map a little back to the west. I know they have it that far east because they are expecting the best tornado threat in the couple hours after 00Z when hodographs become very impressive, but regardless I still think it’s a bit too far east. On that note some night chasing will be in order. If I’m on a good storm I will chase it for a couple hours after dark since the tornado threat will increase in that time frame.

I will post regular updates and forecasts through the morning.

After glancing over the NAM, 00Z soundings and surface obs I am thinking I might be shifting my target slightly to the south about 30 miles or so. Some place between Fairview Oklahoma and the KS border is where I want to be. I will definitely stay a good 20 miles north of where I expect a storm to fire since storm motions are fairly quick. Ahead of the dryline in this area hodographs have good curvature and length, 1km SR winds are around 40kt (which is excellent) and 1km SRH is well above the 100m2s2 threshold for a decent tornado threat. Those are all good indicators of tornado potential, but the questionable moisture and weak instability complicate the situation. It is important that storms fire early enough for them to move out over the warm sector where they can realize the better moisture and impressive low level shear. I think we will get a couple storms coming off the dryline in the Medicine Lodge to Fairview area and if they are persistent and manage to stay discrete they will likely be tornadic. I would tend to agree with SPC that a strong tornado or two are possible IF they can get out into the warm sector where LCL’s are lower and 0-1km SRH is higher during day light hours or shortly after dark.

I will post another forecast in the morning and then I’ll post occasional updates through the day. I will closely monitor satellite and surface obs and fine tune my target. As soon as I get it figured out I will certainly post it. Like I said I have internet in the car now so I can post regular updates. You can also track me on spotter network if you even care lol. Good luck to everybody chasing tomorrow.

I was working on equipment all day so I didn’t get to monitor surface charts and moisture advection like I wanted to.
I am still waiting for 00Z soundings to get an idea of the moisture depth over Texas and southern Oklahoma. All the models have a strong low level jet advecting moisture northward through the night and how quickly moisture can move northward with a strong LLJ never ceases to amaze me.
I did just take a look at the Ledbetter and Purcell profilers (I think those were their names) and although the trajectories were as they should be, I wasn’t real impressed with the spead in the low levels.

I am waiting for tonight’s soundings and the NAM to update and as soon as I get a chance to go over that I’ll post a brief update.
BTW I have internet in the car this year so I can post updates while I’m actually chasing. I am on spotter network too if you want to track my location on there.

I’ve spent a little while going over models and current conditions this morning and I am a little more optimistic about the chances of a few tornadoes tomorrow.

Morning soundings show that moisture is adequately deep across a large portion of eastern and southern texas. This moist tounge is about half way across Texas now (going off >55 td). Trajectories will remain very favorable for further moisture advection and my best guess is that we will get dewpoints in the 58 degree range near the KS-OK border. If dewpoints are at or above 58 degrees it will be adequate for a respectable tornado threat with any discrete, persistent supercell.

There isn’t much to say that I haven’t gone over already. The keys to this setup is getting the quality moisture up to the KS-OK border, getting some clearing over the warm sector ahead of the dryline to allow for destabilization and getting a persistent supercell off the dryline near the KS-OK border or a little south of the border. The sweet spot for tornadoes is northeast of the Cherokee-Medicine Lodge area, so any storms developing in that area should track through the best environment and would have a good chance of going tornadic IMO. The location of the dryline is still uncertain, so these targets I’ve mentioned could shift east or west tomorrow based on where the dryline sets up.

My target as of now would be the KS-OK border straight south of Medicine Lodge. I am hoping for a storm to fire south of there and track northeast. On fast storm motion days like tomorrow you always want to cheat downstream of your actual target area. Because of that I will probably set up shop in Medicine Lodge. Remember it is a hell of a lot easier to catch a storm that is moving at you than one that is moving away from you, so make sure you cheat north of your actual target area.

I will post updates through the day on how moisture advection is going and on anything else that I may pick up on when I work on my forecasting. Below is a map showing the area that I think has the highest tornado probability tomorrow. Remember this could shift east or west based on the location of the dryline.

I have looked over the 12Z data and there are some differences between the two, but I’m not going to point out every difference between each one because it’s a pain in the ass and doesn’t tell you anything anyway. I agree more with the GFS on some things and I agree more with the NAM on others. I still haven’t checked the European or UKMET.

My forecast focuses on the dryline area over the northern half of Oklahoma and the southern half of Kansas since this is the area that I plan on chasing (I think this area and the surface low have the highest tornado potential).
Monday morning a dryline should be located over western Kansas and extend south into the Texas panhandle. The dryline will mix east through the day and should be in the the vicinity of Woodward by late afternoon when storms fire (dryline location could change).
The big problem with this setup is moisture and instability, as it traditionally is this time of year. I honestly don’t know what to think about dewpoints and instability. Both models have been pointing towards 55 degree dewpoints or so near the Kansas border by Monday afternoon. Surface temperatures over this same area have changed drastically from one run to the next over the last couple days, so there is a lot of uncertainty regarding that too (which influences instability). Both models are showing around 1000j/kg of CAPE ahead of the dryline. That is far from good, but it is certainly OK for this time of year. My thinking is that cloud cover will begin to clear/break up over Oklahoma Monday morning and spread northward into Kansas allowing decent insolation in a 60 mile wide area (at least) ahead of the dryline. This will create your typical spring time thermal tounge that covers the dry sector and overlaps into the warm sector.
Moisture advection is much more difficult to predict. Soundings along the gulf show very shallow moisture currently. There are favorable trajectories in the low layers of the atmosphere from now until Monday afternoon for moisture transport to the target area and there are dewpoints in the 60’s over the gulf, but the models want to mix down the moisture as soon as it moves on shore in Texas and then the dewpoints are more like 50 degrees. By Monday both models show mid 50 dewpoints over the target area and possibly high 50’s. I don’t know much about vertical mixing and its effects on moisture so I’ll have to believe the models for the most part on this one. If dewpoints only get up to 55 near the KS border, that isn’t very good and the tornado potential will be very low. If we can get dewpoints into the upper 50’s near the KS border then I think we’ll have a solid 5% tornado probability over the dryline area centered on the border.
The good news with this setup is the shear. A few days ago the directional shear was nonexistant, but it is half way decent now. Deep layer shear is quite good and when combined with 1000j/kg of CAPE will be supportive of supercells. Low level shear is pretty good with both 0-1km and 0-3km SRH exceeding the traditional thresholds for a tornado threat. 0-1km SRH gets as high as 200m2s2 around 00Z, which is quite good (and 0-1km SRH is a better predicter of tornado potential than 0-3km SRH). Forecast soundings show decent hodographs with a little curvature in the lower levels (not as much directional shear as I’d like to see, especially in the 0-3km area) and sufficient length. The low level winds are very strong though and this can help to offset a lack of directional shear. 850mb winds will be screaming by 00Z.
With poor moisture LCL heights are going to be at the higher end of what is acceptable for a decent tornado threat. I haven’t looked at many forecast soundings, but I expect them to be around 1000m AGL.
The GFS and NAM have both been very consistent in breaking out convection all along the dryline with a tail end to the convection in the KS-OK border area. I think this is the best area where you have a good chance of a storm firing early and remaining discrete. Further north storms likely won’t be discrete and farther south storms may fire too late. This is my compromise between the two.
My target is going to be some where between the Woodward area north to the KS border (where ever the dryline is). I think storms firing in this area and tracking northeast towards Medicine Lodge will be in the best environment.
Basically we have a setup with good deep layer shear, moderate directional shear, poor instability, poor moisture and strong low level winds. That is a good mix of good and bads and makes forecasting the tornado potential extremely difficult to say the least. I do think they will get a couple weak tornadoes near the surface low and then I think there is a pretty decent shot of a tornado with any persistent supercell firing along the dryline in the area I’ve discussed as my target (we may not get any persistent supercells though). I think there is a solid 5% tornado probability over my target area and another lower end 5% near the surface low (higher probability along the dryline to account for the potential of stronger tornadoes).
We are still a long ways out and a lot can and probably will change. Check back for updates and additional forecasts. I will be updating regularly (whenever I have something to say) and I will be posting forecasts at least once or twice a day.
Below is a map with a striped box to indicate the general area I think has the best tornado threat.

I saw I’ve had quite a few hits on my website/blog this morning already so if you are checking it for the new forecast I promise I’ll get it posted in a bit. I have to go shower and get ready for my meeting at 1pm. After I get done with that I’ll begin working on my forecasting and post when I get done.
I just looked at a couple things from the 12Z runs and I still think we have a solid 5% tornado probability along the dryline, especially in the area along and either side of the KS-OK border area (say 60 miles either way).
Anyway, I will post the forecast this afternoon.

I really doubt I have time to forecast tonight. I have a meeting tomorrow I’m trying to get ready for. The good news is that I should have plenty of time tomorrow morning and afternoon to forecast so I’ll get one posted then. There is a slim chance I might still get a forecast posted tonight, but don’t bank on it. It just depends on how fast I get the stuff I’m working on done.

Maybe I won’t be doing much forecasting. I thought the GFS would have updated by now, but it hasn’t so I’ll just go over my initial feelings after glancing over the 12 run this morning (which I didn’t spend much time on).

There are a couple spots where tornado potential should be enhanced slightly. The first area is near and just northeast of the surface low, which should be located over northwestern Kansas near the Nebraska border.
The other area is farther south along the dryline in the Kansas/Oklahoma border. Picking a place to target around a dryline in a setup like this can be tricky. You have to compromise on several things and try to pinpoint where the tornado potential will be maximized. I would target Woodward going off the 12Z gfs data and stay on a storm tracking up towards the Kansas border. IMO this area is far enough south that moisture should be slightly better and temps should be slightly warmer (regardless of what the gfs is showing) and hence CAPE should be a little higher. It is also the point where I think storms will start to become more isolated and where mid level flow begins to veer a little more improving the directional shear in the 0-6km layer. There is also extremely strong 850mb winds in this area which is a huge positive IMO. There are some concerns with this area too. I don’t like how 500mb winds start to back from 18Z to 00Z, which should begin to create more of an S shaped hodograph. Even though the directional shear is better here it still leaves a lot to be desired.

edit – I just caught a quick glimpse of the new 00Z run and it makes more sense than the 12Z so I’ll write a new forecast in the morning.

Overall I think there is a fair tornado threat. I am definitely going to be chasing and I fairly certain I’ll be targeting the dryline in the area where mid level flow begins to veer a little more than points farther north. I will be keeping a close eye on temperatures and moisture advection and that could influence where I set up along the dryline. It looks like a pretty good chase for this time of the year. I feel somewhat optimistic about my chances of getting a tornado, but these early season chases have a much higher bust probability so you never know.

I will post a couple new forecasts tomorrow.

I am starting on my forecasting now. I will keep it brief and get it posted before long. I’m also going to post a couple maps to go along with it that point out the threat area. I’m doing this primarily for practice so I know how I want to do it when we have real day one and day two chase situations in the future. Anyway, check back in the thirty minutes or so if you want to see the forecast.

I haven’t spent much time forecasting, but I figured I would give a brief update since Sunday and Monday are beginning to look like chase days. This is the traditional spring severe weather scenario where you get two days of potential storms. On day one there is very good directional shear, but moisture may be lacking a little and the cap is an issue because the upper level support is still too far west. That is the case this Sunday except moisture doesn’t seem like an issue since it doesn’t improve much by Monday according to the gfs. The moisture could certainly be better, but dewpoints in the upper 50’s is good enough for tornadic storms. Normally on day two of these setups there is much better instability, you have great deep layer shear, the cap isn’t an issue at all, but the directional shear has kind of gone to crap. That is exactly what Monday is looking like. Deep layer shear and CAPE combinations will support supercells, but I’m never very optimistic about tornadoes when there isn’t much in the way of directional shear. There is maybe 45 degrees of turning in the 0-6km range. That sucks. Tornadoes do still happen (kind of frequently) on day two of these kinds of setups, but convection is wide spread so there are a lot of storms to choose from. The day 1 situations normally only produce a few isolated storms if the cap is broken. I will look a little closer at the forecast and post again, but I will definitely have to get out for this one if it verifies. I don’t think it looks great or anything, but there is a solid 5% tornado probability with what the gfs is showing now.

This mornings run of the GFS brings better moisture into Kansas on Sunday. It shows mid to upper 50’s, which if verified would be adequate for some decent severe weather. I have barely even glanced at the 12Z run because I don’t want to waste too much time forecasting when so much can change, but the gfs hasn’t been wanting to break out precip along the dryline. I haven’t checked the European, but I read the long range spc forecast and they mentioned the european was a little less progressive than the gfs and I’m not sure if it was as agressive with the trough digging south and taking on a negative tilt. I’ll probably start spending some time on it tomorrow. I just have a really long list of things to get done before I’m chase ready so I’m trying to knock those out one at a time. This is definitely taking away from my forecasting, but I’ll get on it.

The next trough will affect the central plains this weekend. Unfortunately this system will not be able to advect quality moisture far enough northward to pose any sort of a tornado or realistic severe weather threat. The wind shear is absolutely perfect with this trough. What a waste of quality shear. If you managed to get decent moisture ahead of the dryline in Kansas for this setup (low 60 dewpoints) would almost certainly be a major tornado outbreak. It sucks something fierce to watch this go to waste.

The GFS has been all over the place with the forecast beyond day 7, so there’s not much use is discussing it, but it continues to hint at a trough near the end of the month. That really doesn’t mean very much with the run to run inconsistency that it’s been showing. For now we’ll just have to sit tight and see what happens.

I’ve been watching the GFS for a couple days now and it looks like we still have a couple weeks to get the equipment ready before season starts. That actually makes me happy because I have a lot on my plate. I am switching over laptops for chasing and adding new equipment and it is not going smoothly. Hopefully I’ll get it finished this weekend.
The GFS shows a trough moving through the plains this weekend. With little moisture to work with severe weather is unlikely. After the trough passes we return to a less active pattern. The 12Z run yesterday showed zonal flow until around day 15. Today’s 12Z run is similiar, but it has a few weak disturbances moving through over the next couple weeks. Either way I don’t think it matters much because there won’t be any tornadoes over the plains with either one of those scenarios. Both runs were consistent in developing a deep trough that comes on shore around the 26th – 27th time frame. This is obviously way out, but this will be our next chance of severe weather and tornadoes should it verify. I am going to get busy and make sure I get everything ready asap just in case this does end up being a good setup. I will post another forecast on this in a couple days.

We are sitting just north of the 135 and 64 interchange, which is like 7 miles north of Perry. I am pretty content with our position so we’ll stay put. I am working on my forecasting so I don’t have much time right now for a detailed post, but if it takes storms a while to fire a may post a more detailed forecast update here in a bit.

I absolutely hate veering 850mb winds. That could be the killer for the tornado potential today. We’ll see. I’m leaving town shortly to head south.

Now I am thinking I will target some where between Ponca City and the Stillwater area. Storms should fire west of there and track northeast. I like this area because it is where the cloud cover has eroded most and it looks like it will get more insolation than any point farther north of that. I am basically planning on targetting just south of the lead edge of quality moisture. I will update again in a while.

I have barely done any forecasting yet, but my preliminary target for today is Blackwell, Oklahoma. I think storms should develop west of there and the greatest tornado threat should develop in the Blackwell to Coffeville corridor. This area of highest tornado threat could easily shift north or south depending on the location of the warm front and better moisture. Like I said I’ve barely done any forecasting so I haven’t even looked at current conditions to see how everything is evolving. I will try to post an update while we are on the road later today.
I don’t think it looks good for tornadoes, but we may get one or two weak ones and it’s a good opportunity to get out and test some of the equipment.

Well storm season is started IMO after yesterday’s tornadoes. I guess you could have said it started last month with the two tornadoes in Oklahoma, but that was a little early. The tornadoes were all very weak yesterday so I didn’t feel bad about missing them. I couldn’t chase if I wanted to because I’m in Topeka visiting family. If I was home I doubt I would have chased anyway.

I am working hard on the equipment every day trying to get everything up and running properly. I already have enough stuff working to go out chasing if I need to, but I still have a whole lot of work to do.

I should start having an add for the chase tours in the paper starting next Sunday. I am pretty much done negotiating the advertising package with the Wichita Eagle, so as long as they don’t try to hose me on the price at the last minute my add should be on the back page of the sports section next Sunday. I also have two signs that should be going up (one out east and one on the west side of town). I doubt the signs get me much business, but they can’t hurt. Regardless I should find out over the next few weeks whether or not I’m going to make money off of this deal.

I will post a long term forecast within the next couple days once I get home and have a chance to spend some time on it.