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05/12/04 FCST: S Alley

Its confirmed.. I'll be in the TX/OK Panhandles for Wednesday. I'll leave Denver mid-afternoon on Tuesday and stay overnight in the Panhandles, chase Wednesday, then return to Denver; going halfway Wednesday night, then finishing the trip Thursday.

You know me by now.. eye the 'WX NERD' plates.. I won't be too far! Will be awaiting upcoming runs and forecasts.. looking good as of now! Keep your fingers crossed it holds! 8)
 
Yeah. I wish I were in the area SW of Wichita Falls when the sun starts heating thing up out there. Tonight's run of the 00z ETA (May10th run) had extreme instablility over that area at 12z the 13th. I can't wait to see what happens when the sun comes up. Point and click soundings show 12z cape at 3668 j/kg and surface LI at -10. No joke. Cinh at -180. That's a little bad news but if there is sunshine it will be very interesting to to see what happens. During the time from 06z to 12z there is cooler temps moving over that area at 500mb. At first glance I could see much shear but I was just looking at 500mb winds. I am near Dallas-Fort Worth so I hope the storms come to me. I am very excited about this event.
 
I'm not real excited about the 12th as of now. The cold front seems to be playing havoc on an otherwise sweet triple point set-up. ETA has very linear-fashion UVV spikes at all levels, and the only precip breaking out through 0Z is in EC/NE Kansas - all long the cold front. There's absolutely nothing south of Newton, KS.

Wind fields look to be highly suspect, if either the ETA or GFS is to be believed. The best flow at all levels simply aren't stacked at all. The killer LL jet looks to be east of the main upper flow/h85 moisture axis, and is directly undrneath a dry fetch at h7. Just doesn't look like May, really.

Of course it's two days out, and the models will change, but I'm not seeing anything special in these current runs that would indicate that Wed is going to be any different than what we've been dealt so far. Naturally, we finally get the Gulf to stop hitting the crack pipe just as the upper level winds decide to vacation early up into the central/northern Plains. That's pretty much been 2004's MO........get one thing fixed and something else breaks. I think I like years like 2002 better........it's more exciting to sit under a thermonuclear cap knowing that if anything does go up, it'll be awesome. As opposed to this year, where initiation is a given but where is the one cell worth your time in all the mess?

I'm not real confident that anything south of the KS/OK border will get its act together anytime soon....and time is running out (since climatology always seems to revert back to 'normal' when it's time for the S Plains season to end).

Hoping the storm gods are listening and wanting to make me look a fool....
 
I don't think western OK looks half bad for Wednesday. I would hang out about 80 miles west of OKC as of now. Dryline looks far enough south of the surging cold front to possibly give one some fun. Now to get there from the Peirre SD area the day before is the trick....hmmm.
 
Both the ETA and GFS disagree with you as of a few hours ago....neither has any precip breaking out south of ICT by 0Z. Otherwise I'd be inclined to stray into NW OK.

But all we're really looking at now are guesses for Wed, so it's quite possible a potent day is in store. Sometimes I forget why I don't look at models more than 24 hours away.
 
Each run of the GFS has been dropping the surface low more south, closer to the ETA's run, and the GFS has been consistent in a dry line surge toward Central KS which would be along dryline/ cold front triple point. With 3000 Capes, Tds near 70 and highs in the 90s there should be updrafts capable of dropping softballs. With a decent shortwave, the surface low should be lower than 1000mb. A couple of isolated supercells should develop from triple point southward along the dryline through Western Oklahoma, maybe down to near Childress. I would bubble in a moderate risk from Childress to near Dodge City, and then another mod along the front.
 
The ETA made a fool out of me so I am watching it 3 runs per day and not going to say anything about it's results. I'm just posting now to answer Chris Hayes question. I use GEMPAK software where I download model data from the NCEP sever and use a program within Gempak called Nsharp. It's a sounding program that comes with Gempak and it plots soundings for where ever you click on a map. Great program but you have to have the Linux operating system to run it. It's free from Unidata. Alot of universities have plots made by gempak programs on their websites. I can't think of an online site that has a page where you can get that kind of thing. I wish there was and I would gladly give a link.
 
Though the constant model flip-flops aren't encouraging to me, and I still don't feel that moisture has fully recovered to climatological Mid-may standards, and lots of other issues I'm too tired to expand upon, the OUN night update is more encouraging than others of late:

RECOMMEND THAT EM AND
MEDIA INTERESTS BE PREPARED FOR POSSIBILITY OF SEVERAL ACTIVE DAYS
STARTING AS EARLY AS TUE BUT MORE LIKELY WED-FRI.


I drove from Los Alamos to Norman today and drove through the DL convection in the TX panhandle that was more depressing/lackluster than anything. The most exciting part of the day was getting static shocked by my weather radio connected to an antenna on the car roof. Crazy!
 
Both the ETA and GFS disagree with you as of a few hours ago....neither has any precip breaking out south of ICT by 0Z. Otherwise I'd be inclined to stray into NW OK.
Click to expand...

I would never base a forecast on what the eta thinks will happen in regards to precip. I swear OFF the ETA and it's precip. It's either chase on the cold front to your north or drive west down the interstate a bit and see what happens, or stay home and see if the eta precip verifies.

http://www.wxcaster2.com/CENTRAL_ETA_SFC_S...INDSLI_48HR.gif

Big fat dryline west of you. Cold front on it's way but well north(according to model anyhow). SFC there to some degree looks a weee bit like March 27(and remember the lack of directional shear that day).

http://www.wxcaster2.com/CENTRAL_ETA_500_G...NDVORT_48HR.gif

30-40 knts at 500mb....as good as it gets this year apparently...lol.

850 rather warm and 700 7-9C. I would imagine you'd get something off a dl like that.

I said western OK didn't look half bad for Wed...I don't think the models are disagreeing with that.
 
One of the things I am really happy to see is the warm theta-e temps, eta has 70-75 deg. while gfs has low to mid 80 deg. in NW and N. Central OK I think that is the warmest we have seen all season.
 
Just got off the phone with my nowcaster (who is coming out here tomorrow for his 2-week chase vacation) and we've decided to target the "triple point" Wednesday until we see anything between now and then that tells us otherwise. Slower storm motions should be forgiving if we target too far north; shouldn't be too much of a chore to race south if we get develoment along the dryline (done it before :wink: ), and anything that does go discrete along the front/boundary should stay well within the warm sector with SRM showing 250-255 as of now. Throw in a deviant right move and we're talking possible hours-long rotating bliss.

I guess I was too literal with my wording of the model interpertation earlier; anyone who knows me knows I take every model with a grain :wink:

Besides, it's May, and sooner or later something's gotta give. H, you heading down this way?
 
Well, problem is I really like ne SD se ND into MN tomorrow, but I'm still up....lol...should be sleeping. I know I'm going to kill myself chasing tomorrow and doubt I'll make OK for Wed, but who knows.

I will say one thing about that triple point. It looks like this is going to be one strong cold front. I am not certain how good triple points are when the cold front is seemingly so much stronger and is going to flat out win this battle(seem better if the sys moves east and the balance is better....just looks like a rather nasty surger...straight south). I myself wouldn't want to be too close to that cold front at all. Then again I think March 27 had this look to it on the models and there was a nice seperation from the dryline for a rather long time. Got me on what will be best I guess.

After looking at Roger's wifes pics from CO tonight I think I should do whatever to make both tornadic targets Tues and Wed!!! Yeeesh.

MIke
 
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