06/05/08 DISC: TX/OK/KS/NE/IA/MO/SD

[Adam Lucio]

I think subsidence and anvil blowoff can be blamed for the northern target bust. While driving down I-80 and seeing nothing but clouds I already had a feeling things werent going to pan out the way I hoped. I also think the upper wind fields were too strong...I watched tower after tower quickly go up and get sheared off...there wasnt enough forcing and instability to maintain the updrafs it seemed.

This reminds me of 6-7 last year. A big hyped up high/moderate risk that didnt live up to its hype. Although one long track tornado did move across wisconsin, not a whole lot happened elsewhere.

If anything can come out of today its another good case study to examine....its proof that no matter how much we think we can forecast and understand the weather....we dont know everything. Our forecasts and model interpritations can be dead on, but it all comes down to live conditions. Thats just the way this game works.

 

[Jim Zandonai]

I know like most chasers we get excited when we we see a moderate risk then when we see high risk we think holy cow this going to be a huge event and hard to contain our excitement. Then when we don't get the 'big bang' its kind of a 'What happened' thing. I think though we have to really take great care and reading those risk assements closely for wording...It did specify Wind alot and derecho was mentioned..That said though I thought the same thing as most that the event was underwhelming but again we set ourselves up for this based on expectations instead of whats really happening. Although I was surprised they let the high risk up all day but as conservative as they are they must have had good reason too based on data. True though there was reports of wind damage etc today and a line did develop as expected..Friday we have a Mod Risk but that could change and while it looks good you never know until it materializes. I try to let my friends know what could happed on days like that and when nothing happens they go yeah whatever..then when it does you look like a scholar. But sometimes its hard to know which way to go..cry wolf or be more conservative..The public is hard to convince..Tornado watch goes up and nothing happens in their town and they go 'yeah whatever..' even in warnings even unless its right over them and they get pummelled. I try to be more conservative lately but sometimes its hard to temper the enthusiasm or hope for a good chase or just a great storm..I still think the SPC does a great job overall.

 

[Darrin Rasberry]

The guidelines for HIGH for a TOR threat are 30/hatched or above according to the SPC. Such was present in the mid-morning through early afternoon tiny circle area in eastern Nebraska. Of course as Dick mentioned this is not a forecast for stormchasers by any means, and even if the day verified with tornadoes in those bows you would have had crazy movement, embedded tornadoes, and other things to drive chasers crazy.

The long line of storms is definitely the "good call" by the SPC and the high risk for THAT is already verifying over Southern Iowa, where 80+ gusts were recorded very recently. However, the tornado talk independent of chasers was this, in Nebraska and Iowa respectively:

1. Near-maxed PDS TOR for Nebraska INVOF the 30/hatch (killed by anvil blowoff, we really felt our hearts sink watching that crap in the vicinity of Seward, although there was some action near the always-whacked Beatrice).

2. Total max PDS TOR for Iowa, with maximum possible "High" probabilities for every category of severe weather, in anticipation of supercell development. This was issued partially in anticipation for the present line and in anticipation for supercells forming ahead of the line (killed off by 12-14 degree temps at H7, 100+ CINH, already piddly CAPE falling like the value of the dollar, and linear winds).

3. Down south (and to the west of the blowoff in NE) we had probably the following problem: the rapid cooling of the aloft temps disintegrated a stout cap into nothing. Tons of storms were forced by the high winds aloft into these lines despite good parameters otherwise.

These are just conjectures based on a limited knowledge of severe weather; as I'm learning and this is a DISC thread I welcome input.

However, my truly expert opinion on the day's fail for up here is:

4. HIGH risk touched Iowa.

They called a meeting of emergency managers today at 1 PM in Des Moines. None of us have ever heard the wording as strongly as KDMX put things today.

 

[Jason A.C. Brock]

;-)

This day reminded me now that I think about it alot like a high risk day that was in Texas in February. I cant recall the year but a huge squall line formed and caused major damage to localized areas of Wichita Falls and accross North Texas. The storm motions were nearly 70 mph and msot of the tornadoes were not "oh my god look at that tornado" type things but were...as your filling up with gas....."oh my god that roof just came off that house accross the road" type tornadoes. I dont think SPC was thinking of high photogenic supercells today but were thinking about lots of 80+ mph wind reports and tons of brief spin-ups....of course not even those really occured either.
Any time I see a high risk issued I get very unsettled. I cant remember chasing a high risk day where I actually caught a tornado in the high risk area.....and usually the moderate risk area is even iffy when that high risk tag comes down.
I also recall a couple of PDS tornado watches...One in the Tx Panhandle and we watched a single non-severe storm die under cirrus near Turkey Tx....and another was for South central OK....2 storms rapidly formed.....rapidly became severe..rapidly moved off 30 miles to the NE....then died.....end of the day.
About the storms in Oklahoma and Western North Texas today.....were they jsut too far removed from the better upper winds and dynamics? I had feared this all day and wanted to make it to at least NW OK....which we did....but I would have expected storms once they moved toward the Enid area would have went haywire....but I guess they did....just linear haywire...lol.
Is it just me....or have there been more moderate risks issued this year than any year? I know the tornado count is near record numbers this season nation wide....so SPC must be doin something right.
BTW....its the WEATHER.....its unpredictable.....gotta love mother nature....;-)

 

[Mike Peregrine]

Here is a pretty good summary of storm damage across NW Missouri, with some additional details of what happened on I-29.

Also, the fugitive elephants have been re-captured. From the Star today:

There were no reports of damage from the elephants, but winds and hail caused extensive roof damage in nearby Collyer, he said.

We should talk about the Trego County storm. That thing was pretty interesting to watch on radar. Not moving at warp 9, behind the dryline, and yet managing to crank out some tornado reports. Ouch -

EDIT - we joked yesterday that my brother needed to check his insurance on his business to make sure it was up to date. He actually did, and it probably was a good idea after all. This morning the Conoco station 50 feet of the west side of his business, which sits on highway 36 in Doniphan County, had the roof taken off and the contents destroyed. Other than losing some of the things outside his shop, his place seems fine.

 

[Mark Blue]

These are the thoughts I was hoping would be discussed. I think the SPC has a hard job to do and sometimes we take for granted the huge area they have to cover, so my hat's off to them for working so hard and diligently for the public's safety.

Seems like a lot of memories revolve around other "Moderate or High Risk" days that didn't verify. I can't help but think about one week ago yesterday where it did verify - meaning what happened in Kearney and along I-80 last week in Nebraska. My lesson learned here is every set up is different and you have to take the good with the bad. Any additional thoughts are still welcome.

 

[Tim Stoecklein]

We should talk about the Trego County storm. That thing was pretty interesting to watch on radar. Not moving at warp 9, behind the dryline, and yet managing to crank out some tornado reports. Ouch -

Mike, it was almost Zen-like to watch this thing on GRL3 without it being surrounded by green diamonds, lol! My mother was working in Gove City when the initial touchdown occurred south of town. As if by stereotypical cue, they were standing outside on the stairs to the courthouse watching it. From there the storm held a good deal of speed until it reached I-70 when it slowed down a bit. I really thought Quinter was going to get nailed again, and I'm surprised Collyer is still standing.

 

[John Hudson]

Did a short chase into SW SD, and watched all the TOR warned cells float north through NE and just get ripped apart by the insane winds aloft.

We got two tornadoes in extreme southern SD, but they were short lived.

I chased one of these cells all the way into eastern MN, but it just fell apart. All in all, a real disappointing end to a day that originally appeared to have potential.

Hodographs and instability looked great, but I imagine that, like their southern counterparts, the cells just never had a good chance to get robust updrafts due to the upper level wind fields?


John

 

[Gabe Garfield]

The Trego County storm was nothing short of amazing. Somehow, it managed to utilize positive storm-relative helicity even though it was west of the secondary dryline. In traditional setups where the cylclonic/right-mover is favored, the hodograph curves clockwise with a storm motion to the right of the curve. EDIT: The hodograph for this storm looped clockwise with height, but it was shifted to the right due to the westerly surface wind. My feeling is that the storm motion was so fast to the northeast (warning text mentioned NE at 50-60 mph, IIRC), that the storm motion vector actually went to the right of curve to produce positive storm-relative helicity. I've never heard of such a storm -- truly remarkable!

 

[Derek Weston]

Wasn't able to do much data analysis in the field... fought the same damned line from Kansas through E Iowa.... but based on what I was seeing early Thur...

Chased in Kansas and felt that a quickly eroded CAP along with largely unidirectional shear (500-850s) really forced things to pop and line out quick. Lousy setup.

Did watch in amazement as the storms in W Kansas fired in what would have seemed to be an unfavorable environment for anything near tornadic.

Also cursed myself for not staying nearer home and trying to play the WF as soon as the Kansas crapfest started -- however, apparently that area never recovered... So not too much remorse. (really thought a well juiced S MN/N IA area near the WF would have held the best tornado potential -- this before taking off for Kansas)

High risk or not, never was convinced about the shear setup for Thur and was worried about linear modes. SPC's wording -- despite maintaining the high risk -- only seemed to reinforce this opinion.

As others have noted... high end wind risk -- for which the SPC went high risk -- certainly verified.

 

[afischer]

Damage assessment for tornadoes produced by "front-end charlie" storm in Clay county KS: http://kamala.cod.edu/ks/latest.nous43.KTOP.html

 

[MatthewCarman]

I was in the MOD risk and had 2 tornadoes touch down by my home town of Newton after 12:30 last night aswell as 50-60 MPH winds. So my area verrified. So far 35 tornadoes have been reported,253 wind reports and 147 hail reports making a total of 435 reports of severe weather. These are just reports but still that is alot. The main threat was supposed to be for damagging to destructive winds and that is what we saw the most of. A wind threat. Based on reports several areas had winds 75-85 MPH. Also some areas had hail 2.50"-2.75". That is significant severe weather in my oppiniun. I think the high risk verrified in my oppiniun and it is better to be safe than sorry. Not every day will turn out as forecasted or as a dream chase day.