Color me unimpressed. A couple hours ago, I was seeing some potential for southwestern Oklahoma. I had been hoping that moisture would be able to sneak back northwestward as strong pressure falls occurred in the panhandles and adjacent areas of KS. However, shortly after noon, convection redeveloped along the OFB in far southwestern OK and northwestern TX. In addition, an organizing MCS / marginal bow echo is moving into north-central Texas, which is likely going to ensure that good moisture return does not occur in western Oklahoma. Given the thermodynamic situation, I'm not sure how kinematic field is being affected (e.g. it may be difficult to develop a strong LLJ given the current arrangement of convection in OK and N TX).
Current profiler data from Haviland (SW KS) shows S (actually, a few degrees E of due S) at 300 mb currently. Yes, meridional flow aloft can still "work" in the high Plains, but the hodographs still need to look decent (which they would if we had strong southeasterlies at 850 mb, for example). Visible satellite supports the observation of southerly upper tropospheric flow, with the anvils from convection in S OK and N TX moving almost due northward. Almost as important, however, are the lower Tds (57-61 F generally) that characterize the outflow / cold pool in much of western Oklahoma. This, in turn, will advect northwestward into Kansas, which means that the marginal Tds already in S KS (e.g. 51 F @ DDC, 52 F @ PTT, etc.) won't really improve that much. With the seasonably-unimpressive dewpoints, we'll need to see higher temps to develop moderate CAPE, which in turn may yield some LCL issues later.
Again, I'm primarily looking only at the OK threat area -- I'm unable to target KS today, and I haven't really looked at locales nearer the sfc low much. I think the usual warm sector play today is hosed, so, if I were chasing farther N, I'd have to look at alternative targets that currently have quite atypical shear profiles (e.g. the area in far eastern CO and western KS) where storm motions may be surprising to some chasers. There is a decent sfc boundary up there, and you never know what can happen when strong convection interacts with sfc boundaries. Current analyses indicate that the upper-tropospheric flow has cut off... In my experiences, in these cases, the best prob for tornadoes is tucked up near the sfc low (perhaps along an occluded front) as close to the mid-level low as one can get with >300-400 j/kg SBCAPE. Time to start looking at 0-3km CAPE analyses...
