2026-04-23 Event: IA/MO/KS/OK/TX

[Matthew Crowther]

Time to discuss the next Plains event. Maybe this time OK will produce, unlike the past two tornado bust days. No real surging cold front, modest WSW mid-upper flow, plenty of CAPE. Unlike the last event at this time range, models in better agreement with Euro pretty much in step with the GFS, not a ton of ensemble spread.
Prelim target: northern OK/south central KS.

 

[Matthew Crowther]

Well, the target mentioned above may not have convection at all, despite it being a relatively weak cold front, almost all models show a squall line maybe extending into central KS with no dryline convection. One or two CAMs have a lone supercell or two in OK, but that seems like an awfully risky play. We are leaving today anyway, more to set up for the weekend, but maybe we will get lucky tomorrow,

 

[Derek Weston]

500 energy seems a little miss-timed from first glance at this here this morning...

Edits, thought this was the weekend setup... NM

 

[Mike Smith]

Based on the Wednesday 12Z CAM's and the ICON (for synoptic-scale features), it looks to me like northeast Kansas and southeast Nebraska will be a likely area for tornadoes. A mesolow will develop between TOP and OMA. Pressures will be falling (something that wasn't the case with last week's events) and will be quite low (below 1000mb) for this late in the season. Nice difluence with the 500mb trough becoming more negatively tilted during the day.

My target would be around Topeka - Hiawatha. While hilly, the road network is good and many of the hilltops have few trees with good visibility. Look for isolated supercells and/or a tail-end Charlie.