3/11/06 FCST: Great Lakes to Western Gulf Coast

[Jacque Tiegs]

I'm planning on going out and I'm looking for someone to partner up with ..I'm in SE WI

 

[Tony Lyza]

Tomorrow would probably be my first chase, but I have company coming over, so I'll be relegated to storm spotting tomorrow. I'll be sure to post any reports.

BTW, if the 18z GFS and NAM are to be any indication, tomorrow could get really wild up this way...

 

[Pat Lawrence]

It will be interesting to see if anything "pops up" in southern Wisconsin tomorrow afternoon. This area is usually a bit too far north this time of year, but time will tell

Pat

 

[Jason McIntosh]

I'm actually liking the chances for tomorrow. Right now I'm aiming on N/C Illinois area. I hope that we don't get too much precip overnight in that area or S WI. If the Cape can get into the 500-1000 region that should be enough to get it started by 3 pm. Dp are forcast in low 60's and the warm front will be in the area. An impressive Dry Slot is now over central IA moving slowly east. I'm hoping that gets here by 4 am CDT and clears us out for what i think will be a good start to the '06 season.

Gotta think positive!

 

[Tony Lyza]

This is actually a bit reminiscent of Utica (I used the local meteorologists' "U" word), only pushed forward a couple hours in time during the day.

 

[Tim Gonyo]

Ok, I will state my thoughts on tomorrow for Southern Wisconsin....

1) The warm front will end up positioned from approx Sheboygan west to Fond du Lac west to La Crosse.

2) The lake boundary will end up positioned from Fond du Lac south to Waukesha south to Twin Lakes

3) Skies will clear shortly after 9 am allowing heating during peak hours of the day

4) Temperatures will rise way above guidance and top out between 65-68 degrees and dewpoints will rise to the upper 50s. Some locations may near 70 degrees.

5) After about 6 hours of heating, with slightly backed winds, a moist, slightly capped atmosphere with plenty of moisure, scattered t-storms will begin to develop over SW WI and begin tracking east northeast. They will take on supercellular characteristics.

6) They will then near the lake breeze boundary and that will be their window of tornadic development because once they cross the boundary the stabilizing atmosphere will eat them up.

7) I think a strong tornado is not out of the question tomorrow in S WI.

 

[Jeff Snyder]

As a reminder, let's all strive to keep the discussion in this thread as high quality as possible. You don't necessarily need to always post in-depth, technical discussions, but one-liners usually don't contribute much to the FCST thread. Per forum rules:

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[Bill Tabor]

I'm not too impressed with Tx chase potential tomorrow. Looks to me like it won't get reasonably good until 0z and that will be mostly in far east Tx in pine woods. The best place is the intersection area of Tx/Ok/Ar and by 0z it looks somewhat favorable for supercells and tornadoes. Problem is it will be dark soon thereafter and you will be in hills and very tall trees I believe. NAM also shows precip breaking out early through day, but I don't really see where it is coming from unless from daytime heating as 500mb is showing subsident DNVA and wrong side of 300mb jet. Cinh seems to be fairly strong until 0z map - but hard to say how many hours before that it breaks loose. Actually between 21z and 0z may be a good time near that location but like I say terrain is very difficult here. I doubt it will be worth the effort.

On the other hand if it can develop a little differently and further back west in Tx than currently shown then maybe it will be worth messing with.

Right now I doubt I'll be making the effort unless something changes. Have to paint the house anyway.

 

[Jason McIntosh]

Ok, this is now looking real good. Saturday 3/11/06 is the first round of madness. I am still heading down towards the La Salle, IL area. If possible i will stay overnight for the next day which I am about to start a new thread on. I have a feeeling in my gut that a few of you chasers might have already felt; the feeling like this is for real! No forcasting here anymore, I'm going out and getting me some action.

 

[Tony Laubach]

Clouds overhead ATTM here in Dallas and visible sat shows them covering most of NE Texas.

Glancing ahead, looks like Texarkana looks to be a safe bet for a target today. Moisture is well on its way with TDs already in the mid 60s across the target area with weak SE winds. Vis sat showing a couple outflow boundries; a stronger one in North Central Arkansas and a weaker one in Southern Arkansas. Wind shift is evident on the northern one.

The ETA is forecasting CAPE over 3000J/kg over NE Texas, SE Oklahoma, and Southern Arkansas. Helicity values are there as well, not as high as they could be, but in the neighborhood. Jet max is still off to the west and think that'll aid in what oughta be a monster day tomorrow.

There does appear to be an 850mb max shooting straight up into Arkansas and extreme eastern portions of NE Texas and SE Oklahoma. High values of moisture will be found over the area all day, so for a change, that won't be a problem!

My reservations fall in chasable terrain; as I've already enjoyed a day in Arkansas this week, I can vouch for its lack of chasable terrain. Not sure how the southern portion of the state is, nor NE Texas, but I'm too close to say no. I'll probably show my face at TESSA and head out and up I-30 to Texarkana for lunch, data, and either and see and wait.

Between now and then, we need to burn off these clouds and erode this thick cap. Oughta make for an interesting day! We'll see!

 

[Mike Peregrine]

Looking at possible targets closer to home again this morning ... back to wondering about Columbia to Marshall somewhere. Forecast soundings from Columbia look pretty sharp - shaping up between 18-21z ... here are a few things I noticed from the Columbia skew-t:

By 21z, L.I. reaches -7.6, SWEAT at 449, LCL <910 mb, CAPE >1700, CINH -3.4. I'm wondering about the wind barbs a bit, as it looks sort of unidirectional - but speed shear looks decent. Showing storm speed at around 40 kts, but I think it could end up being greater than this. I'm thinking we could end up with another power squall up here, but it might be worth it to see if storms might somehow remain broken for a while.

By the way - could someone help me with what we're seeing in Kansas on satellite? - Looks like a line of fairly well-defined cumulus moving northeast. Looks like another feature near DFW on the west side of the cirrus canopy that is currently covering all that gulf air progged to advect north ... wondering about high moisture again and insolation again today.

 

[Skip Talbot]

Of course I'm envious of the rich moisture and sky high cape down in Arkansas, but I'm playing the target close to home. Gonna seat myself between the warm front/cold front boundary in west central IL. RUC and NAM are in relatively good agreement that the temps and moisture will make quite a run north (even into Wisconsin). I'll be watching the surface charts as the day progresses though and see where the dews wind up. Targetting the Macomb area right now.

 

[Rocky Rascovich]

Ark./Okla. chase today

After pondering over the upcoming scenario for this weekend, Vince Miller
and myself have decided to forego the TESSA meeting in favour of a gamble
on todays events in eastern Okla. and Ark.

Moisture is surely in place, over SE. Okla. where dews are close to 70F,
as the shortwave approaches by 21Z, 850mb. flow ramps up, speed shear
coupled with capes close to 2500j/kg over far eastern Okla. into areas
between FSM and HOT should set the covection off by that time, maybe even
initiating as close as TUL. I'm concerned about it becoming linear shortly
after but any discrete cells that occur could be very interesting.
Obviously the big negative for today is where we're chasing, but my gut
feeling is that we'll see some nice storms.

Tomorrow we should set up shop somewhere near MCI, more on that later.

Rocky&family

Cell: 405-226-2996

 

[Scott Lincoln]

onna seat myself between the warm front/cold front boundary in west central IL

Are you talking about the boundary now setup roughly through Kentucky? Its hard to tell where that connects in with the system.

Right now i see the main low up in Iowa, forecast to move out of Iowa and into WI/MN throughout the day today.

Judging from the potential for this boundary to move north into Illinois, and the somewhat favorable helicity and CAPE values being brought with it, I could see the area between Columbia, MO to St Louis to Quincy, IL as being a good chase zone. This is also where the RUC breaks out the most intense precipitation on the northern end of the system.

 

[Jason McIntosh]

I am about to roll towards IL. I am still sticking with N/C IL for some warm front action this afternoon. The temp is already 52 F in Madison at 10 am with a Dp of 43 F. On the rise with plenty of sunshine.

Good Luck today!