Blog post about recent "cold core" issues and events

[Jon Davies]

With the closed 500 mb systems coming through the central U.S. this week, I've had several people ask me to discuss what may have gone right or wrong with the "cold core" aspects of these systems. I've even been asked to discuss the definition of a "cold core event", a term I tend to use rather loosely without getting caught up in labels.

FWIW, I put a longer than usual blog post about the above at:
http://davieswx.blogspot.com/

Hope this discussion is useful. Thanks...

Jon

 

[Scott Olson]

Very nice read, thanks Jon.

 

[Rob H]

Thanks Jon! The first thing I did when seeing these setups was go back and re-read your cold core case studies, so I was hoping you'd weigh in on this week's activity.

 

[GlennMartin]

Always thoroughly enjoy your analysis Jon. Thanks

 

[Jason Boggs]

Thank you Jon for this great write-up!

 

[Jon Davies]

Thanks everyone for all the appreciative comments!

If I had chased last Monday 3/8, I probably would have been in the OK panhandle rather than west central OK. So... a tough forecast week. The positives about studying and forecasting cold core events is, there's always something to learn. The negative is, well, there's always something to learn .

We'll see what next weekend's system does (being advertised by the current GFS).

Jon

 

[Mike Phelps]

Ok, now I don't feel nearly as bad about being in the TX and OK panhandles shooting antelope while the tornado was happening in western OK.

Jon, great job as always. You know I've always had a fascination with these events. Not real successful chasing them, but fascinated nonetheless.

 

[Chris C Sanner]

Good stuff as always Jon. I'm especially interested in the outflow boundary you overlayed since I thought I had noticed some hints of outflow throughout the afternoon as the earlier MCS pushed off to the east as that was my working theory on why the Hammon storm went crazy while the rest in the environment were tame in comparison. Of course, there were other factors in play, but that seemed to be one possibility for why one storm went bonkers while the rest didn't do any noteworthy severe. It'll be an interesting case study for years to come.

 

[Mark Boghurst]

As a new student to this chasing lark this information has really helped me understand a lot. Thanks.