Free Floating Warm Front?

[Jason Toft]

Hello all,

I have a question. Take a look at this picture from Weather Underground:

Note, this will change...

Notice in the middle of the CONUS, the free warm front...

I thought Warm Fronts were attached to cold fronts/cyclonic storm systems. Can anyone help me explain this?

Thanks,
Jason

 

[Jason Toft]

Ok, this picture is being updated every 30 minutes. Might I be correct in thinking that a low pressure system might be forming over eastern Illinois/West Indiana?

Thanks,
Jason

 

[Jason Toft]

Ok, scratch that last post...I'm gonna say that map will have a low centered over the Dakota's by tonight...cool! I'm loving this continuously updated map!

Jason

 

[Morgan Palmer]

Yep, just by the isobars alone, there's a low center over the Dakotas. Just not plotted apparently. MP

 

[David Wolfson]

But, regardless.... There's no Law (I'm aware of, anyway) that says fronts must be anchored by a surface low. They're simply boundaries between different air masses. Anyone who's spent much time in New England has experienced warm fronts rotating around a warm barotropic high, "back-door" (sea-breeze) cold and warm fronts, and secondary cold fronts where the baroclinic surface low is long-gone. FWIW.