From tornadoes to blizzard in three days?!

[Joel Wright]

I'm not sure if this should be in the map room or not. It's not really anything anyone would chase I wouldn't think.

It looks like a pretty nice snowstorm is shaping up for much of Iowa tuesday afternoon and night. There are still some model differences, which is to be expected. But for the most part much of IA is in the bullseye. Another low is going to bomb, but this time the track is much farther east putting IA in the cold side. The NAM really slams IA with high winds and snow. There could be wind gusts over 50mph combined with heavy wet snow. Even south into northern MO and maybe even western IL could get in on the act tuesday night.

It's just amazing that it can go from tornadic weather to blizzard conditions that quickly.

 

[nickgrillo]

It's just amazing that it can go from tornadic weather to blizzard conditions that quickly.

It must be NOV

 

[Jayson Prentice]

Yep, the Stratford area which will be picking up from their devistation is likely to get 1 to 3 inches of the good white stuff tomorrow night and into Wednesday. It is certainly hard to believe for me as well, going from tornadic weather to snow in just those 3/4 days. It is certainly November and is definately one to remember.

 

[Edward Ballou]

I agree! I was happily surprised on Saturday when I heard thunder, and a little later a tornado watch posted. I got out just in time to fly a couple miles down the interstate and witness some pretty good rotation.

Now I'm looking at the Winter Weather Watch posted showing 4-6 inches and high winds for tomorrow.

Talk about living on the edge of a sword.

I am very interested at how this all came about. I suppose it's been all the warm temperatures that have been up here for the past week has been taking effect and then finally we have a cooler system push through and these are just the effects. Just makes me love weather even more!

 

[Mike Hollingshead]

It's not really anything anyone would chase I wouldn't think.

I'm very tempted to. I'm planning to chase some aspect of this storm. It just looks too impressive not to. I'm a huge high wind fan and this at least looks like a sure bet. I'm considering going to IL for the severe if I think it'll really happen. Sort of torn between the two since one is much further away and more conditional.

 

[nickgrillo]

If I can find a damn way to get down there by tomorrow, I will most surely be chasing the IL/IN area -- particularly right near the surface low (cold front/warm front intersection) as if anything big goes across this region tomorrow... That's where it'll be.

 

[Joel Wright]

As interesting as the potential outbreak of severe weather/tornadoes is, now that it's late in the year I'm more in the mood for snow I guess. To me it looks like central IA could get a quick heavy snow. It looks like the heaviest amounts will be in southeast MN into the NW half of WI.

The 18z NAM now deepens the low to below 980mb by midnight tomorrow night. So anyone who is getting snow will have near blizzardlike conditions, even with minimal amounts of snow on the ground.

This storm system just seems to be getting more and more interesting each model run...

 

[Dan Robinson]

Another November to remember. I am planning on heading out to Louisville tomorrow morning to set up either west or south of there. Storms should take me right back to WV after dark, so no long post-chase drive home. Will be the third long-distance chase this month. Pushing 1,000 chase miles this month as it is.

 

[Jay McCoy]

Come to the Texas panhandle Joel. Forget 3 days. I have seen it go from torndao to blizzard on the same day.

Back on April 10th 1997 (pretty sure) we had a mother of a front coming through. We had a tornado on the rim of Palo Duro Canyon while 20 miles way in Amarillo we were getting 8 inches of snow. 2 counties north they had Blizzard warnings out. The little bug in the corner of the tv was lit up with every color of the rainbow with Blizzard warnings north, Winter strom warnings for Amarillo and tornado warnings for multiple counies just south . Randall county which amarillo is in had a winter storm warning and tornado warning at the same time!! I shot 2 tornados that day south of Happy and then had to switch to 4x4 as I got back to amarillo. A trip of 35 miles!

 

[Robert Dewey]

Well, latest 18Z NAM has this monster of a system traveling along the spine of the relatively warm Lake Michigan. It deepens this thing down to 975MB, or a >20MB drop in as little as 6-9 hours. You don't even know how much that impresses me... Sure there have been deeper systems across the Great Lakes (967MB, November 1998), but they never deepened at the rate this thing is forecast to.

This will obviously allow for some destructive non-convective winds to occur over a pretty large area near and 3-6 hours behind the strong baroclinic zone (typically where theta-E crashes into the ground / good isentropic downglide).

I also happen to be a fan of strong winds... You can usually see me parked in a lawn chair watching the winds, while others wonder "what the hell is that idiot doing?!".

 

[Joel Wright]

I'm a little disappointed in the latest forecast by our (DVN) NWS. They actually dropped winds from 55mph to 45mph tomorrow night, even though the storm is forecasted by the models to be at least 5mb deeper than previous model runs along basically the same track. I don't understand their reasoning.

If I had time to chase the snowstorm aspect of this system, I would place myself out near Des Moines, or up towards Waterloo IA. Since there will be significant banding with this storm, there could be large variations in snowfall amounts within a countywide area. If the storm would slow down just a little, there could be some amounts greater than 8" in northern IA, but this storm isn't going to stick around too long as it heads into Canada.

 

[Robert Dewey]

I'm a little disappointed in the latest forecast by our (DVN) NWS. They actually dropped winds from 55mph to 45mph tomorrow night, even though the storm is forecasted by the models to be at least 5mb deeper than previous model runs along basically the same track. I don't understand their reasoning.

If I had time to chase the snowstorm aspect of this system, I would place myself out near Des Moines, or up towards Waterloo IA. Since there will be significant banding with this storm, there could be large variations in snowfall amounts within a countywide area. If the storm would slow down just a little, there could be some amounts greater than 8" in northern IA, but this storm isn't going to stick around too long as it heads into Canada.

Pressure gradient is only one aspect of a high wind event. You also need a high mixing layer and/or strong winds in the very low levels (2-5K FT). Strong cold air advection in the low/mid levels creates subsidence (sinking air), which also helps bring things down. Combine all of those, and you can have a real nice event.

I think the biggest killer for you guys is being too close to the low... All the times you complain you're too far away... Now you're TOO close :x! Latest 18Z NAM actually shows 850MB wind speeds of 8-10KNTS across your area, only increasing to 25-30KNTS by 12Z WED... The pressure gradient is probably the only thing giving you the winds, and 45MPH might even be a stretch.

 

[Bart_Comstock]

I cant remeber what the date was but I remeber reading about a tornado that devastated part of Tuscaloosa, killing about 11 people. It got up to 72 degrees the day of the Tornado, and by the next morning, it was 15, followed by a snowstorm and freezing temperatures for a week.

 

[Laura Duchesne]

I wouldn't call this a blizzard, but a similar event happened on Nov. 9th in Hamilton, Ontario.

We had a cold front go through and trigger a line of strong thunderstorms. I heard a few mesos were on a few cells. An F1 tornado touched down in Hamilton at 4 pm. It struck a school and several homes. Under a day later, snow fell through opened roofs.