Future of the season part deux

I'm saying this kinda jokingly, but I think I'm going through the 7 stages of grief with this month. I know I was in disbelief/denial for a few days, now there's anger, bargaining, and perhaps a little depression going on too. The only stage I haven't reached I think is acceptance/hope. I guess the one good thing about this season is I pretty confident I won't blow my budget for chasing. Perhaps I have reached that last stage, maybe there will be something during the weekends in June when I am working.
 
Has there been any seasons where there literally was no classic outbreak of chaseable, classic tornadic supercells across tornado alley?

We've had a couple decent days so far this year, but nothing to write home about.

I'm with Warren - I'm tired of chasing HP storms that obscure good structure and are just a PITA. I'm willing to chase some isolated setups with good LP structure, even if tornado chances are low.
 
Vortex is hanging out in Hays, Kansas? Ughhhh. Now that is tough duty.
Speaking of monsoon moisture...we here in Tucson (southeast Ariz.) are normally bone dry through May and June. But in the last couple of days...our dews have jumped from single digets to the mid 40's. There were mostly dry t-storms here..but western Az. had some real action. Warren's point about monsoon moisture being worth watching for the Colo / eastern New Mexico areas is a good one. Here in Tucson we are supposed to be getting a better shot of moisture in the next few days. Oftentimes this moisture will get diverted to the high plains.
I will never forget what one North Platte forecaster told me at their offices over twenty years ago. I'd been chasing solo for about two weeks...working with very little moisture. No success at all. Anyhow, he was showing me that a bit of moisture was going to arrive that evening in their area. He said that there would probably about hi 40 or low 50 dews as a result. I scratched my head and blurted something about that not being enough for what I was looking for, and he stopped me and said in a slow lazy drawl...."around heeer.....it don't take muuuuuchhh". 4 hours later I was literally running into a stranger's farmhouse...without knocking and worried about getting shot...with a tornado flipping over pivots in the guy's fields next to us. This was near Creighton, Nebraska.
Don't let hope die so easily guys...especially in this game.
 
Robert Edmonds said:
I'm saying this kinda jokingly, but I think I'm going through the 7 stages of grief with this month. I know I was in disbelief/denial for a few days, now there's anger, bargaining, and perhaps a little depression going on too. The only stage I haven't reached I think is acceptance/hope. I guess the one good thing about this season is I pretty confident I won't blow my budget for chasing. Perhaps I have reached that last stage, maybe there will be something during the weekends in June when I am working.
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Here is a chart we use over at TSPTalk.com for market emotions. It fits well.
 

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To quote Dr. Evil, "Throw me a friggin bone here."

Ugh. I was hoping that the ECMWF/GFS would at least hint some sort of breakdown in the Omega ridge of d00m but that pattern seems to be pretty locked in for the foreseeable future. I'm also another one who is contemplating putting off my vacation until the first part of June.

Well, at least monsoon season is just right around the corner. We're getting a taste of it today with pop-up thunderstorms and dewpoints in the 40's. That's pretty muggy in this neck of the woods...If you don't have to put 4 layers of lotion on in the Desert Southwest, then it's definitely humid.

Tick-tock, goes the clock...
 
Andrew Stoller said:
Here's the headline from Pueblo, CO's morning AFD today:

... THE MONSOON ALREADY?? ...

That usual spells the end of good classic spring type severe setups. :(
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From my experience in the past, the start of the monsoon season certainly coincides with the end of the chase season in the southern and central Plains. Also, this blocking pattern which is currently developing across the Plains is the type of blocking pattern we typically see when summer has officially arrived. I hate to say this.....I really do, but I think this season is all but over. It could be over before it ever got started. EPIC.....no.....HISTORIC FAIL!!!!
 
I have faith that this pattern will break down and we will get at least one more classic western trough sometime in June.

If not, perhaps we can get a decent high plains northwest flow event. We're due for that.
 
It's no easy pill, but this is one of those seasons that as a chaser, you just have to take. Death ridge seasons are just a part of chasing as the 2003s and 2004s. There are always going to be seasons like this eventually, might as well get this one out of the way. It's happened before, it will happen again. Good news is, so will the great seasons. I'll take a down year given what I've been privileged to see in past years, and likely will see in the future.

2006 was one of my best lightning years, incidentally. Despite the tornado drought, every storm that year seemed to produce amazing lightning.
 
Welcome to "Ridgefest 2009" ... Below was probably my most exciting time during a 2003 ridge...

m4deer.jpg


Just like 2003 - Had to be that damn mullet ;-(
 
Seems like a 1988/1989 kind of thing to me....both terrible chase years as far as quantity and quality. Not quite time to write this one off the books but the blockiness almost to the friggin North Pole is all kinds of scary. We'll need a steady barrage of vicious Pacific jets to tear that thing down and allow progress !! At least the 500mb heights have not gotten out of control just yet. Now if we begin to see the old "ring of fire" that may be the RIP on tombstone for 2009 chase season.
 
I got a tornado already this year. I'm still sort of a noobie at the whole chasing game so I still consider 1 tornado an accomplishment. I'll be happy as long as Ma Nature owns Chicago with extreme CAPE and unidirectional shear once again in August. Corn planting is late in IA and MO this year, but hopefully it will be sweating out those 80F dewpoints when the time comes.

08/23/07

08/04/08

??/??/09
 
As far as N. IL/S. WI goes it has been very quiet so far overall. Although most of my chases don't get going until the very end of May through Summer.

Matter of fact 'ring of fire isn't a bad thing here because we usually get on the ring ;)

Still unless we get some really warm and humid air in here which seems to be tough lately it wont do us much good here either.
 
So how many of you folks will we be seeing this coming late week/weekend trying to tackle this monsoonish/upslope/weak disturbance/stalled front stuff in the High Plains? Just curious.

We've got 2 weeks with 16 chasers, 12 or so who have paid tuition for a 3-hour course, and we will have already delayed as long as we can (4 days) when we leave Thursday morning out of Virginia. So we're going to go and do our best to find a diamond in all the coal chunks. We've had some success doing that before. And we'll hope the mid to latter part of our trip provides a 1 or 2-day window of something vaguely resembling more classic Plains chasing.
 
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