What is your home storm season?

[Susan Strom]

Since we are all located in different states and countries around the world, it would be interesting for us to post our own home storm season's vital stats, specific to our areas.

General activity, what to expect, what can be chased there, and nuances of the particular area and tips would be welcomed.

I'll start with Arizona, USA

What to chase: Southwestern Monsoon
Time of year: Approx July 7 - Sept 15
What to expect: Thunderstorm activity in a "burst and break" pattern. Some days on, some days off.
What the weather has in store: Moderate to intense lightning; flash floods; high winds (even to 100mph gust at times); haboob/dust storm with dramatic sand wall; pulse, orographic, and storm-related higher-based convective structure usually (but not exclusively!) non-tornadic; very heavy isolated to scattered rainfall; microburst.
Typical time of day for storm activity: Late afternoon until midnight
Temperatures: Desert heat 100-120 degrees F, milder in the state's alpine regions. Especially in the deserts, precautions must be taken and excess water carried. One cannot count on ANY water to be found in the desert in plant life, streams or mountains. Best to plan for none available.
Terrain: Rocky, mountainous, basins to extreme topography with steep canyons - a desert valley that stretches for miles sweeps up to a jagged sawtooth range 7,000-10,000 ft, volcanic peaks 12,600 in alpine northern AZ. Landscapes are vast, the Tonto National Forest alone is the size of the state of Connecticut. It is sometimes difficult to judge sense of scale. A mountain or canyon that appears 5 minutes away takes an hour to reach. Keep the tank full, it can be 40-70 miles between services.
Cell phones: Often there is no coverage in canyons, mountains, basins. Calls can drop due to terrain. Best in urban areas like metropolitan Phoenix and Tucson. Some coverage as well in the deserts and some parts of the interstates. Carry a CB radio.
Roads: Highways in Arizona are usually very well maintained, remarkably so given the terrain. There are many steep grades and windy roads. Roadside scenery is often breathtaking. There are also numerous primitive roads varying from well groomed to severely rutted/4wd only.
Associated chase hazards: Very capricious lightning (long running channels, "bolts from the blue", lightning from deceptively benign-looking clouds. My rule in Arizona: If it's convective, it's electric.); extreme temperatures; low visibility in blowing sand; flash flood; venomous creatures (snake, scorpion, insect life); human/illegal border activity (chase north...advised); unmarked mine shafts.
Tips: Guide yourself well in the landscape. Read materials written by and talk to guides such as rangers, outdoor enthusiasts and Native guides. Published by the AZ Dept of Transportation, Arizona Highways magazine http://www.arizonahighways.com is another source of information. Stop by Wide World of Maps for good topos and guidebooks http://www.wideworldofmaps.com/
Payoffs: Incredible light and color; picturesque storms and lightning; storms interact with dramatic mountainous or desert terrains; sweeping vistas; interesting cacti and vegetation, canyons, startling moonrises and other sky features. Patience is a required ingredient for chasing Monsoon.
The "official" start of Monsoon is: It does not fall on a specific day, but rather, when a dewpoint of 55 degrees or greater has been achieved 3 days in a row.
Distance from Tornado Alley: One day's drive. Chasing the Monsoon does not conflict with the May/June storm season there.

What is your home storm season? Any nuances or specifics you would like to talk about?

Some people added some good categories, like cell phones. I updated mine.

 

[Scott Olson]

Brookings, SD

Chase Season: May 20th- July 31st
What to expect: Usually Classic and LP supercells. Lots of nocturnal strong convection great for lightning shots.
Roads: Good road network with usual 1/2 mile gravel roads and plenty of county and state roads.
Area: Flat with less than 30% tree density.
Cell Coverage- Cellular one has both rural and urban coverage. Verizon has good coverage around interstates and urban cities.

Historically area does not usually see traditional outbreaks as our neighbors in Nebraska and Iowa due (June 24,2003 aside) rather most tornado days involve 1-3 tornadoes.
-Scott.

 

[Andy Wehrle]

Green Bay, Wisconsin (for college), Stoughton, Wisconsin (for home)

Peak of storm season: May 20-July 10. Late May through early July is the time period when this area gets its best balance between moisture, dynamics, shear and capping to maximize severe thunderstorm potential (earlier in the year moisture/cape is usually too marginal, and later capping gets too strong/dynamics too weak). As Scott said about SD, classic tornado outbreaks are rare with most tornado days featuring half a dozen or less small, brief, usually weak tornadoes. Even June 23 last year was not a classic synoptically evident outbreak. The reason that supercell outbreaks seldom initiate over the state appears to be because most days with severe weather potential are preceded by an outbreak further west that sends an MCS/sometimes derecho over the state overnight, which leaves a cloud shield behind till 3 in the afternoon the next day.

Road network is fairly extensive, usually not hard to find a road where you want to go (at least in the areas I frequent, which is the south-central part of the state). Topography is less than ideal, however, with hills, trees and cornfields that often make it difficult to get a good view of the sky.

 

[Jeff Miller]

South Sioux City, NE

Chase Season: May 1st - July 31st
What To Expect: All varieties of supercells, squall lines and MCSs. Storms have frequent lightning and pea to golfball hail is common. Many storm systems in this area originate as supercells farther west and begin to congeal into lines/bow echoes approaching the Missouri River. Wall clouds are quite common, tornadoes are possible.
Roads: Can be challenging with the Missouri River. Access to NE/IA/SD is limited, plan your route carefully.
Area: Rolling hills, larger on Iowa Side. South Dakota area is flattest and the best chase terrain.
Cell Coverage: Best on Iowa Side. Most of NE Nebraska will put you in roaming on many plans.
Typical Chase Time: 2:30PM - 10:00 PM
Traditional "hotspot" areas for severe weather include Holt County: ONeill, Nebraska, and Thurston County, Nebraska, which seem to have a greater number of severe occurences than other areas. Other "hotspot" areas would be Yankton, South Dakota to Vermillion, South Dakota.

 

[Tyler Allison]

Northern Kentucky and South East Indiana

Chase Season: April 1st- July 15th
What to expect: Mainly squall lines with the occasional embedded rain wrapped tornado
Roads: Horrible. Very few major highways following no standard pattern.
Area: Mainly one lane highways with tree cover on one or both sides. As you enter NKY you get rolling hills thrown in.
Typical chase time: Mid afternoon into early evening
Cell Coverage: Never been a problem. The occasional drop out due to distance between towers in heavily rural areas.
Distance to tornado alley: Too far for me to consider. Though Indiana is second in the nation for F1+ tornado hits.

 

[Aric Cylkowski]

This is my take on Southeast Michigan (I'm sure everyone else around here has a much different opinion than me):

What to chase: Derechoes, classic and HP supercells, small tornadoes.
Time of year: Approx May 1 - July 20
What to expect: Mostly linear activity, impressive classic or HP supercells at times, lake breezes can rapidly create squall lines if conditions come together.
What the weather has in store: Moderate lightning, intense rainfall, downbursts, generally weak tornadoes, winds anywhere from 60mph to 80mph (derechoes that can push that much higher).
Typical time of day for storm activity: late afternoon until midnight
Temperatures: 65 to 90 degrees F.
Associated chase hazards: Intense downpours reduce visibility dramatically at times, plenty of trees and forests to block your view, plenty of road construction limits intercept options (and escape routes).
Payoffs: Extended periods of severe weather (May 22, 2004 and May 23, 2004) allows for many intercept chances, spectacular lightning displays if you can get a clear view at night.
The "official" start of the season is: When dewpoints get above 65 and temperatures remain above 70 for three or more days before any cold front approaches.
Distance to tornado alley: Roughly 2 or 3 days (depending on how long you prefer to drive per day), conflicts with season there.


This would be more detailed if I had the format down and more detailed knowledge of how this stuff gets going.

 

[Dan Cook]

Macomb, IL
Time of year: I'd say March 1 to Nov 1
Expecting: Supercells, Squalls, Derechos
Roads: Great and easy driving

 

[Blake Michaleski]

Baton Rouge, LA and Mobile, AL

Season: Year round.

Severe: October-May

Tropical: June-November

Road network sucks, trees suck, hills suck, river crossing limited.

Nearly inpossible to chase severe weather but if there is a storm I cant tell it no.

 

[Austin Ivey]

There has never been a reported tornado in Los Alamos county (in recorded history of course). Local conditions are not favorable for supercell development.

However, similar to Susan's description we do get a couple months of "monsoon" type weather in July and August. The scenery is amazing in Los Alamos so we can get some absolutely spectacular storm scenes. Rainbows and unusual colors draped across a high desert environment with mountain peaks flirting with 13000 feet.

Plus, Los Alamos is located around 7400 feet ASL so after it storms during "monsoon season" its very pleasant outside.....often dipping into the 40s throughout the summer. You people in the midwest and south can keep the heat!!

 

[Justin Turcotte]

Grand Forks, ND.

North Dakota is highly underrated in terms of chasing. Lack of population either inhibits tornadoes from getting reported or obtaining large F-scale ratings. Lack of population and being located on the northern fringe of Tornado Alley limits chaser convergence (a plus).

Chase season generally begins in mid to late May and lasts through August with July being the peak frequency month in North Dakota. April tornadoes are rare here. The corridor of highest frquency stretches from Minot to Bismarck to Jamestown to Fargo.

The Red River Valley of the North is approx 80-100 miles wide, is flat as anything out there with sparse tree coverage. Further west the terrain gets a little more rugged but still light on the trees. Go west of Bismarck and you will see the badlands of North Dakota. Go east of the Red and you are stuck in the trees of MN.

Supercells range from LP to classic to HP with most LPs occuring in the west. ND is also home to some spectacular mid summer MCSs.

Proximity of Grand Forks to Canada will allow for international chasing. Photos of tornadoess in Canada are relatively rare and I hope to grab some this summer.

Hazards. Occasional extreme rainfall/flooding in the east. Any low spot in the Red will quickly become innundated because terrian is so flat. Lots of hail central and west.

Road network: east A+, central B-, west D+

 

[mikegeukes]

West Michigan: It just sucks.

May into July for severe weather.

Hail: Do not expect to see large hail, anything over 1.75 inch (golfball size)is rare, often you see in the LSR's 0.75-1.00 inch, with a occasionally 1.75 inch report.

Tornadoes: Strongest tornadoes occur in the month of April, June is the peak month.

Winds: Occasionally 60 mph, with some higher gusts. We did have the May 31, 1998 derecho with winds estimated at 130 mph.

A lot of the storms are squall lines, and the occasional pulse variety, with a supercell once in a while. Storms form in the later part of the afternoon, into the evening, sometimes in the early morning.

Lake Michigan, tends to weaken some of the storms, over the cooler waters, sometimes storms will fire on the lake breeze boundary.

Forests, trees, and traffic, from urban areas like: Battle Creek, Grand Rapids, Holland, Jackson, Kalamazoo, Lansing, Muskegon, St.Jospeh, makes it very frustrating. Roads are on a grid system, but often no real good shoulders to pull over on, especially on paved roads, trees along the roadways, do not help. Gravel roads, are better to pull over, but more and more are being paved, plus trees are a problem.

Best bet is to find areas, with farmland, you will see a mixture of woods and farmland. Photos opportunities, not the greatest.

Mike

 

[Jeff Wear]

I'll leave it up to others to discuss my current home area (Oklahoma), instead I'll discuss my original home area - the Central Valley of California

Time of year: anytime during the "rainy season" (October-May), greatest concentration is from February to May.

What to expect: hail, funnel clouds, tornadoes (mostly F0-F1).

Terrain: remarkably flat.

Road network: fairly dense grid of roads oriented N-S, E-W, and occasionally NW-SE with few curves.

Visibility: nearly all storms occur in the cold sector so haze and low clouds are almost never a problem. since the region has little in the way of native trees the terrain and road network makes most rural areas very chaseable, although sight lines can be severly limited near almond orchards.

Hail: rarely gets over 1" in diameter, but significant accumulations of small hail are quite common

Tornadoes: rarely do damage greater than F1 but usually have photogenic condensation funnels. about 3-6 tornadoes are confirmed in the valley each year, with a greater number of funnel clouds reported. suspect at least some of these "funnel clouds" may really be weak tornadoes, but are never confirmed since they don't pass over areas where they can do damage.

Wind: straight line winds associated with thunderstorms are extremely rare

Opportunities: usually there will be a half dozen per year, again mostly between February and May. some years there may not be any chase opportunites at all - others there may be quite a few (1994, 1995, 1996, 1998, 2002, and 2005 come to mind).

Hazards: flooding is a big hazard due to the poor drainage - storms can drop over 1" of rain in 30 minutes. also many chase days occur the day after a significant rainfall and there can still be a lot of standing water around. the large accumulations of hail also present a great hazard and often cause motorists to slide off the road.

Distance to Tornado Alley: about 18 hrs to AMA, 19 hrs to DEN, 22 hrs to OKC. each time I've returned to CA from a Plains chase, it has snowed over Donner Summit - even in June.

Other notes:

- Temps in the low 60s and dewpoints in the low 50s are often enough for severe weather here since 500mb temps will generally be below -22C.

- NW-SE orientation of the valley helps back the low level winds making shear profiles especially favorable.

- local NWS offices generally do a better job than the SPC at identifying severe weather potential for this area.

- almost all storms have tops less than 30,000 ft.

 

[Thomas Loades]

Sydney, NSW — Australia

Season: (approx.) Sept. 15–March 15; severe storms have been observed as late as April 14–30 period

Chaseable material: squall lines, supercells, weak single cells — lightning

Usual pattern: hot day, storm builds up in afternoon/evening (typically 1500–1900). Storm can bypass area, leave you with only distant views of anvil: pretty, but frustrating.

What you can get: Straight-line winds of 109 mph; full gamut of supercell spectrum; non-cyclic supercells; cyclic supercells; hail from quarter size to orange size (or, as we know it, "cricket ball size" — still about the same size as an orange, though); generally weak tornadoes, though anything could happen

Chase hazards: well, it's a city, so not exactly the best for chasing in — especially when drivers have a tendency to go nuts in hail and drive around with beach towels covering their windshields, then stop up under any tree or underpass. Also, flash flooding, debris/downed trees on the roads; media often negligent of thunderstorm advice, and weather channel frequently worthless in storm situation, so access to an internet connection is a must.

Pluses: There are some very good viewing points around, particularly in the W/SW suburbs — it's slightly hilly, enough to elevate one above the otherwise flat area to see what's approaching (the best views are often to the W and S, where the storms will typically come from)

Also of note: Storms are upside down here — the updraft base is in the NW part of the storm, with precip to the S and E. The hook then goes up.

 

[mikedeason]

Central Nebraska

Time of year: Greatest concentration of of severe storms and tornadoes occur from May through July, with occasional episodes occuring in April as well as into mid-autumn. Early season severe weather is typically associated with migratory cold core upper level systems while mid summer to late fall episodes are commonly produced during a northwest flow regime.

What to expect: Almost easier to state what not to expect! Supercells and squall lines are the predomonant mode of convection during the early to mid part of the season with a transition to HP's and multicell clusters during the summer and fall months under northwest flow regimes. Overnight MCS's rolling in from the Nebraska Panhandle are quite common during the season as well.

Terrain: Very flat along the Platte River Valley with rolling hills south of the valley. North to northwest parts of the regions transition into the Nebraska Sandhills. Non-riparian forestation is fairly sparse throughout most of the region offering excellent vanatge points in most locations.

Road network: Platte River Valley pretty well delineates orientation of the road network. In the valley and south, roads are predominately N-S, E-W with numerous FM gravel roads. North of the valley, roads tend to take on the orientation of the terrain and sandy ranch roads are common. Extreme caution must be taken on all gravel and sand roads especially if wet. Also, all "Low Maintenance" roads MUST be avoided!

Visibility: Visibility is excellent, overall. Biggest visibilty problems occur due to smoke from controlled and uncontrolled burns and during periods of stagnation during the summer.

Hail: Very common, anywhere from pea size up to volleyball size! Larger hail tends to be aggregate/conglomerate type stones, athough solid, layered baseball and softball size hail does occur with very strong supercells.

Tornadoes: Occur frequently with supercells during the spring and early summer. During the heart of the summer, tornadoes produced from HP's are more common as well as weak landspout tornadoes which occur under the developing updrafts of multicell clusters. Most tornadoes produce little damage and many have probably gone unreported until the proliferation of chasing in the local area. Occasional damaging tornadoes do occur from multiple supercells moving at an average rate of speed (May 22, 2004) as well as isolated stationary supercells (June 3, 1980.) LP's are fairly common, especially in the extreme western reachs of the area and can occasionally produce weak tornadoes (May 22, 1996, Benkelman, NE)

Wind: Strong winds of over 50mph are frequently associated with thunderstorms in the region, but widespread damamging wind events are not common except for non-convective events produced by strong, synoptic scale systems. Summer can bring an interesting phenomena to area in the form of nocturnal heatbursts generated from decaying convection (I experienced three such events at my home during July 2003.)

Flash Flooding: Always a hazard, especially areas south of the Platte River valley. Occurs frequently with slow moving HP's and nocturnal MCS'.

Distance to Tornado Alley: Right in the heart of it.

Non Weather Photo Op: The Nebraska Sandhills, the largest formation of sand dunes in the western hemisphere. The view can be quite breathtaking especially on days with a vivid blue sky and scattered coverage of cumulus.

Regards,

Mike

 

[Ken Johnson]

Mississippi, Louisiana, Arkansas, and Tennessee

Time of Year: November through May, but most tyipcal severe weather events happen in November and late Feb through late April.

What to expect: HP's, Classics, Squall Lines, Pulse (every day in summer) Tropical low topped supercells (landfalling tropical systems)

When: Anytime, day or night. A lot of our events happen during the middle of the night, which contribute to a higher death toll.

Most severe setups occur with strong wind shear and very limited instability. But with low LCL's, we can get low topped supercells, usually embedded within a line, to produce tornadoes.

If we get good instability to go along with the good dynamics, wide spread tornado outbreaks occur,which typically happen about once or twice a year. Some are intense.

Large hail is less of a threat, due to the warm, tropical nature of the environment.

This season has been different. Cold, dry air aloft has produced monster hail on several accounts.

Terrain: Not good in most spots. Tree's and curvy roads and some small hills. However, across northeast Louisiana, eastern Arkansas, and northwestern Miss, the area known as the delta, it's flat with few tree's. Very similar as Iowa and Northern Missouri, and Illinois. Good road Network and cell coverage...