First CI of the day...

So unlike yesterday, activity has not waited and is currently ongoing and the EWP has began warning operations over the OUN CWA where a tornado watch has been issued at 1803 UTC. Forecasters were monitoring the GOES-R CI products throughout the morning following the issuance of their initial AFD. A line of cumulus formed along a dryline extending through western OK down into TX. At 1702 UTC, UWCI flagged a towering cumulus cloud for "pre-CI growth" (see image below) near the TX/OK border. SATCAST did not flag this storm and at this time radar reflectivity had already exceeded 35 dBZ for this particular storm (see image below). It is likely that the storm initiated between the 15 minute scan period from 1645 UTC and 1702 UTC. UWCI continued to flag this storm during the 1715 UTC scan for "CI ongoing". Also at 1715 UTC, SATCAST flagged a storm just north of the initial storm which continued to form a 35 dBZ echo at 1754 UTC, providing a 39 minute lead time on radar. The southern initial storm had it's first CG flash at 1800 UTC, providing about an hour lead time for the first occurrence of CG for the UWCI.

4-panel CI display (top) and radar reflectivity (bottom) for 1702 and 1707 UTC respectively.
4-panel CI display for 1715 UTC
Unfortunately, as it always seems, we lose satellite data for a 30 minute gap during initiation period, so the EWP forecasters have moved into warning operations using radar data as storms continue to develop northward along the dryline. Hopefully at some point this afternoon/evening we will get a chance to examine the overshooting-top and thermal couplet products in warning operations, as well as the PGLM as the storms move a little further east into the OKLMA domain.