Day 2 Mesoscale Discussion: Tue, May 10

Today we are in the San Angelo, TX CWA (SJT). Eastern TX has a very warm, moist airmass, with much drier air over the western portions of the state behind a dryline.

Looking at surface observations and GOES LAP low level PW values, the dry line appears to be draped over the western portions of our CWA.

GOES LAP CAPE values are also increasing considerably early this afternoon, with an axis of 1500 to 2000 J/kg located over the SE portions of our CWA. Expect the best chances for signficant convection to be in this region.

 

The supplemental 18Z radiosonde sounding from KDRT to the south of our CWA is located in the middle of the high CAPE values from the LAP image. An impressive low level capping inversion is apparent. However, surface temperatures over our forecast area are a good 5 to 10 degrees higher than at KDRT and expect that we will warm up enough to break this cap later this afternoon. This will allow us to tap into very impressive instability. Shear values from 0-6km are not all that high, but some better directional shear is apparent above 6 km. Expect as convection becomes deeper, we will see potential for severe weather, mainly hail and wind, as low level shear and helicity would not seem to favor tornadoes.

- JP