GOES CI products from UAH and CIMSS not showing a sustained area of CI across Ern NM and SW TX. SE Colorado had some nice CI and subsequent deep convection.
Tuesday, June 12, 2012
MAF: Waiting for CI
Forecaster comments from EWP blog...
GOES CI products from UAH and CIMSS not showing a sustained area of CI across Ern NM and SW TX. SE Colorado had some nice CI and subsequent deep convection.
If we can overcome CAP, storms in Ern NM/SW TX will have a lot of
CAPE to work with with above normal vertical wind shear for this time of
year. SPC has issued an MD for possible severe tstorm watch for SE
NM/SW TX. Not talking it up too much however.
19Z OUNWRF showing that AMA and SJT WFOs may have the most action tonight. We’ll see...
GOES CI products from UAH and CIMSS not showing a sustained area of CI across Ern NM and SW TX. SE Colorado had some nice CI and subsequent deep convection.
LUB- GOES-R Nearcast of Instability/Moisture
Forecaster comments from EWP blog...
GOES-R Nearcast shows the low level moisture and instability axis from the Low Rolling Plains off the Caprock northwest into the southern Texas Panhandle at 21z. The Nearcast of CAPE is around 1500 J/K in the LUB forecast area but higher in northeast New Mexico.
Waiting for storms to develop. But once storms develop, Nearcast of
low level Precipitable waters shows the higher low level moisture axis
will remain over the South Plains and Rolling Plains through the
evening. With the directional shear from low level easterly to modestly
strong mid and upper level westerly flow, potential for convection to
grow upscale into MCS later tonight.
GOES-R Nearcast shows the low level moisture and instability axis from the Low Rolling Plains off the Caprock northwest into the southern Texas Panhandle at 21z. The Nearcast of CAPE is around 1500 J/K in the LUB forecast area but higher in northeast New Mexico.
ABQ – First Experimental Warning of the Day – Update at 1945Z
Forecaster comments from EWP blog...
Storms firing northeast of ABQ are strengthening. Cloud top cooling around -29C/15min.
Storms firing northeast of ABQ are strengthening. Cloud top cooling around -29C/15min.
EWP daily debrief 6/12
Today we had the opportunity to debrief our final group of forecasters for the first time this week. Most of yesterday was spent familiarizing the forecasters with the products in AWIPS II. Below are some comments gathered during today's debrief...
SATCAST / UW Cloud-top Cooling
- "In Tulsa's area, SATCAST strength of signal was always under 40 or so... at one point it did start to develop a consolidated area just south of I-40 where it was an area that was associated with some enhanced low-level moisture convergence... nothing really happened, but it was still interesting to see the evolution. The values were still low, so I wasn't really expecting much to happen... it was nice to be able to have some confidence that CI might not occur."
- "We had a little bit down in Birmingham's area and we did see some strength of signals reaching 80 and those did develop and some became severe, so it did a nice job."
- "We had a couple CTCs reach near -20 C / 15 min and we did see a cold pool coming down, so we did go ahead and trigger a warning on it... The one tower that cooled the most was the one that went up the fastest and was associated with some high winds later on."
- "Some of those that were to the north of HUN's area did have some significant CTCs but nothing happened... there were only a couple of these... it seemed like the FAR was pretty low."
Nearcast
- "It was telling us that the axis of instability was going all the way to the coast (and it did) and that would be a huge thing to know, whether the convection would continue or die."
- "In the Tulsa domain, looking at the low level PW and theta-e, it was really showing the drying coming down.... the surface obs saw this too, but it was still interesting to see that and how it affected the convection."
PGLM
- "We saw some increases in lightning activity, but I wouldn't say it became an indicator one way or the other... but we were dealing with an ongoing MCS, so there may not have been many changes going on... it did not sway us in our warning decision."
- "There wasn't much lead time on the occurrence of CGs... they seemed to happen at the same time of the ICs... but again, we were dealing with an MCS."
- "At a CWSU, if I had this data everywhere it would be huge because you may not have any 'ground truth' from CG data with storms that may still have tops up to 32k ft and producing IC flashes that you don't want any planes flying into."
- "It was nice because you can't really see any sort of jumps in lightning from CG data alone."
- "We did have two 60 mph wind reports near Mussel Shoals that were associated with some increases in lightning activity."
SATCAST / UW Cloud-top Cooling
- "In Tulsa's area, SATCAST strength of signal was always under 40 or so... at one point it did start to develop a consolidated area just south of I-40 where it was an area that was associated with some enhanced low-level moisture convergence... nothing really happened, but it was still interesting to see the evolution. The values were still low, so I wasn't really expecting much to happen... it was nice to be able to have some confidence that CI might not occur."
- "We had a little bit down in Birmingham's area and we did see some strength of signals reaching 80 and those did develop and some became severe, so it did a nice job."
- "We had a couple CTCs reach near -20 C / 15 min and we did see a cold pool coming down, so we did go ahead and trigger a warning on it... The one tower that cooled the most was the one that went up the fastest and was associated with some high winds later on."
- "Some of those that were to the north of HUN's area did have some significant CTCs but nothing happened... there were only a couple of these... it seemed like the FAR was pretty low."
Nearcast
- "It was telling us that the axis of instability was going all the way to the coast (and it did) and that would be a huge thing to know, whether the convection would continue or die."
- "In the Tulsa domain, looking at the low level PW and theta-e, it was really showing the drying coming down.... the surface obs saw this too, but it was still interesting to see that and how it affected the convection."
PGLM
- "We saw some increases in lightning activity, but I wouldn't say it became an indicator one way or the other... but we were dealing with an ongoing MCS, so there may not have been many changes going on... it did not sway us in our warning decision."
- "There wasn't much lead time on the occurrence of CGs... they seemed to happen at the same time of the ICs... but again, we were dealing with an MCS."
- "At a CWSU, if I had this data everywhere it would be huge because you may not have any 'ground truth' from CG data with storms that may still have tops up to 32k ft and producing IC flashes that you don't want any planes flying into."
- "It was nice because you can't really see any sort of jumps in lightning from CG data alone."
- "We did have two 60 mph wind reports near Mussel Shoals that were associated with some increases in lightning activity."
Monday, June 11, 2012
HUN: NowCast #3 1833 CDT Monday 11 June
Forecaster comments from EWP blog...
Thunderstorm line moving across Lauderdale, Colbert and Franklin counties starting to indicate potential of weakening slightly next 1 to 2 hours. Storms are initiating along the leading edge of a strong cold pool…and that process will continue farther east into the current SVR tstm warning polygon. WoF indicating updraft strength weakening slightly past few passes, and the lightning rates have shown a decrease over the past 4 passes. Expect to see 50+knot winds along and behind the bow to continue being brought down at times next hour…but for areas farther east suggested to have a slightly more stable airmass in place in the GOES Vertical Theta-e Diff Low-Mid imagery…which would suggest the threat might diminish as the storms approach the Cullman and Huntsville areas. Stay tuned.
Thunderstorm line moving across Lauderdale, Colbert and Franklin counties starting to indicate potential of weakening slightly next 1 to 2 hours. Storms are initiating along the leading edge of a strong cold pool…and that process will continue farther east into the current SVR tstm warning polygon. WoF indicating updraft strength weakening slightly past few passes, and the lightning rates have shown a decrease over the past 4 passes. Expect to see 50+knot winds along and behind the bow to continue being brought down at times next hour…but for areas farther east suggested to have a slightly more stable airmass in place in the GOES Vertical Theta-e Diff Low-Mid imagery…which would suggest the threat might diminish as the storms approach the Cullman and Huntsville areas. Stay tuned.
HUN: NowCast #2 1733 CDT Monday 11 June
Forecaster comments from EWP blog...
UAH_CI and CIMSS Cld Top Cooling imagery indicating potential for stronger storms over southwestern forecast area…mainly Franklin, Lawrence and Cullman counties next hour or so. Continue Severe Thunderstorm Warnings for Franklin and Colbert counties but threat passing south of Limestone county. May see shallow spinnup on the leading edge of the bowing structure moving into Red Bay area…but nothing to warn on for tornadoes right now.
UAH_CI and CIMSS Cld Top Cooling imagery indicating potential for stronger storms over southwestern forecast area…mainly Franklin, Lawrence and Cullman counties next hour or so. Continue Severe Thunderstorm Warnings for Franklin and Colbert counties but threat passing south of Limestone county. May see shallow spinnup on the leading edge of the bowing structure moving into Red Bay area…but nothing to warn on for tornadoes right now.
HUN: NowCast #1 1705 CDT Monday 11 June
Forecaster comments from EWP blog...
Nearcast Vertical Theta-e Difference forecast fields showing deeper
layer instability ahead of the squall line moving southeast across
Mississippi and will increase across Northwest Alabama over the next
three hours. We don’t expect a lot of weakening of the strong to severe
storms along the line moving southeast passing north of Tupelo into NW
Alabama. CIMSS CI-Layer cloud top cooling rates now around -23C
indicative of strong updrafts in storms north of Tupelo…and pGLM 1 minute composite showing an increase to 4 over past 5 minutes…and
increasing updraft strengths. Given the environment, we expect to see
an increased risk of severe storms with damaging winds in excess of 60
mph, frequent lightning over Franklin Colbert and Limestone counties
over the next 1 to 2 hours. Storms over northern Mississippi past half
hour still indicating localized winds to near 70 mph, according to
spotter reports out of the Memphis NWS Foreccast Office.
TSA — Looking for CI
Forecaster comments from EWP blog...
Looking at the various CI products for the TSA CWFA. With the strong
EML, it may be tough for the cap to break today with sfc temps only in
the lower 90s. Seeing a little more organization in the UAH CI product
along the front, but it is possible that we will need to switch domains
in the next hour or so if we do not see better development.
MCS in MEG – storm environment
Forecaster comments from EWP blog...
Started looking at NEARCAST 780-500mb CAPE vs RAP13 (aka RUC13) 850-700mb computed CAPE. 2hr fcst valid 2200UTC. Realizing that we cannot compare these two fields 1-for-1, the NEARCAST CAPE seems more accurate compared with the location of the MCS precip and cloud field.
See the vis satellite image and obs from 21Z for more “truth”.
We expect the storms along the leading edge and flanking edge to the
west of Memphis along I-40 to continue to intensify. Will continue to
watch the NEARCAST and CI images for new trends.
Started looking at NEARCAST 780-500mb CAPE vs RAP13 (aka RUC13) 850-700mb computed CAPE. 2hr fcst valid 2200UTC. Realizing that we cannot compare these two fields 1-for-1, the NEARCAST CAPE seems more accurate compared with the location of the MCS precip and cloud field.
Final week
We are underway with our 5th and final week of the experiment. This week we have 6 forecasters from across the country looking at the various experimental products we have available. Today we are working with the forecasters to familiarize themselves with the AWIPS II environment, and also load the experimental products into AWIPS II.
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