hlcater

Guys! The ERTAF is showing some hope in the long range! http://atlas.niu.edu/ertaf/

Well the primary jet really likes the northern conus and Canada, so I think sustained periods of AOA 40kts flow over the plains will be hard to come by. Thinking “day-of” events, upslope and boundaries are going to rule the 2nd half of may. However, with sufficient moisture and instability, this can work.

2nd week of may looks to be dominated by a pretty hefty ridge in the west based on both operational models and their ensembles. Not sure how long it’ll be after this trough early week. I’d hedge to say that it’s gonna be quiet for at least 5 days after that.

I wouldn't call next week's setup ideal... it's got problems. Particularly problems with moisture(especially on the euro side of things) and the GFS digs the trough deep enough such that 500mb orientation is mediocre at best. I'm not seeing an outbreak, but I'm seeing perhaps a few events in the plains from this.

Tornado EMERGENCY in Louisiana for this nasty tornado right here. That thing is meeaannnn.

I think the NAM is suffering from convective feedback, especially across TN. Therefore I’d probably take its output with a grain of salt.

Pretty sure you summed up mike morgan as a whole right there.

You guys are getting (measurable)snow before we are IN IOWA! I highly doubt that's ever happened before.

Bouncing around with the rough placement of this body of cold air. But they all have been remarkably consistent in having this cold air present and have been hinting at storm potential somewhere, but that's where the consistency ends. I'm just happy that we've got a solid mass of seemingly persistent cold air for systems to feed on. Obviously better if the main body of cold air is further west, like you mentioned, but as long as its cold without dry northwest flow, I'll take it. But I do expect the cold(maybe stormy?) look to last, maybe even for those further south.

I've noticed there seems to be a problem with the GFS over-amplifying TCs lately. It was doing this last week too and has in the EPAC as well, although to a lesser extent. I'm pretty sure the GFS just had an update recently and this update brought a bit of an over-amplifying issue it seems. Either way, I wouldn't buy that, although decent strengthening is probable, just not to 870mb.

A strong June EML remains my biggest concern, although its really too far out to make this call, I really dont like that the past several GFS runs all have a very strong capping regime, so even if we do get excellent wind fields and solid CAPE, it may not matter. However, the main part of the trough is in Canada, which probably contributes at least a little to the whole plains being capped off. If the trough is able to slide south some and not eject so far north, I feel like eroding it should become much easier. This trough also has a huge area of 50kts+ 500mb flow, which is excellent for June, would be a shame to see it largely go to waste.

In the EC's defense, the GFS verification scores are quite terrible lately. I saw a graph 2 or 3 days ago showing the scores, and the GFS is way(like significantly) lower than the Euro for the past week or so. I don't exactly know where to find it though.

That low up in near Sioux City is the key, that needs to lift north and/or be not nearly as strong with the CAA or else cyclogenesis will probably have a bit rougher of a time.

Is it just me or does the JTWC have a tendency to over estimate wind speeds. That doesn't look on par with a cat 4 due to a filled eye and no convection north of the center. Wasn't an issue on meranti before it entered the south China sea. Then I think they were over a little. I see lots of storms given ratings, that, based on satellite appearances do not look that steong. However I'm not familiar with the Dvorak classification or whatever thing they use to determine pressure and intensity.