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Virtual Severe Weather Forecast and Chase Contest


tornadotony

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First chase I've been able to spend some time on and decided to make an entry on - pulled out a high risk. Oklahoma, particularly Northern and North Central Oklahoma looks prime IMO. Never claimed to be great at this though ;)

I am thinking i might go a bit further north but nice graphics...... mine are plain awful, using the touchpad, but very nice touch, looks like it is broadcast/tv quality. thumbsupsmileyanim.gif

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Here comes another fail map

Target Oklahoma City, OK

As for reasoning, I think this is your classic dryline setup with tornadic storms along dry line and along the warm front to the north also.

I dont know if I would call this a classic dryline setup..It's not really that tight at all with mid 60 dew points in central OK only dropping off to the 40's around AMA. I can possibly see this being a MDT risk. Nice steep mid level lapse rates between H5-H7 with good shear/abundant moisture and nice southerly-backed sfc winds. A strong H3 jet streak of 90kts observed at AMA at 12z.

I am looking at southern KS right now but will fine tune tomorrow.

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I dont know if I would call this a classic dryline setup..It's not really that tight at all with mid 60 dew points in central OK only dropping off to the 40's around AMA. I can possibly see this being a MDT risk. Nice steep mid level lapse rates between H5-H7 with good shear/abundant moisture and nice southerly-backed sfc winds. A strong H3 jet streak of 90kts observed at AMA at 12z.

I am looking at southern KS right now but will fine tune tomorrow.

Yeah you are right I was miss reading a few dewpoints, still a weak to moderate dryline though, just not as good as I originally saw it.

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Difficult chase case. Here's why:

1) Despite the strong flow at 300mb, the flow at 500mb isn't all that strong. Clearly this is a case of a strong Pacific jet carving out a beautiful broad trough in the western U.S., but at 12Z, this process is just beginning. I imagine a rather loose height contours at H5 with multiple areas of shortwave ridging and troughing, rather than the clear dynamic system of prior cases.

2) For some reason the EML doesn't seem that robust. The cap does not look super strong, and the dry air aloft is having a tough time mixing down to the sfc, with Td's behind the dryline in the 40's. All this with SW'ly 850's too, so one would expect better.

3) Notice that temps at OKC drop between 15Z and 18Z despite robust warm advection all around that area. A closer inspection with a magnifying glass indicates that this is a rain-cooled airmass as thunderstorms are in the vicinity. In fact, looking at other obs, there has been precip from Midland to Abilene to Dallas all morning, which may explain Point #2. Culprit appears to be a shortwave over W TX at 12Z. Of greater concern, in immediate areas around this band of precip, winds are veering. Nevertheless, the warm advection is amazing, and the winds in vicinity of the precip are backing. Is that precip induced, or something legit?

But really, I haven't made any definitive conclusions yet. After all, winds could re-back, convection could lift out, etc. However, I'm going to be extra cautious about a southern target, given the veering winds around the precip and the area of precip itself (which could mean an area of subsidence nosing into that area later). This is all of course highly uncertain, and low-confidence. And I would hate to break with the OK-S KS consensus, because that usually means I'm wrong, and I am missing something significant; after all, the southern target doesn't look that bad otherwise. I would target N KS, but that missing ob near Concordia at 18Z makes me worrisome. If the sfc temps aren't going to rise enough up there the low-lvl lapse rates are going to be an issue up north.

Lol, I'll post a target later. I will however go with an SPC categorical outlook of MDT.

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Difficult chase case. Here's why:

1) Despite the strong flow at 300mb, the flow at 500mb isn't all that strong. Clearly this is a case of a strong Pacific jet carving out a beautiful broad trough in the western U.S., but at 12Z, this process is just beginning. I imagine a rather loose height contours at H5 with multiple areas of shortwave ridging and troughing, rather than the clear dynamic system of prior cases.

2) For some reason the EML doesn't seem that robust. The cap does not look super strong, and the dry air aloft is having a tough time mixing down to the sfc, with Td's behind the dryline in the 40's. All this with SW'ly 850's too, so one would expect better.

3) Notice that temps at OKC drop between 15Z and 18Z despite robust warm advection all around that area. A closer inspection with a magnifying glass indicates that this is a rain-cooled airmass as thunderstorms are in the vicinity. In fact, looking at other obs, there has been precip from Midland to Abilene to Dallas all morning, which may explain Point #2. Culprit appears to be a shortwave over W TX at 12Z. Of greater concern, in immediate areas around this band of precip, winds are veering. Nevertheless, the warm advection is amazing, and the winds in vicinity of the precip are backing. Is that precip induced, or something legit?

But really, I haven't made any definitive conclusions yet. After all, winds could re-back, convection could lift out, etc. However, I'm going to be extra cautious about a southern target, given the veering winds around the precip and the area of precip itself (which could mean an area of subsidence nosing into that area later). This is all of course highly uncertain, and low-confidence. And I would hate to break with the OK-S KS consensus, because that usually means I'm wrong, and I am missing something significant; after all, the southern target doesn't look that bad otherwise. I would target N KS, but that missing ob near Concordia at 18Z makes me worrisome. If the sfc temps aren't going to rise enough up there the low-lvl lapse rates are going to be an issue up north.

Lol, I'll post a target later. I will however go with an SPC categorical outlook of MDT.

You have a target Jim?

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Most of you guys played a little too far to the east. This was a prolific dryline tornado outbreak in western Oklahoma. The most notable tornadoes were the F3 near Elk City and the borderline F3/F4 that hit Cordell.

post-97-0-49441400-1299986458.jpg

None of you went for the equally fun Nebraska target, though...

post-97-0-10044300-1299986502.jpg

As the maps show, those of you who went along the KS/OK border got snake-bitten and snake-bitten badly (and unfortunately, that was a lot of you). As for outlook verification, I preferred moderate from NE to OK, but also accepted high risk as long as it was for the southern target, since there were 19 tornadoes there but 3 of them were F3.

Chase 4 scores:

brettjrob: 34

OHweather: 30

Stebo48858: 8

Chicago Storm: 7

TheWeatherPimp: 7

cmichweather: 4

*IndyMeso*: 4

IsoDerecho: 2

L.B. LaForce: 2

Thundersnow12: 2

thewxmann: 1

Overall scores:

Thundersnow12: 91

brettjrob: 85

Chicago Storm: 54

thewxmann: 53

L.B. LaForce: 37

OHweather: 30

Stebo48858: 16

Kevin Askew: 11

cmichweather: 9

*IndyMeso*: 9

TheWeatherPimp: 7

IsoDerecho: 6

CandymanColumbusGA: 4

Chinook: 1

Chase 5 will be up later tonight and due at 9 PM CDT on Monday.

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