A Glance at Friday: Severe Weather in the Great Lakes

It now seems a sure bet that the eastern Great Lakes is due for a spate of severe weather. The SPC is presently making it out to be a linear event, as is typical of cold fronts sweeping through our region, but the wind profiles suggest the possibility of supercells and tornadoes.

If you go by the present, 12Z NAM run, central Ohio appears to be the sweet spot, with a variety of parameters converging over or near a bullseye of 2,000 j/kg SBCAPE. Here are a few maps for forecast hour 21Z to give you an idea. Click on the images to enlarge them. The first shows the aforementioned SBCAPE (shaded), sea level pressure (contours), and surface wind barbs. Not a bad bit of instability if this scenario pans out.

In the second image, you can see a nice overlay of 55-60 kt 500 mb winds (shaded) over 35-40 kt 850 mb winds (contours). The wind barbs are for the 850 mb level. The H5 winds veer still further to the west. I think it’s safe to say that shear won’t be an issue, and 1 km VGP, not shown, is as high as 0.4 in the area of heightened instability. Helicity maxes are well to the north, but I wonder what kind of effective SRH we’ll wind up with where it counts.

The third map shows a Theta-e lobe pushing up into northern Ohio with a surface lifted index between -4 and -6 perched squarely over the axis. That should get the job done.

In the last map, three different significant tornado parameters–the well-known STP, the APRWX tornado index, and the Stensrud tornado risk–all converge nicely over the same spot near Newark, Ohio. Three overlays can be a bit difficult to decipher, so let me help: the STP is shaded, the APRWX is tightly contoured like an onion, and the Stensrud has broader

contours, with its highest value circling the APRWX in a yellow ring.

All this to say, Friday may have some potential. I don’t get too excited about cold front events around here–not that we have many options in the Great Lakes, but a steady diet of squall lines has a way of lowering a person’s expectations. Of course, as soon as you let down your guard, along comes the exception to prove that storms in our area can and do deliver. Maybe this round will prove to one of those occasions. We’ll find out two days hence.

The Farmers’ Almanac, Woolly Bears, and Government Cover-Ups

Given the unreliability of long-range forecast models, there’s a lot of justifiable skepticism in the storm chasing community when someone (like me, for instance) talks about an event that’s 120 or more hours out. Beyond maybe three days, trying to forecast weather events becomes increasingly like reading tea leaves. We watch the ECMWF and GFS for signs of agreement and consistency, and if they start showing up, we cross our fingers, knowing that a lot can happen between now and payday.

So I’m not sure what to think when the revered Farmers’ Alamanac gazes into its crystal ball and issues with serene confidence the following prognostication for the Great Lakes region:

November 2009
1st-3rd. Sunny, with increasing clouds. 4th-7th. Rain spreads in from the west. Turning clear and frosty. 8th-11th. Rapid temperature changes. Storm moves east, with heavy rain or wet snow. Frigid cold air follows. 12th-15th. New storm moves into Great Lakes. Heavy rain and/or wet snow. Then clearing and very cold. 16th-19th. Storm sweeps across the area, followed by very cold air. Fast-moving storm, reaching the region by the 19th. Heavy snow, followed by colder air. 20th-23rd. Cold Canadian front brings rain and thunderstorms for the Great Lakes region. 24th-27th. A wet Thanksgiving.  28th-30th. Few rain or wet snow showers. Turning colder.

December 2009
1st-3rd. Rain and wet snow shift into the Great Lakes, south to Kentucky, followed by clear and cold weather. 4th-7th. Storm Ohio River Basin deposits heavy rain and wet snow. Very cold air follows. 8th-11th. A “winterlude” for Great Lakes and the Ohio River Basin. Temperatures still well below seasonal norms. 12th-15th. Scattered snow showers and flurries. 16th-19th. Considerable cloudiness over most areas, but little precipitation. Nights are seasonably cold, days are mild. 20th-23rd. Rain and/or snow.

Not being a climatologist, I’m unaware of what sophisticated meteorological resources the Farmers’ Almanac may be tapping into. Possibly they’ve been consulting woolly bear caterpillars. According to folklore, you can tell how severe the winter will be by the ratio of brown to black banding on the woolly bears. Plenty of brown means a mild winter; wide black bands with little brown points to a nasty snow season. A few weeks ago, I found an all-black woolly bear. I knew that couldn’t be good.

If only we could get the woolly bears to cooperate when storm chasing season is underway. But the little critters have other things on their minds by then, namely, pupating and becoming Isabella tiger moths. So I guess we’re stuck with the Euro and the GFS. Or sacrificing chickens, though the research supporting the link between chicken sacrifice and improved storm intercepts is slim.

No doubt the government is covering up the information, just like they do everything that’s related to severe weather. They want us to remain ignorant, unsuspecting guinea pigs while the weather gods at Norman conduct their insidious experiments, using their array of antennas and radars to generate monster tornadoes 400 miles away and then guide them unerringly through populated areas. Take the May 13 Kirksville, Missouri, tornado, for instance. That one had Government Issue written all over it. The lack of a single shred of substantiating evidence just goes to show how expert Big Brother is at keeping the truth hidden.*

That’s why you’ll find no NOAA papers correlating tornado outbreaks and chicken sacrifice. Same with woolly bears and long, hard winters–though the Farmers’ Alamanac folks, bless their hearts, have obviously made the connection, and hence, they have the weather for November and December pretty well locked in. I call that kind of forecasting ability reassuring.

As for the rest of us, well, we’ve got the ECMWF, the GFS, and tea leaves. How do you like your tea?

_______

* The following disclaimer is intended only for those who take me seriously: I’M JUST KIDDING! Sad that I’ve even got to say it, but the truth is, some folks out there do in fact believe some damn crazy things about the government’s ability to manipulate the weather. I’m not one of them, and I wouldn’t want to be mistaken for such.

That being said, I would love to see the SPC’s research on chicken sacrifice and tornadogenesis.

Guest Blog: Storm Chaser Andrew Revering on How to Forecast Northwest Flow Events

Regarding tornado potential…with storms moving southeast or even south in some cases, you have to keep in mind that the storm-relative inflow will have to shift in order to maintain a good, dry updraft and support supercellular structure.

Welcome to the first guest post in my new, improved Stormhorn.com blog! I’m pleased to feature Andrew Revering sharing his insights on forecasting northwest flow chase scenarios. Northwest flow seldom produces severe weather; however, some noteworthy tornadoes have occurred in northwest flow. I’m delighted to have Andy share his knowledge about how to forecast the rare chaseworthy setups.

Andy is the proprietor of Convective Development, Inc., and the creator of the unique, enormously powerful F5 Data forecasting data feed and software. A meteorology student both privately and in educational institutions for his whole life, Andy has been a storm chaser for 15 years, four of which he served as a contract storm chaser for KSTP, an ABC-TV affiliate in Minneapolis. Andy started writing weather software in 1996 as a high school senior, developing such programs as AlertMe, APRWeather, WarnMe, StormGuide, AlertMe Pro, SkyConditions, and F5 Data. His current projects include F5 App, F5 Maps, and CellWarn.

During the nearly three years that I’ve used Andy’s F5 Data, I’ve been impressed not only with the power of the product, but also with the knowledge, friendliness, and helpfulness of its creator. Without further preamble, here he is, helping you to get a better handle on…

FORECASTING CHASEWORTHY NORTHWEST FLOW SCENARIOS
By Andrew Revering

The weather pattern known as northwest flow often means cold, stable air and clearing skies, since it comes in the wake of a large synoptic low that has just come through, cleaning the atmosphere of moisture and instability. However, on rare occasions northwest flow can produce very photogenic supercells and even tornadoes.

A northwest flow setup is normally undesirable for storm chasing because severe weather typically occurs in the warm sector before a synoptic system passes, with the jet coming in from the southwest. After the system passes, the shifting jet structure puts you into the northwest flow with limited moisture and instability. With desirable surface features now to your east, you will typically have scrubbed the atmosphere of any good moisture and instability, thereby preventing severe weather from occurring.

However, this is not always the case. A weak ridging pattern, for example, can also produce northwest flow, and it’s possible for weaker surface systems to traverse the flow, bringing in adequate moisture and instability to create a chaseworthy setup.

Regarding tornado potential, the concerns to look at from a forecasting perspective are the same you would consider with a typical deep trough/southwest or westerly flow scenario. Check for adequate deep shear and low-level shear (helicities, 1 km shear vectors, etcetera). You also want to look at the storm-relative inflow. However, with storms moving southeast or even south in some cases, you have to keep in mind that the storm-relative inflow will have to shift to maintain a good, dry updraft and support supercellular structure.

Keep in mind some basics. In order to sustain a single-cell or supercell structure, besides having decent deep-layer shear (40-plus knots at 6 km depth vector), you should also have the environmental wind directions blowing at an angle, with storm motion at roughly ninety degrees from the direction of the environmental winds.

For example, in a classic scenario, storms move due east, with surface winds moving from the south. This allows unstable, warm, moist air to enter the storm on the south side. The storm moves east because the upper-air steering winds are pushing it in that direction. Therefore, when the tower of the storm goes up it gets tilted downwind to the east of the updraft, and rain falls ahead of the storm.

That’s the key point here: rain falls ahead of the updraft. So when you have warm “feeder” air flowing toward the southern side of an eastbound storm, that air can enter the storm unobstructed by precipitation, thus allowing for warm, buoyant air to drive the updraft.

Conversely, if the surface winds came from the east of this same eastbound storm, you’d have storm-relative inflow at 180 degrees. This is BAD for a storm when it comes to producing a tornado, because the incoming air is encountering all of the cold outflow produced by the rain core. It cannot effectively get around this obstacle to feed the updraft. So two problems occur: 1) the warm environmental air gets blocked by the outflow; and 2) the inflow speed decreases, which in turn greatly decreases the low-level shear vector.

Think of it as an extreme. If outflow blocks the environmental winds completely you have zero knots of inflow air into the updraft, which becomes contaminated by the outflow.

In this scenario, the warm air still gets into the storm to feed it, but the storm becomes front-fed, with the warm inflow riding up over the cold outflow. It enters the storm at the mid levels, pushed there by the outflow/gust front, which creates a wedge and causes a shelf cloud to form. The storm then becomes outflow-dominant—linear, multicellular, or some other mode that is unfavorable for tornadoes.

To summarize, then, you need the environmental wind direction to be entering the storm at an angle between, say, 45 and 135 degrees of a storm’s motion to help the storm maintain a super-cellular shape (along with good deep-layer shear and other parameters).

Applying these general principles to a northwest flow event, if your storm motion is southeasterly, south-southeasterly, or southerly, you need storm-relative inflow to be west-southwesterly, westerly or possibly even easterly or east-northeasterly. Since the storm motion is usually going to be southeasterly, the westerly surface options are typically the better choice.

This seems illogical to most chasers. These are not the typical directions you would expect for good inflow; however, they can work well if you have enough instability, moisture, and other of the right ingredients.

When chasing northwest flow storms—or any storms—keep in mind that you want to be on the side of a storm where the environmental inflow is approaching the storm. In a classic setup with an eastbound storm and southerly surface winds, you would look for the updraft base on the south side of the storm (though that can vary from the southeast to southwest side of the storm as well). In a northwest flow scenario, if the surface winds are west-southwest, look for your updraft base on the west-southwest or west side of the storm if its moving south, south-southeast, or southeast. This arrangement can be disorienting to a chaser who doesn’t normally chase storms moving in these directions. In northwest flow, the south or east side of the storm will have few features and present what looks like an outflow-dominant storm, making it easy to miss the tornado on the other side.

Northwest flow storms can be good tornado producers for another reason that I haven’t mentioned yet: they typically bring in cool air in the mid levels. This cool air advection greatly increases instability provided there’s good moisture and instability at the surface. Getting the right surface conditions in place is difficult, but those conditions are the key factor in a good northwest flow setup. Surface moisture and instability combined with unusually cold temperatures in the mid levels can add up to decent instability overall.

Additionally, if the mid levels are cold enough—say, less than -16C at 500mb—you may get a ‘hybrid’ cold core setup to amplify the scenario. However it probably wouldn’t be a true cold core as defined by Jon Davies’ work, given the presence of northwest flow and the likely absence of a significant mid-level cyclone in the area.

Most northwest flow setups occur in June, July, and August, with the peak being in July. These three months account for 85 percent of northwest flow events as studied by Kelly et al, 1978. It is pretty evident that the delay in northwest flow setups during the severe season is due to the lack of adequate moisture in earlier months. In the summer you can get an adundance of moisture that lingers after the passage of a system, allowing for a northwest flow system or even a post-frontal storm or two.

Storm chasers often ignore northwest flow patterns because they typically mean few low pressure centers for convergence and moisture fetch. But while severe weather is rare with northwest flow, it can occur. So keep an eye out. You can easily miss a decent chase scenario by writing it off too quickly.

VORTEX 2 in Northwest Missouri

After years of planning and digging for research dollars, VORTEX 2 finally hit the pavement this spring, only to be met with a severe weather famine. It had to have been heartbreaking for the team, watching that merciless, unending ridge stretch from day to day and week to week, knowing that the clock was ticking on their window for gathering data.

Thankfully, tornadic storms hit the Plains before the window closed, and the team got what they needed. I wish it had gone as well for me. My tally for this season has been one tornado. But I did at least get the compensation of catching some nice storms with cool structure, including the June 7 supercell in northwest Missouri that every chaser in the country seemed to be after–including, of course, the VORTEX 2 armada.

Just for kicks, here is a shot of one of the DOW trucks–the new one with the square radar rig. I believe I took this shot south of Forest City. The DOW is parked to the left in the photo, and I’m looking at it head-on. Viewed from that angle, the radar unit looks like the front end of a tractor trailer.

One of the DOW (Doppler On Wheels) trucks collecting data.

One of the DOW (Doppler On Wheels) trucks collecting data.

Sure does bring back memories. I hope I’ll get a chance to make a few more before the chase year closes. Prime storm season is over, but it’s still a long time yet before the snows fly.

June 19 Central Illinois and Indiana Storm Chase

Approaching our storm from the north near Normal, Illinois.

Approaching the storm of the day south of Normal, Illinois.

After Iowa’s blue-sky bust on June 18, yesterday provided some welcome and much-needed activity. Between illness and May’s ridge of steel, my chase expeditions this year have been limited. The Edina, Missouri, tornado of May 13 has been my only tornado to date for 2009. Yesterday did nothing to improve that statistic, but it did offer a vigorous, classic supercell with some great structure that ensured my 1,650-mile, two-day chase with my buddy Bill Oosterbaan wasn’t a complete washout.

For that matter, storms did finally fire in eastern Iowa, and while Bill and I were too late to catch the big mutha that slammed Prairie du Chien (Ben Holcomb, if you happen to read this, great job on tracking that beast into the hills and jungles of Wisconsin!), we did manage to latch onto the one that followed in its footsteps. But I’m no fan of night time chasing and neither is Bill, and knowing the kind of topography that lay to our east once we crossed the river, we dropped our chase at Prairie du Chien and found ourselves a hotel.

After a decent breakfast yesterday morning, we were on the road by noon and headed south. The SPC showed a moderate risk for a large area extending from Iowa and Missouri east across the corn belt and Great Lakes. With a continuation of yesterday’s huge CAPE and good bulk shear, a widespread severe weather outbreak seemed like a sure bet. However, veering surface winds and unidirectional flow seemed to put the kibosh on chances for tornadoes in all but a few areas to the east, where helicities improved, particularly around 21Z.

As we approached Davenport, Iowa, heading south, we could see towers muscling up along an east-west boundary that transected Illinois south of the I-80 corridor. Catching I-80 east, we could see new cells firing up farther to the south on GR3. With a Kankakee target in the back of our minds, we decided to drop toward Normal on I-39.

By the time we drew near the town, the northernmost storm was showing rotation on the radar. The tower was just to our west, and as we proceeded down the highway, the updraft base came into view, dominated by a well-developed wall cloud.

Wall cloud on northernmost storm.

Wall cloud on northernmost storm.

We headed for an intercept, tracking with the storm until it began to degrade. Meanwhile, another cell to the south was strengthening and beginning to exhibit distinct rotation on SRV, so with the storm we were on mushing out, we abandoned it in favor of the second, rapidly intensifying supercell.

One heckuva hail shaft or what?

One heckuva hail shaft or what?

This bad boy had an impressive hail shaft, if hail is what we were actually seeing. Maybe it was just plain old rain with a bit of hail mixed in. The reason I wonder is because of the paucity of hail reports. We got tapped a bit as we closed in, but mostly we just encountered buckets of rain. Whatever the case, the updraft tower with the sunlit precip column was a beautiful sight.

Second storm showing hail shaft and updraft tower.

Second storm showing sunlit precip core and updraft tower.

After working our way south of the storm’s rear flank, we proceeded east and finally gained some good, clear views of the business end. Tracking with it from near Urbana through Homer, Fairmount, and Westville toward the Indiana border, we were in a good position to enjoy the structure as the storm went through several cycles.

Rotating wall cloud.

Rotating wall cloud.

Just east of Homer, the wall cloud tightened and I could see rapidly circulating cloud tags descending toward the ground. We pulled over to watch. The rotation wasn’t far away–maybe a quarter of a mile–and it appeared to be moving toward us. This was strange as we were southwest of the wall cloud, but you can’t argue with a developing tornado. With the updraft approaching to within a couple hundred yards of us, Bill seemed intent on analyzing why the storm was acting so peculiarly, while I favored beating a hasty retreat and working out the behavioral aspects of storm circulation from a somewhat greater distance. Storm chasing sure has its interesting moments.

No tornado materialized, the storm headed east, and we continued on with it. I noticed a couple of tornado reports from around Fairmount and Westville, but while I suppose it’s possible that there was a brief spinup or two, Bill and I never saw an actual tornado. We did witness a few times when the wall cloud began to torque  pretty intensely, and I sure wouldn’t have wanted to be directly below it.

The whitish wall cloud is half a mile from us and rotating vigorously.

The whitish wall cloud is half a mile from us and rotating vigorously.

Possibly a funnel cloud at this point.

Possibly a funnel cloud at this point.

But from the time we first intercepted it to the point where it finally began to fizzle 120 miles later west of Crawfordsville, Indiana, the storm was outflow-dominant. Never once did we enounter surface inflow, though above ground level, I’m sure inflow was strong. In Bill’s words, the circulation kept reaching toward the ground, looking for something to grab onto, but it never could manage to root and produce a tornado. If we’d had backing winds…if the helicities had been there…I’m sure the storm would have been a potent tornado breeder. It never got its act together in that regard, but I doubt the communities in its path felt terribly disappointed, and from my perspective, the storm provided an interesting chase with some very nice moments.

Last gasp: wall cloud at US 41 west of Crawfordsville, Indiana, shortly before the storm began to collapse.

Last gasp: wall cloud at US 41 west of Crawfordsville, Indiana, shortly before the storm began to collapse.

For sheer structure, the “Danville supercell” was interesting and photogenic, with some nice RFD slots wrapping in, and, toward the end of the storm’s career, with a classic, stack-of-plates mesocyclone that was as nice as anything I’ve ever seen. (Sorry, no photos–the ones I have didn’t turn out well.)

One downside to this chase–and it is a big one–is that somewhere between Homer and US 41, I lost my camcorder. It wasn’t a pricey camcorder; it was a used Sony that I bought from my friend and fellow storm chaser Kurt Hulst. But it has done me good service over the past year, and I hate to think that it is presently sitting out there by the side of some Illinois backroad. What’s even worse is, my video of this chase is in it.

The drive back to Grand Rapids was a long one. I arrived at my apartment around 2:30 a.m. and collapsed. The chase was fun and I think I needed it, but it’s good to be back home with the love of my life, Lisa, whose bright eyes and beautiful smile warm my heart wherever I travel.

Elkhart County Historical Museum Remembers the 1965 Palm Sunday Tornadoes

My friend Debbie Watters, prorieter of the 1965 Palm Sunday Tornado Memorial Park in Dunlap, Indiana, sent me the following article from the Elkhart Truth newspaper:

It’s been almost 44 years since the Palm Sunday tornado tore through Elkhart County, killing dozens and injuring hundreds. It will be the focus of a special program at a local museum.
The Elkhart County Historical Museum is organizing a remembrance of the April 11, 1965, di saster. The memorial will be from 2 to 4 p.m. April 5 at the museum, 304. W. Vistula, Bristol.
Nicholas Hoffman, director and curator of the museum, said the tornado is an important part of local history.
“It was a really big occurrence that impacted many people,” Hoffman said.
Patrick Murphy, a meteorologist from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association, will talk about how tornadoes form and the factors that led to the 1965 tornado outbreak that spawned 40 tornadoes across the Midwest and left 271 people dead.
“We’re really excited to have NOAA participating in this event with us because they’re certainly the experts on these events,” Hoffman said.
A panel of survivors of the Palm Sunday tornado will take questions after Murphy’s presentation.
The panel will include John Clark, a retired Elkhart police officer, and Paul Huffman, the retired Elkhart Truth photographer who snapped the famous photo of the twin twisters.
“[Huffman] captured the horror of that day with one photograph,” said the curator.
There will be an open microphone portion for anyone interested in talking about the disaster.
The museum will also provide table space for collectors to display items they found in the wake of the tornado.
For more information call the museum at 848-4322.
Of course I plan on attending. My interest in the Palm Sunday Tornadoes extends back to my childhood, and in recent months it has become an area of increasing research. I am particularly excited to learn that Paul Huffman–whose photograph of the twin funnels striking the Midway Trailer Court, remains one of the most dramatic, all-time classic tornado photos ever taken–will be one of the panelists. That’s just my opinion, but I think that many severe weather meteorologists, tornado historians, and storm chasers will agree. Over the years I have viewed hundreds of tornado photos. I have seen some incredible images, ranging from the sublime to the scary, but nothing quite like that old black-and-white snapped over forty years ago by a young press photographer as he stood in the inbounds with his camera just a few hundred yards from mayhem, witnessing the last moments of a community.
I hope to get a chance to talk with Mr. Huffman. I also look forward to meeting Pat Murphy, lead forecaster for the Northern Indiana NWS. He and I have connected previously concerning the Palm Sunday Tornadoes, and have made plans to get together next week Sunday, April 11–the 44th anniversary of the outbreak–to trace the paths of some of the twisters. But that’s a separate story, and while this is an area of personal fascination for me, there’s also another, parallel motive which I’m hesitant to divulge just yet.
Stay tuned, though. You’ll be reading more about the 1965 Palm Sunday Tornadoes in this blog.
And on that note, I invite you to leave a comment if you experienced the Palm Sunday Tornadoes firsthand. If you are a storm survivor, or if you possess personal, unpublished photographs or old film footage of one of the actual tornadoes, I would love to hear from you.

First Storm Chase, 2009

What a memorable way to kick off storm season 2009! Yesterday, I chased supercells in Kansas with my buddy, Bill Oosterbaan, and today we attended Tim Vasquez’s severe weather forecasting workshop in Norman, Oklahoma. I’m writing this post from a Best Western Hotel maybe a mile north of where the 1999 Moore tornado crossed I-35. All in all, not a bad past couple of days for a lad from Michigan.

Yesterday’s chase began with a visit to Picher, Oklahoma. The southern portion of this tiny town got wiped out last spring by an EF-4 tornado. Today, a year later, that desolate landscape shows scant chance of recovery. It’s a sobering place to visit.

But that’s another story for a different post. Right now, I just want to share a couple images from yesterday’s chase. The moisture was marginal, with dewpoints averaging around 55 degrees up toward the warm front north of Wichita. That’s where we headed, in search of the better helicities. A lot of folks questioned the setup, but it produced. The storm we intercepted put out four tornadoes, though those occurred before we caught up with it. We still saw some nice structure, including a nice wall cloud and a funnel. Check ’em out.

Funnel Cloud

Funnel Cloud

Nice Structure!

Nice Structure!

Severe Weather Forecasting Workshop and Southern Plains Drought

It’s Thursday, and I’m in Louisville, Kentucky, with my buddy Bill. He’s got business here, and I’m taking care of business here on my laptop, and then we head to Norman, Oklahoma, for a severe weather forecasting workshop with Tim Vasquez. At times like this, I’m grateful for the freedom and mobility that come with being a freelance writer. As long as there’s work for me to do, I can do it pretty much anywhere provided I have my laptop and Internet access.

I’ve been hoping to catch a little early-season convective excitement this Saturday. Not sure that’s going to happen, though. The wild card seems to be moisture, but capping may also be a problem. It would be a shame to make the journey to Oklahoma and not see a little decent, Great Plains weather. Of course, that’s not the focus of the trip–the forecasting workshop is–but still, a supercell or two would be nice. Unfortunately, it looks like a cold front will provide the lift that finally busts the cap, and that suggests “linear.”

Sunday is the workshop, so I don’t much care what the weather does that day. I’ll be in class.

Monday may offer another crack at things, and it may be our best opportunity. It’s too far out to say (for that matter, Saturday is still a bit too far off yet to feel either good or bad about it), but assuming that the southern Plains at least get a bit of rain to relieve their dry spell and give the ground a good soaking, moisture may not be the question mark that it is for Saturday’s setup.

Frankly, the current forecast discussion on Stormtrack is the first time I’ve given serious thought to the effect of soil conditions on convection. I had always thought of ground moisture and evapotranspiration as just enhancements to the return flow, not potential deal-breakers. To my mind, a nice, deep low pulling in rich dewpoints from the Gulf of Mexico would more than compensate for dry regional conditions. But more than one seasoned Great Plains storm chaser has looked at the current drought conditions in Texas and Oklahoma and opined skeptically about the chances for 2009 being a good chase year in the West unless the region sees some rain.

Ah, well. The season hasn’t even begun yet, so I’ll take what I can get and hope for better as we move into May and June. Right now, it’s nice to simply see the sun shine, feel fifty-degree temperatures, and know that winter is drawing to a close.

Monte Montgomery Concert Tomorrow Night

Whew, I have let waaaay too much time elapse since the last time I posted an entry in this blog. Let me mollify you with a nice, bright, sunny image from this cold, early March day. The following photo is one of a number that I took out at Pickerel Lake near Grattan Township in east-central Kent County. It’s a beautiful area, and with spring rapidly rolling in, today was a great day to capture the beauty of the icy landscape while I still can.

Pickerel Lake

Pickerel Lake

Cold as this day has been, there’s no question that warmer weather is moving in. By Thursday, temperatures here in the Grand Rapids area should be in the forties. But I won’t be here. I’ll be with my storm chasing buddy Bill down in Louisville, Kentucky, where he’ll be meeting with some of his clients while I do my own business on my laptop. Then from Louisville, we head out to Norman, Oklahoma, for an all-day severe weather forecasting workshop with Tim Vasquez on Sunday. I’m really looking forward to it!

On the way out there, I hope to catch some early season action. The GFS is calling for a low to be positioned in Colorado or somewhere out there, and with a little luck, we’ll see the right combination of moisture, lift, and kinematics to make life interesting somewhere between Louisville and Norman. Arkansas looks likely. We’ll see.

More immediately, and on the musical side of things, tomorrow night is the Monte Montgomery concert at the Intersection in downtown Grand Rapids. The concert got rescheduled from its original date last September due to illness, and now the time has arrived.

I’ll be playing with the Ed Englerth band as the opening act for Monte.  We rehearsed last night and sounded tight, and today I took my horn to the shop and got a leak tightened down, so all in all, I feel good about playing tomorrow.

If you’re in the neighborhood, come on out to the concert. Ed’s material is strong, and if you’ve never heard Monte, prepare to be stunned. The man is a brilliant guitar player, rated one of the all-time top 50 by Guitar Player magazine. The show starts at 7:00 p.m. Admission is $10 (cheap!),  and worth every penny. See my events calendar for more details.

Preparing for Storm Season 2009

Out of curiosity, I just ran the GFS down to 384 hours. The SPC has posted a light risk for parts of the South on Wednesday, but that may be just a foretaste of an upcoming active period. Did I already write about this recently? Not sure, but if so, I’m writing again.

Long-range prognostication is something like reading tea leaves, but consulting the numerical models still beats going to a groundhog for your two-week weather forecast. At around 204 hours, a nice surge of moisture appears to unlock the the Gulf of Mexico for several days, with 55 degree  dewpoints extending as far north as Missouri, southern Illinois, and Indiana.

Am I hanging my hat on this? Heck no. I’m just thinking, quite wistfully, how nice it would be if what I just saw bore some resemblance to how things actually play out nine days hence. In February, one dreams if he’s a northerner and shudders if he’s a resident of Dixie Alley.

I’m anxious to to see some great storms this year. Last year was fabulous, but I blew some great photo ops because I didn’t know how to use my camera. This year I think I’ve overcome that concern. Now if only the weather and my finances will cooperate.

Meanwhile, I’ve decided to make the best of the holding pattern by signing up for Tim Vasquez’s severe weather forecasting class. It’s a small group setting that will be held on Sunday, March 8, in Norman, Oklahoma. I just shelled out my hundred bucks today and am really looking forward to attending this thing. My chase partner, Bill Oosterbaan, will be joining me. This ought to be a perfect way to really tighten down our forecasting skills for storm chasing season 2009 by learning from one of the foremost gurus of the field. I own nearly all of Tim’s books, and also his Forecast Laboratory software. It’ll be cool to finally pick his brain for eight hours in a focused, fairly personal setting.

More immediately, though, this evening the sun set at 6:17 here in Caledonia, and tomorrow the temperature is supposed to spike to a sweltering 36 degrees. I’ll take that and like it for now. It presages good things to come.