Over rated?

I'm still sticking to my guns 8-10" is what I'm calling for... I think this storm is over rated and who know's I can be wrong but hey if I'm right then what can I say but "I'm awesome" HAHA HAHA Just Kidding!!!

Christmas Week

OK, still pretty early to tell but geesh the NWS is really blowing this out of proportion I think. Here is the latest graphic that they have.

FCST Christmas Week 2009

First to start out there are going to be 2 systems moving in, one tonight through tomorrow morning and Wednesday through Christmas day depending on frontal speeds this system could linger until Saturday AM but it's a ways off so a little too early to tell right now.

System#1

This one is looking like it's going to dump a max of 3" on the area, NW is going to be hit the hardest with the max of 3" and we are looking for 1" tops in RV. Overall a rather fast moving system but it's got to get out of the way for the new system coming in on Wednesday. Here is the lifted moisture that is possible precip.

System#2

I'm planning on elaborating more on this either tomorrow afternoon or Wed. AM, it depends how my schedule works out. For the most part over the plains we are looking for heavy precip, 8-12" possible with strong winds to bring it to a blizzard condition.

Down south there is a slight chance of SVR WX Eastern TX, Western AK & LA. here is a graphic to show dew points & mixing winds. This doesn't have a huge CAPE rating but it looks as though this should be enough to have some super cellular storms along with a couple smaller tornado's that could be reported.

FCST Dec 14-19, 2009

Looks like next week is going to be very similar to last week but without the heavy moisture in the air like Tuesday when the blizzard struck. There is however a slight chance of snow Sunday night into Monday AM. This will be a 1/2" possible tops, there just isn't enough mixing of moist air coming in from the gulf, this is shown in detail with the pics below. What's happening is we have 120Kts high altitude wind blowing in from the Rocky's but what would cause a good storm is is we had 30-50Kt lowwinds coming in from the gulf. This would provide just enough lift to give us precipitable moisture. This is OK since it's winter it's not that much fun to scoop snow anyways. So I like being able to forecast easy ones like this.

I'm sure I will update closer to the end of next week as it looks like there maybe something to write about for Christmas Week! Pretty early to tell for sure right now.

Fireworks

I know it's not storm chasing or forecasting but here are some pics of a fireworks display in Rock Valley that we (the FD) had to supervise

I always enjoy watching the fireworks so close, it's really amazing to watch when you're right under them.

8-19-09 SVR T-Storm Event

First off I knew I wasn't going to want to drive a ton because the set up wasn't the best so I figured that I will conserve a little gas until the next big event.

Well this storm started to take shape around Parker SD and looked as though it was heading straight E, as soon as it hit Harrisburg, SD it changed to a SE course looking to blow right over RV. At 4:45 I took off to sit 6mi W of RV and this is what I saw

There was quite a bit of scud rotating around that wanted to form, it didn't take long and it all formed into a non rotating wall cloud, looked pretty impressive for a short while.

This is where the storm picked up speed and really started to form into a gust front storm with a nice hail shaft following.

Rardy and I chased it all the way to Alton, IA where it died. It was over all a good chase that had a lot of horizontal rotation on the gust front and looks as if it was going to produce a tornado a couple of times. Looks like the next week is going to be pretty boring so I don't think I'll be posting anything anytime very soon.

FCST 8-19-09

There looks to be a pretty decent chance of svr wx tomorrow afternoon/night. There is a low cold front moving in combined with 500mb moisture flowing in @ 65kts. They are expected to meet over NW IA :) right along the hwy 18 line :) Hopefully there is something worth while writing about tomorrow, I will post more as the system unfolds.

8-6-09

Tonight there is a chance for large hail for all of SD and western IA, these hail stones can get up to the size of golfballs. Reminder if you get stuck in a hail storm don't go outside, golfball size hail can fall at a speed of 171mph. The terminal velocity of this size hail stone can cause severe concussions so just stay where you're at and don't go outside unless you have a helmet but even that expect some bruised shoulders!

Here is the outlook for hail today.

At least in western IA there isn't enough instability in the air to contain much of a tornado threat but if you're in Sturgis for bikeweek you might want to pay pretty good attention to the skies because the CAPE if off the charts in that region for this afternoon.

Overall we are in for a good night of lightning photo ops and some hail probabilities. I'm planning on staying local to RV tonight so I will mainly be focusing on lightning photos tonight and measuring wind velocities. Good luck to everyone out today.

Summer Fun

Well it's been 2 months since my last post and I thought I should fill you in on my current activities in the field of chasing and forecasting. I am still staying very current with my forecasting but I haven't been able to chase as much as I was hoping this spring mainly because there just wasn't crap worth driving for. I have done quite a few smaller "backyard" chases around NW IA and SW MN. Overall these have been a ton of fun and have even gotten pretty intense. I'll give a breef outline of my more memorable chases this summer starting with May 31, 2009


May 31, 2009
Jill (my wife) and I were sitting at my parents having a couple of drinks watching this storm develop and come our way. Around 9:30 the lightning really started up so Jill and I decided to go get some photo ops. Here they are, sorry for not knowing our cameras settings and not knowing that they had the options they had but here they are.

June 18, 2009

All the convective outlooks looked to have moderate warnings for N central IA and as soon as work was over a group of us crazy asses decided to take off to chase. We took off from Sioux Center right at 6:00pm headed E at a good pace, got to Estherville IA and re-grouped, looked at the radar and nothing was firing. Looked at sat. images still nothing the only thing that would be fun was way up by Brookings, SD moving E NE at 15mph so we knew we could get up towards Marshall, MN in time (1 3/4 hrs) so we did. We put on 350mi. and when we got just south of Marshall we stopped for some pictures and as soon as it hit Buffalo Ridge the storm died. Nothing, not even lightning wanted to fire so we drove 350 mi. 7 1/2 hrs in a vehicle for 10 min. of photo taking. Still no regrets we still made it a blast.

June 21, 2009 (Fathers Day)

I just want to say sorry to my Dad for being late to his supper but this thing was crazy. 4:10PM I get paged out on the Fire Dept. saying we need to go out spotting. I just looked at the radar about 45min. before that and I had ruled out the thought of going out because it just didn't look like it could possibly strengthen but I WAS WRONG!!! So I get in my truck start heading out, booting my computer, getting in online, firing up the cameras, I look straight north of RV, what do you know but a rotating wall cloud!!! It was really close to putting something down a couple times but it just didn't want to. So I called a couple people, got them on the road to assist chasing it lasted to Boyden and then it was done. The rain choked it off.

July 7, 2009
I knew that this was going to be a good night to chase but I was busy until 7:00 PM so I got started late but still ended up on some great structure in Le Mars, IA.

August 2, 2009

Mainly lightning with this storm but there were 70+mph winds that were recorded in Rock Valley along the gust front. I ended up getting trapped in the front and almost went in the ditch but I recovered. This was a great lightning op. storm so thats exactly what we did! BTW: we are getting better with our cameras and always learning what settings we should use to get those harder to capture photos.

P.S. Credits go out to Brent Koops for the Marshall, MN picture. I would also like to say thanks to the team so far this year, we have done a great job with not much to work with.

Our chase group consists of Brent Koops, Luke Kroese, Greg Rardin, Pete De Boer, Jill and myself. Thanks again guys.

Not going to hold my breath!!!

The trough looks pretty shallow out to the west if it is even starting to build. The outlook looks to be Sunday afternoon-evening for a chance at severe storms in our area. I think that the chance will be further east of us but there might just be something chaseable that comes out of this. If anything there will be some good cloud to ground lightning. More to come as this system unfolds

ZZZZZZZZZZZZ...............

I'm hoping by early next week we can finally have something to maybe look forward to. This has been a fairly common picture of May that I just don't like to see. There hopefully will be a trough building in the west coast come the end of May beginning of June that could finally spark the severe weather season. Don't get me wrong, there has been a few severe storms in the US and even tornados but this year they are so wide spread and all over the place. Normally by this time in the year we have quite a few severe warned storms roll over our area and a couple tornados but this year has been 0/ZERO.

Textbook

Check out these little towers just starting to develop, this is textbook. This is right over Omaha and Mo Valley

The coolest thing is to watch the wind shear from the N hit the shear from the S and start to form the towers.

Faster than Expected

It looks like the cold front moving in from the NW moved faster than expected last night pretty much knocking any chances of severe storms today and tonight out of the question for our little region. 100 miles south of us and there will be a better chance of running into something. Overall it's dissapointing but only to be expected this early in the year for this far North.

Finally Something Worth While to Write About!!!

Late Friday afternoon through Friday Night we are looking for some good activity in western IA. To start out with look at SPC's probability outlook, we are just on the line of 30% for tornadic activity in NW IA where as 100 miles south is right in the middle of it.

Next look at the wind shear, at the surface we have great southerly winds blowing in moisture from the gulf intesecting with colder Canadian air running from Duluth MN all the way down to Dodge City KS area. This alone is cause for some pretty good instability.

Then you look at the mid level winds they are blowing at 35Kts W SW bringing in Pacific moisture to add to the Cape. The combination of N cold air S humid air and W SW partially humid air will really light up the sky.

The next thing we should look at is the mixing ratio which is once again centered right over our area and the Cape which is just over extending our area.

This setup looks to be almost a fool proof setup for our area. We should be looking at a great possibility of some supercells actually getting up into this region and with all this instability there will be a high chance of tornadic supercells. Another thing is if these fire during the daylight there will be a pretty good chance to see some great RFD cuts along wall clouds because of the closeness of all the cool air. Tomorrow should be a pretty exciting day that really fires up some activity that we have been long waiting for.

Blah!!!

April is looking to be pretty lame around here with anything that does come our way won't be worth chasing until at least the end of April if we are lucky. The moisture barrier has froze in KS and isn't allowing us sufficient moisture or humidity to get us fired up into spring weather patterns, hence the cold and dry air that has granted us with its presence. I have a feeling the blog will be pretty boring until then so I probably won't post until something changes. We are however supposed to get some Thunderstorms at the end of this week but nothing that will be worth waisting gas on. Here is what I am talking about when I say the moisture barrier has froze in KS. So until we blog again, happy mild weather:(

Worse than expected

Well the NWS took it a step beyond what I thought would happen but UGH... if they are right... I'm going to be pissed!!!

Wet Wet Wet

Well as I said in the previous post we had a chance for rain and snow for this weekend but it is definitely looking like we are going to be getting more than we bargained for.

We are getting slammed with moisture from the SW and then just to our east cold dry air is going to be taking over and creating enough instability to drop in temp and moisturize (for lack of a better word) the cool air, thus creating a ton of cold type precipitation.

This is showing the mixing ratio of mid level winds at 11:00 am Sat. Right over top of our area.

This is showing the precipitible water at 11:00 am Sat. once again right over top of us.

This is showing mid level wind shear blowing the moisture in from the SW at 11:00 am Sat.

Finally this is what is going to suck, here is the precip. outlook for us, pretty much 8-10 in. of the wet wet heavy snow.

Irritated, lame, boring, and wet

Doesn't really make sense does it? Oh well doesn't really matter.

This past week really sucked around here for weather, cold & wet days then the next day it's in the 50's then next thing it's cold and wet again. UGH it's spring already give me something to chase!!!

The outlook for the next week is where the irritated comes into play, nothing besides a chance of snow and rain again for this weekend.

I'm not near good enough at forcasting to say but maybe by the end of next week around the 11th we might, just might have something to look forward to.

Good oulook for our area today!!!

All the models suggest a little west of here but still for it being this early in the year this is very exciting to be this close to severe weather. We have a pretty good possiblity of seeing some strong thunderstorms over NW IA this late afternoon/evening. This trough is slamming moisture from the gulf right into us and creating instability with the cold trough being brought in from the rockies. We will likely have tornado watches this afternoon after 4:00 pm.

Now with all this said for NW IA I would really love to be able to take off to the Withita/OKC area today but that's just not possible since I got really ill a couple weeks ago I have to concerve my PTO otherwise it just might be a little hard to pay some bills with this great economy.

Check this probibility outlook out, it's pretty sweet. I'm sure my buddy Brent is really itching to take a trip to his home state today to get some great photo op's. All in all though we have a pretty great chance of having some low topped supercells coming our way so it could really be alot of fun around here too. Plus it's cheaper to do it that way.

Moday through Tuesday next week !!!

The forecast models are looking rather promising to have some thunderstorms from Monday -Tuesday next week. There is going to be a strong upper level trough that is pulling into the central planes during the day Monday along with a deep surface low pressure system in the same region.

This could really spark up some great weather events throughout late afternoon Monday through Tuesday (Tuesday will be more toward our area). I will have more to come later.

Warm up, mild week !

Well as we approach this week we are looking for a pretty mild run of weather. We are getting pounded by a warm front that is keeping us around 20 degrees above normal today and tomorrow. Tomorrow night there will be a cold front rolling over but don't expect it to get to cold because Wednesday is still supposed to be up in the low 50's the coldest day this whole week is looking to be Thursday with the high at 49! All this mild weather this week could easily stir up some fun "chasable" weather by early next week. Hopefully the sheer, cape and overall instability will fall into place so I don't have to drive to terribly far to get a glimpse of some severe weather. It looks like a great week to get off our butts and get some outdoors stuff caught up. About the most exciting weather (I guess you could call it weather) event that we have to look forward to is a red flag warning. I'm a firefighter so I find that exciting! I will post later on this week with some predictions about early next week.

Artic Blast, Warm IL, Causing Instabiliy

Well as there is an artic blast blowing by just to our N NE it is helping fuel some instability in IL and MO. This afternoon looks like it could be an interesting day, I would say hail and high winds would be the mail concern but there could be just enough fuel to drive some tornados down. I notice TVN chaser Andrew Pritchard is in central IL as we speak getting read for a chase. I wish him the best of luck and hope he gets some footage to brag about! Below is a surface map that is showing the artic blast driving some cold dry air right into the warm front located right on top of IL, when these two meet it could spark some interesting sights.
As for the rest of the week in NW IA, it looks pretty calm. We are going to have a warm front push N and give us some more pleasent weather starting Thursday night into Friday. Until then this artic blast will cause us to be in the teens tomorrow

Snow, Ice, Rain!!!

Well my rookie instincts were pretty close other than the fact that I was thinking it could be Thursday before it get's crappy but it's looking like late tonight the weather will be rolling in. NWS in Sioux Falls is showing some pretty good predictions, after looking at the surface maps they are right on what I would say too.

As this system rolls off tomorrow afternoon to the East it's going to cause some slight instablilty to the south of the system causing a 15% svr outlook for tomorrow around the Mississippi river basin. There are going to be 80 knot high level winds blowing in from the rockies along with 35-40 knot winds blowing in from the gulf so we will have to see if there is any moisture thrown in later on today. We'll see if I can get to another post tonight or not.