mnchaserguy

I think most chasers (myself included) understand that things need to be taken with a grain of salt at this point. .

This is about as nice of a forecast sounding as you can get. What can go wrong. .

Saturday is finally within range of the NAM and it is throwing out some big parameters across KS/OK. The dry line and warm front both look like good options. As long as things don’t go early, it could be a pretty big day. My biggest concern is storm motion. Forecast soundings showing bunkers right storm speeds at 40+ knots. That’ll make chasing difficult if those are accurate. .

I’ll be coming from Minneapolis on Friday so my plan is to chase the warm front Friday afternoon in Iowa. Now that it’s finally in range on the nam, central/southern IA looks to be where the warm front will set up Friday afternoon. Taken verbatim, the 12 nam shows an MCS developing across central Iowa with a tail end Charlie moving through a pretty good parameter space. That being said, this is only one solution several days out so it’s hard to know exactly what to expect right now. At this point, all I can plan on is leaving Minneapolis by 11:00 am and driving south to try to be in position for the afternoon. Friday could be impacted by convection from the night before, but right now Thursday looks to remain mostly capped. Even with parameters and moisture really ramping up after dark on Thursday night, most models look like they remain dry. I would think this would be a good thing for Friday so we don’t risk mid day convection ruining the atmosphere. Saturday looks like a pretty solid day in the central plains. Dryline with deeper moisture in the warm sector with a strong jet streak overhead should lead to a good set up. Problem I see is some of the best parameters stay way south in southern OK, likely due to some early convection firing farther north. My current plan is to try to make it to KC on Friday night and head south to chase the dryline Saturday afternoon, possibly as far south as southwest OK if I have to. Was hoping to chase Sunday but it looks like the system might be too far east for my liking by Sunday. Could be some potential right up next to the center of the low, similar to what happened in northwest IA last week. That would probably be a really conditional threat if anything. .

It’s a little outside of the geography of this sub but I am planning on chasing Friday and Saturday. Friday in Iowa along the warm front and Saturday farther southwest along the dryline in Kansas or maybe Oklahoma. Been a long time since I’ve done a little multi day chase so I am pretty pumped about this weekend. .

Made the last second decision to play northwest IA thanks to the dry slot cleaning out just enough to get things going. I should have left the house an hour earlier. Missed the tors but still saw a lot of good rotation and motion. I’m really surprised this thing didn’t produce while I was on it. The 0-3km CAPE must’ve been zapped just enough to keep the lowest levels of the atmosphere from being able to finish it off. Oh well. Solid first chase of the season. .

I wouldn’t call it a cap bust. Early precip is screwing up the heating and probably leading to some subsidence as well. Temps don’t rebound out of the 60s behind that initial band. .

I want to chase tomorrow but it looks really messy. An initial band of severe storms comes through Iowa early afternoon and mixes up the environment. Highly doubt anything substantial happens after that initial band comes through, unless you get way down to southeast IA or northern MO, which is out of range for me on a Tuesday. Hoping the 0z CAMs look more promising for the later afternoon. The early band may still produce a couple tors but it’ll be damn near impossible to know where or when to be on it to have a chance seeing anything. .

Surprise snow here in MSP this morning. Roads are just wet but I bet we will pick up a quick inch in the grass. It’s coming down about as hard as it has all winter. .

Allegedly we got 10” here in Blaine Sunday night/Monday morning. Combined with the 4” we got last Thursday and the 4-6” we will have by the end of today, we will be close to 20” here in the last five or six days. .

Yep. Looks like MSP is in the sweet spot. The area of snow is just rotating right over us. The Duluth radar looks crazy too. North Shore is getting dumped on again today. Already well over a foot in Duluth and Two Harbors. .

It is snowing very hard at my house. Not very often we get all snow in 40-50 dbz returns around here. .

That band moving up from the south is no joke. Should be fun to watch it when it gets here. It had some thundersnow for a while down by Rochester. .

Can confirm from the middle of that MD that it is snowing pretty hard. .

Snowing pretty good here at the National Sports Center on the north side of MSP. .