ORH_wxman Posted August 3, 2012 Share Posted August 3, 2012 Of course, on the flip side to that, it's not like these numbers/indices are based on imaginary things. They are based on tangible things that affect the atmosphere. I definitely agree with both of you that the basics need to be addressed first before getting into specifics, e.g. indices; but, we should also remember that they are based on tangible atmospheric elements. For SNE, I've viewed most threats through the idea that if we are trying to overcome a major obstacle or two, then its almost a guarantee we will not get a widspread high end severe wx outbreak here. Now obviously that doesn't really help if we are trying to forecast for isolated or widely scattered severe wx (or marginal severe)...but in the case of the last threat, I think it was looking pretty bleak by that morning when it was becoming obvious we'd struggle to heat the surface with solid cloud cover in addition to pretty mediocre (or worse) ML lapse rates...thats when it was time to pull the plug on a huge widespread outbreak for W SNE. Admittedly its difficult to do that when the previous SPC outlook was honking pretty good and the radar looks nice in NW PA/far W NY. Smaller pockets of severe wx (esp low end severe wx) are much more difficult to decipher since so much depends on nuances that are within the error bars for even a 3 hour NWP forecast. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CoastalWx Posted August 3, 2012 Share Posted August 3, 2012 Of course, on the flip side to that, it's not like these numbers/indices are based on imaginary things. They are based on tangible things that affect the atmosphere. I definitely agree with both of you that the basics need to be addressed first before getting into specifics, e.g. indices; but, we should also remember that they are based on tangible atmospheric elements. Many times there are indices that balance each other out. For instance CAPE may look decent, but lapse rates may suck or the atmospheric column is rather dry above the boundary layer. So it's not like we just throw out indices...but it's important not to get wrapped up in it. Or even better...like art..meteorology requires a fine blend of certain elements and it's important to know how to blend these things. That's something nobody is perfect in, but we can improve. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NorEaster27 Posted August 3, 2012 Share Posted August 3, 2012 Sunday looks run of the mill to me. No EML, a good deal of morning convective issues, modest shear (SREF is just below 30 kt) and modest instability. agreed, each run of the NAM is becoming less and less impressive. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StormDude81 Posted August 3, 2012 Share Posted August 3, 2012 This isn't going to be a big new england event, from East OH to PA to Central NY Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CT Rain Posted August 3, 2012 Share Posted August 3, 2012 agreed, each run of the NAM is becoming less and less impressive. lol There could be a tornado down the street from you and you'd say it was unimpressive. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
N. OF PIKE Posted August 3, 2012 Share Posted August 3, 2012 Ryan and his rising heights caution flags ftw so far today Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CoastalWx Posted August 3, 2012 Share Posted August 3, 2012 lol There could be a tornado down the street from you and you'd say it was unimpressive. Yeah it seems like many are looking for EMLs and widespread siggy severe. I guess we raised the bar for some reason. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CoastalWx Posted August 3, 2012 Share Posted August 3, 2012 Ryan and his rising heights caution flags ftw so far today Yeah one of a few reasons I think for nothing forming. Not even a cell. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
andyhb Posted August 4, 2012 Share Posted August 4, 2012 lol There could be a tornado down the street from you and you'd say it was unimpressive. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CoastalWx Posted August 4, 2012 Share Posted August 4, 2012 Heights do rise today which is a negative, but a couple of things look better than yesterday. Possibly very weak contribution from H2 jet streak and moisture in the column is better this morning than yesterday. WF may focus storms along interior..possibly further east later in the day, but coverage may be sct at best. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CoastalWx Posted August 4, 2012 Share Posted August 4, 2012 Looking at the 12z soundings, you can see pockets of dry air on OKX and CHH soundings. Albany has best looking sounding and probably why chance of storms is best near there and into SW NH. Might see some slow movers with heavy rain in nrn berks near MPM?? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CT Rain Posted August 4, 2012 Share Posted August 4, 2012 12z soundings are on 'roids today. Wow. I think we will see some good storms today. CAPE is more impressive and CINH appears to be a bit weaker. Less cirrus around should allow us to get a bit warmer than yesterday. Heights rise weakly but not as significantly as Friday. 700mb temps only about +7 or so. Not bad. I like the Litchfield Hills/Berks maybe ORH hills/Monadnocks today. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CoastalWx Posted August 4, 2012 Share Posted August 4, 2012 12z soundings are on 'roids today. Wow. I think we will see some good storms today. CAPE is more impressive and CINH appears to be a bit weaker. Less cirrus around should allow us to get a bit warmer than yesterday. Heights rise weakly but not as significantly as Friday. 700mb temps only about +7 or so. Not bad. I like the Litchfield Hills/Berks maybe ORH hills/Monadnocks today. Albany sounding was quite impressive. I like those areas you outlined. OKX was pretty unstable, but funny dry layers too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
weatherwiz Posted August 4, 2012 Share Posted August 4, 2012 Not too often you see these instability numbers we have in place, let alone this early in the day. Unfortunately though heights have been slightly rising and 500mb temps have actually warmed some. We'll see if we are able to generate something today. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CT Rain Posted August 4, 2012 Share Posted August 4, 2012 Not too often you see these instability numbers we have in place, let alone this early in the day. Unfortunately though heights have been slightly rising and 500mb temps have actually warmed some. We'll see if we are able to generate something today. I do like that 700mb temps are only around +7 or so. That's not awful. Heights seem to level out later today it seems so we may be able to fire off some storms. I'm sort of intrigued with tomorrow... especially for NW CT/Berkshires/Albany area. Looks like we destabilize a good bit and may have the prefrontal trough set stuff off. Post 21z we have a nice LLJ in place and while deep layer shear is meh we may be able to get some low level mesocyclones given the 0-3km horizontal vorticity in place. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
weatherwiz Posted August 4, 2012 Share Posted August 4, 2012 I do like that 700mb temps are only around +7 or so. That's not awful. Heights seem to level out later today it seems so we may be able to fire off some storms. I'm sort of intrigued with tomorrow... especially for NW CT/Berkshires/Albany area. Looks like we destabilize a good bit and may have the prefrontal trough set stuff off. Post 21z we have a nice LLJ in place and while deep layer shear is meh we may be able to get some low level mesocyclones given the 0-3km horizontal vorticity in place. Yeah those 700mb temps could be much worse but with 500mb temps which are around -10C though theose warmer 700mb temps are yielding to much steeper mid-level lapse rates. CIN looks to be less of an issue today with deeper moisture and Ncapes of 0.25 suggest we have a nice fat cape profile in place. LFC height isn't as bad as yesterday either so that's at least good and the KI is into the lower 30's. If we do see storms pop I think it would be later in the afternoon, and we're definitely going to need orographic enhancement and sea-breeze enhancement I think. If we can get storms to pop though they will have tons of energy to work with. I also like how there is some weak upper level divergence in place. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CT Rain Posted August 4, 2012 Share Posted August 4, 2012 First shower of the day just west of ORH near Warren, MA. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
weatherwiz Posted August 4, 2012 Share Posted August 4, 2012 It's going to be quite difficult to get organized significant severe weather tomorrow. Those mid-level wind fields are garbage. There is some decent directional shear though and with increasing llvl wind fields helicity will boost but storm organization is going to be a difficult task, especially if we're only seeing around 1000-1500 J/KG of Cape. Maybe we can see some severe tomorrow night though as that potent trough pushes east...very good dynamics associated with it...just a matter of if we can stay unstable through the night. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CT Rain Posted August 4, 2012 Share Posted August 4, 2012 It's going to be quite difficult to get organized significant severe weather tomorrow. Those mid-level wind fields are garbage. There is some decent directional shear though and with increasing llvl wind fields helicity will boost but storm organization is going to be a difficult task, especially if we're only seeing around 1000-1500 J/KG of Cape. Maybe we can see some severe tomorrow night though as that potent trough pushes east...very good dynamics associated with it...just a matter of if we can stay unstable through the night. mid level lapse rates are also garbage tomorrow. We'll see what develop... I wouldn't count it out yet especially given nice LLJ that develops. Especially western areas. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CoastalWx Posted August 4, 2012 Share Posted August 4, 2012 Something popping right over the city now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CT Rain Posted August 4, 2012 Share Posted August 4, 2012 Fun looking Cu field. Tiny (width-wise) towers going up. Mid level dry air and lack of a focusing mechanism preventing these from taking off. In the hills things are getting going a bit better. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CoastalWx Posted August 4, 2012 Share Posted August 4, 2012 Fun looking Cu field. Tiny (width-wise) towers going up. Mid level dry air and lack of a focusing mechanism preventing these from taking off. In the hills things are getting going a bit better. What do you think Kevin's tainted Dew sensor reads? 84?? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CT Rain Posted August 4, 2012 Share Posted August 4, 2012 What do you think Kevin's tainted Dew sensor reads? 84?? There's a downpour of condensation coming off that thing at the moment. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CoastalWx Posted August 4, 2012 Share Posted August 4, 2012 Shwrs seem struggling a bit with some mid level dry air. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Damage In Tolland Posted August 4, 2012 Share Posted August 4, 2012 There's not going to be many storms today. Driving you can just see CU struggling. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CoastalWx Posted August 4, 2012 Share Posted August 4, 2012 These storms may be the classic localized Berkshire flooding ones that cut power and cable to remote places like Pete's house. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CT Rain Posted August 4, 2012 Share Posted August 4, 2012 There's not going to be many storms today. Driving you can just see CU struggling. No surprise. Didn't you expect widespread severe today? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
H2Otown_WX Posted August 4, 2012 Share Posted August 4, 2012 mid level lapse rates are also garbage tomorrow. We'll see what develop... I wouldn't count it out yet especially given nice LLJ that develops. Especially western areas. Doesn't it look like what showers do develop run way out ahead of the good upper-level dynamics tomorrow? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CT Rain Posted August 4, 2012 Share Posted August 4, 2012 Doesn't it look like what showers do develop run way out ahead of the good upper-level dynamics tomorrow? Not really. Heights fall all afternoon/evening with weak synoptic ascent so that's not really the issue. The bigger issues is mid tropospheric winds that are meh and garbage mid level lapse rates. The latter being the most detrimental to the svr threat IMO. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
weatherwiz Posted August 4, 2012 Share Posted August 4, 2012 mid level lapse rates are also garbage tomorrow. We'll see what develop... I wouldn't count it out yet especially given nice LLJ that develops. Especially western areas. Yeah was just looking at tomorrow more closely as I haven't had time to but tomorrow looks pretty meh. The only thing going for tomorrow will be strong forcing/lift so we'll see convection but I think severe is pretty isolated and on the marginal side. Instability looks to be an issue further west as well where shear is a bit stronger and I just don't see enough to warrant any threat for a tornado...not with those garbage mid-level wind fields. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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