Today's tornadoes & the setup...updated

re: Western Kansas tornadoes and the set-up

bewild79 — Fri, 23 May 2008 01:32:39 GMT

I am supposed to be driving down to Lebanon tomorrow evening, do you think we will run into any rain between here and there from say 5pm - 9pm?

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It looks like a very slight chance.

Gary

re: Western Kansas tornadoes and the set-up

Roberto — Fri, 23 May 2008 01:36:19 GMT

Lots of tornado reports in western Kansas. SE Kiowa County is under a tornado warning, but Greensburg is just outside of the polygon warning. I guess the dryline will fall apart before it reaches us, which is good, but we need rain!

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Andrew_Stafford — Fri, 23 May 2008 01:44:45 GMT

Wow! I think I'm going to have to get the $250 in 1-2 days! (I wish)

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Andrew_Stafford — Fri, 23 May 2008 01:46:38 GMT

Hope you do get video in time! I want to see it, and imagine I was there! :)

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Andrew_Stafford — Fri, 23 May 2008 01:52:56 GMT

I think Me and Dad this weekend are going storm chasing by ourselves with a weather radio, a storm spotters guide, and our eyes!! I'll save up to get the equipment,but this year I still plan to see my 1st tornado. If my dad will do it...

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bewild79 — Fri, 23 May 2008 01:56:38 GMT

Thanks Gary! I have one more question though, when I first started looking at this blog some months ago, I heard mention of the bloggers convention. Will there be another one? It would be nice to put some faces to these wonderful people in here! :)

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Yes, we will be thinking seriously about putting one together sometime soon.

Gary

re: Western Kansas tornadoes and the set-up

5kckmartins — Fri, 23 May 2008 01:59:09 GMT

andrew
if you go PLEASE be very careful...

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5kckmartins — Fri, 23 May 2008 02:03:20 GMT

Anyone think that these storms could actually hold together and make it in here tonight?

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Turd Fergenson — Fri, 23 May 2008 02:14:11 GMT

I dont know. I think the Dryline will fall apart around 10:00 and the cells will be gone about 10:30

re: Today's tornadoes & the setup...updated

LVStormSpotter — Fri, 23 May 2008 02:28:34 GMT

Thunderstorms developing in North Central and Southeastern KS, may need to keep an eye on these.

Any chance of severe weather tomorrow or Saturday around here?
NOAA has us in a risk for at least 4 days.

re: Today's tornadoes & the setup...updated

Andrew_Stafford — Fri, 23 May 2008 02:28:36 GMT

Tornado Watch Number 339

Effective Until: May 23 5:00 AM CDT

Kansas Counties Included Are:
Barber, Barton, Butler, Chase, Chautauqua, Clark, Clay, Cloud, Comanche
Cowley, Dickinson, Edwards, Elk, Ellis, Ellsworth, Ford, Geary, Greenwood
Harper, Harvey, Hodgeman, Jewell, Kingman, Kiowa, Lane, Lincoln, McPherson
Marion, Mitchell, Morris, Ness, Osborne, Ottawa, Pawnee, Phillips, Pratt
Reno, Republic, Rice, Riley, Rooks, Rush, Russell, Saline, Sedgwick
Smith, Stafford, Sumner, Trego, Washington

Nebraska Counties Included Are:
Adams, Buffalo, Clay, Dawson, Fillmore, Franklin, Furnas, Gosper, Hall
Hamilton, Harlan, Kearney, Nuckolls, Phelps, Thayer, Webster, York

Oklahoma Counties Included Are:
Alfalfa, Blaine, Creek, Custer, Dewey, Ellis, Garfield, Grant, Harper
Kay, Kingfisher, Lincoln, Logan, Major, Noble, Osage, Pawnee, Payne
Woods, Woodward

PROBABILITY TABLE:
PROB OF 2 OR MORE TORNADOES : 40%
PROB OF 1 OR MORE STRONG /F2-F5/ TORNADOES : 20%
PROB OF 10 OR MORE SEVERE WIND EVENTS : 60%
PROB OF 1 OR MORE WIND EVENTS >= 65 KNOTS : 30%
PROB OF 10 OR MORE SEVERE HAIL EVENTS : 60%
PROB OF 1 OR MORE HAIL EVENTS >= 2 INCHES : 20%
PROB OF 6 OR MORE COMBINED SEVERE HAIL/WIND EVENTS : >95%

re: Today's tornadoes &amp; the setup...updated

DaveC — Fri, 23 May 2008 02:30:31 GMT

Did I hear you say it was Jeff Penner's 38th birthday today? Today is my 38th also..wow.. that looks funny type in..38..yuck..anyway.. Another wierd tidbit is my Last name now shares with someone else famous.. Cook..

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Happy Birthday! Yes, you and Jeff were born on the same day 38 years ago!

Gary

re: Today's tornadoes &amp; the setup...updated

Greg — Fri, 23 May 2008 02:30:54 GMT

Gary, what was the official high in Olathe today? My thermometer read 75 at about 4:30 p.m.

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It was 74 in Olathe today, 71 downtown, 70 in Lee's Summit, and 69 at KCI.

Gary

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marlina10 — Fri, 23 May 2008 02:47:03 GMT

It was amazing to see how fast those storms in western Kansas were blowing up on the radar today.

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NotesInTheMargin — Fri, 23 May 2008 03:13:10 GMT

Scott - if you're reading:

If its any consolation, it got to 73 degrees in my back yard today here in northeast KS.

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Notes,

As often happens, someone who forecasts 73 today would have been correct, but this same forecaster would never have thought that half of the viewing area would have been in the 60s. Even though it hit 73 to 74 in spots, the point and forecast of 69 was the most accurate. Would you agree?

Gary

re: Today's tornadoes &amp; the setup...updated

5kckmartins — Fri, 23 May 2008 03:23:07 GMT

Where's Sean's footage?? I wanna see..lol

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Sean did get us some pictures. We will try to post them to the blog tomorrow. He says his video is much better. The pictures are of some very low wall clouds.

Gary

re: Today's tornadoes &amp; the setup...updated

NotesInTheMargin — Fri, 23 May 2008 03:25:49 GMT

I'm sure glad you said "That's the WRONG place to be" after showing that tornado video this evening!

It still amazes me how much harm was generated by the widespread airing of the infamous Andover "turnpike tornado" video of 04/26/91 with no disclaimers of how dangerous taking shelter beneath an overpass is.

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Exactly! It appeared he was in the tornadic circulation, with the debris flying overhead, but even and EF 1 could have pulled him away as he stepped outside. The full impact just missed his house, so he was just lucky.

Gary

re: Today's tornadoes & the setup...updated

5kckmartins — Fri, 23 May 2008 03:29:16 GMT

Was he in Colorado or just in western Ks?

re: Today's tornadoes &amp; the setup...updated

maryb — Fri, 23 May 2008 03:31:44 GMT

Gary,
The clip that was just shown on the 10:00 pm newscast from the tornado in the Ft. Collins vicinity is remarkable in one particular way. Did you notice the absence of any sirens? i grew up in Denver and attended Colorado State in Ft. Collins and to my knowledge there are few, if any, warning sirens along the front range (Denver proper does have them, but the Denver metro suburb areas do not).
We should take pause and appreciate the training that is done to advise the public on the proper precautions to take in severe weather by you nad others in our area. When I moved here and heard sirens for the first time....I had no idea what they meant or what to do. That was 25 years ago. We've come a long way!
As we speak I imagine several of my red cross friends are packing to leave to go help those in need tonight in those areas.
Thanks for keeping us up to the minute and advised at Action 41.

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Wow, great point. There were no sirens and I watched his entire video.

Gary

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bewild79 — Fri, 23 May 2008 03:37:10 GMT

Gary,
I know you are going to be at the Price Chopper in Parkville on Saturday. I had been planning to go just to meet you. ( I already bought one of the weather radios ) However, my hubby had decided to drag me out of town this weekend. Is there a possiblity that you will be at any other price chopper in the northland soon? I would be so excited to meet you.

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I will catch you the next time. Have a great weekend.

Gary

re: Today's tornadoes & the setup...updated

LVStormSpotter — Fri, 23 May 2008 03:41:15 GMT

You should come to Leavenworth!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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bewild79 — Fri, 23 May 2008 03:42:03 GMT

Thanks Gary you too! :)

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NotesInTheMargin — Fri, 23 May 2008 03:45:45 GMT

Gary,

I agree entirely that your forecast nailed it. I was just writing about my own 73-degree high because I know that's what Scott had forecast...

I will concede that you're in a tough spot to forecast for a large demographic area...it'd be easy for a forecaster to claim success with any value from the upper-60s to the upper-70s today as long as they could cherry-pick the verification point after-the-fact, but I respect you sticking to verification at one point.

Even though that one point cannot possibly represent your entire demographic every day of the year, if verification is important (which I'm glad it is for you) then having a fixed point for verification is essential.

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LRCfan — Fri, 23 May 2008 03:48:03 GMT

Gary, in last night's blog I asked you if I would make it to work ok at 5 am from leavenworth to lenexa you thought I would make it and it would be close,well as soon as I got to work inside it started pouring so you did a great job on predicting that and today's forecast you nailed it that's one reason why I watch your forecasts because you are so accurate thanks again for being so accurate.

re: Today's tornadoes & the setup...updated

LRCfan — Fri, 23 May 2008 03:54:19 GMT

also looks like a few popcorn showers and thunderstorms developing in southeast ks drifting northeast,not out of the question one could stray in here early in the morning.

re: Today's tornadoes & the setup...updated

HailJonathan — Fri, 23 May 2008 03:59:45 GMT

I know that Jeri was going with Sean today I wonder if she saw that tornado too. that's an amazing tornado. do you think it's as big as the one in Greensburg?

re: Today's tornadoes & the setup...updated

Andrew_Stafford — Fri, 23 May 2008 04:10:17 GMT

I just got an email back,and yes that webcam that I posted a link to earlier this afternoon did capture the tornado in Colorado! He sent me the pictures from the 2 webcams when it hit at 11:45am MDT.

re: Today's tornadoes & the setup...updated

5kckmartins — Fri, 23 May 2008 05:08:27 GMT

I'm wondering the same thing Johnathan.

re: Today's tornadoes &amp; the setup...updated

kcwxguy — Fri, 23 May 2008 13:35:19 GMT

Sorry for the grim response yesterday, Notes...Gary set me up a bit...LOL

All said, I agree with Note's last point above. Gary, yes..you did a good job, and I would agree, it was a better forecast than what I put out there as it relates to the entire area and nailing it at KMCI.

You had the foresight to know that there would be a temp gradient seen through the metro, and it happened.

Anyway, you got it right, as I did..just you did it a bit better...so congrats.

Forgive me today as I have modelitis. Looking at the GFS, it paints a woeful picture in my opinion. Beyond this next frontal passage, it looks pretty bleak to me. Looks like summer will be here before we know it.

Sigh - hot humid days with an occasional pulse storm. Its for the birds...LOL.

I will have to keep watching, but I am getting the feeling that the summer forecast over emphasized the current LRC strength. Looks kinda warm and dry long range purely based on the models in analyzing just a few runs long term.

Convecton is always a weakness in the models, and maybe that will save the "wetter" long range forecast.

;-)

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Scott,

Thanks for the acknowledgement, although it seemed like you forced it out. LOL

The LRC and the summer forecast is another one of those experiements. No matter what the LRC is, the heights will rise and summer will move in. When we see the pattern set up for summer, in the next few weeks, it will become more obvious how the weather pattern will react. The mean "long term" longwave trough will lift north into Canada. The heights will rise across the United States. And, it will warm up. But, I still believe that when energy, in Canada, drops into the longwave position, cold fronts will make it down here. This is really the main emphasis of the summer forecast as it relates to the LRC.

And, you are just panicking right now with how the models are behaving. Just wait until next week and let's see how everything flows. There is enough energy in the pattern now where we will see another legitimate "slide by" type storm we have seen this season. It should start showing up soon.

Gary

re: Today's tornadoes &amp; the setup...updated

NotesInTheMargin — Fri, 23 May 2008 13:44:40 GMT

Wow...it appears as though today is shaping up to be another gem for chasers in western into central KS...sure wish I could be out there today. I would imagine today will come close to matching (or even surpassing) yesterday's LSR totals.

Scott - why the loss of confidence in the cycling theory and the emphasis on the models now?

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Notes,

He has severe modelitis this morning.

Gary

re: Today's tornadoes & the setup...updated

Adam Penney — Fri, 23 May 2008 15:09:05 GMT

re: Today's tornadoes & the setup...updated

Adam Penney — Fri, 23 May 2008 15:15:16 GMT

WOW.....what a day I had yesterday! I left Hays around 12:30 and shot down I-70 to Oakley,KS. From there I headed south to just north of Scott City and headed east to intercept a tornado warned storm just east of the town Dighton,KS. This storm produced a small tornado, and interestingly enough, I ran into the DOW(Doppler on Wheels, Josh Wurman's team/circus). Seriously, he has like 68 cars along with him it seems....LOL!

Anyway, this storm had the most AMAZING inflow I have ever experienced. They were howling in out of the ESE at around 40-50 mph. It was absolute incredible. I did not witness the cones yesterday either as I was too far south. However, this was easily my best chase day ever.

Stayed in Hays last night, and had our power knocked out as some pretty potent storms rumbled through between 5 and 6 this morning. Thunderstorms are now moving away and some clearing is starting to take place back to the west and southwest. If can clear out these clouds, the SPC is talking HIGH risk again, with Day 2 of the tornadofest out here.

WOW.......what a couple of days we are having here!

Adam.

P.S. Taking a look at the RUC and current spc mesoanaylsis I think just south of I70 will once again be a better play with everything moving north with time. Current temps south of I70 are in the low-middle 70s with 2000-3000j/kg present already with clearing skies. If the RUC is correct bringing in a whopping 5000-6000j/kg and 70+F tds (GBD td 68F as of 9:45am) we could see some nasty cells south of I70,

Today's tornadoes & the setup...updated

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