Today could be a big day in Tornado Alley. All the right ingredients seem to be coming together for quiet a severe weather event in Central Kansas this afternoon. Ample instability, upper-level winds from the southwest, surface east winds, and dew points possibly getting into the mid 60's this afternoon will fuel this event, which will likely produce the discrete or isolated supercell thunderstorms that we've been longing to chase all week. The fly in the ointment this morning is that there is a rather large cloud shield over the state that needs to move northeast before anything can happen. The sooner this happens, the better. Also, there's a dry slot aloft in the Oklahoma Panhandle that needs to make it here by this afternoon (that shouldn't be too much of an issue). If either of these things fail to happen, we could be stuck with a situation like yesterday where no storms form.
The Storm Prediction Center has issued a Slight Risk for Central Kansas this afternoon with a 10% hatched tornado risk. This is the biggest tornado risk that they've issued since I've been in Tornado Alley these two weeks so far. Here's an interesting tidbit from the SPC's discussion this morning:
A FEW DISCRETE SUPERCELLS APPEAR LIKELY WITH VERY LARGE HAIL AND TORNADOES POSSIBLE. ACTIVITY SHOULD DEVELOP NORTH-NORTHEASTWARD INTO CENTRAL KS DURING THE EVENING WITH A CONTINUED RISK OF SEVERE STORMS. STRENGTHENING LOW LEVEL WIND FIELDS DURING THE EARLY EVENING COULD RESULT IN A STRONG TORNADO OR TWO IN THIS AREA.
Pretty strong wording, no? Let's hope it all pans out for our sake and for all the other chasers out there who are starving for some activity.
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