6/24 - 11:55pm MDT - An Unexpectedly Great Chase Today!

I can't say that I fully expected to see a great storm today. With all the intense surface heating and warm air aloft coupled with weak upper-level winds, the odds were against us. The great thing is that a storm did indeed form in this environment and it took advantage of every ounce of energy it was given from what it looked like. This storm split into a couple parts at one point and these parts were battling each other out for a while before merging back into one mean storm. This storm did have a few radar scans of rotation and we could certainly see it from the ground for a few minutes as a brief rotating wall cloud formed. A fleeting finger-like funnel danged down for a moment at the peak of the rotation, but it was gone by the time we all pointed it out and raised our cameras to capture it. Something that stuck in the back of my mind is what I posted on the Storm Chasing Adventure Tours Facebook page last night in an update:

Looks like we may be heading north from Denver in the morning! A few storms may try to develop during the afternoon and evening tomorrow where South Dakota, Nebraska, and Wyoming meet.

The intersection of South Dakota, Nebraska, and Wyoming is almost exactly where this storm formed today. Where the three white lines intersect to form a rotated "T" on the upper-right of the radar image to the left is where these state lines come together. My estimate of where we would end up was an educated guess based on data, but I really didn't expect it to come so incredibly close. The other thing about this storm is that it was the only severe storm west of the Mississippi River at the time we were chasing it during the late afternoon. Storms that developed to the south of us in Northeast Colorado just couldn't get strong because it was much too warm both at the surface and aloft.

Check out the video below to see the storm in action and then check out my Flickr or Facebook storm chasing albums for even more views of today's chase:

Tomorrow we'll be heading northward to the Dakotas or Wyoming. The Storm Prediction Center has a 5% risk for severe weather, but we'll be looking at all the data tomorrow morning to see how it all shapes up! Be sure to check back around noon tomorrow on the East Coast for a complete blog update with a discussion on where we're headed.

5/28 - 10:30am - Video from Friday's Chase

Check out this video taken on Friday just south of Hays, Kansas during our storm chase. The supercell storm we followed for a good portion of that day had quite a bit of blowing dust and even a few gustnadoes. I wish I could have captured more of the gustandoes, but they were happening very quickly and usually while we were driving. This cell ended up producing a very brief, very small string-like funnel before it dissipated.

5/26 - 11:35pm EDT - The Journey Home

Storms yesterday in Central Kansas did not produce a tornado for us. We did see a very brief string-like funnel at one point, but that was about the extent of our tornadic sights for the day. There were many tornadoes that touched down with damage reported closer sunset with these storms, but we had to make the judgement call to bug out and get back to Oklahoma City in time for people to get on their flights home before this happened. If these storms had organized a little quicker I think our chances of getting on a tornado would of been much better. The day began with a stop in Russell, Kansas where the Center for Severe Weather Research's ROTATE project happened to stop by for awhile. We were able to visit with them a bit and take some great pictures!

The chase began near La Crosse, Kansas where we followed a couple of developing supercells that had quite a bit of dust kicking out from under their ouflow. We followed a right-moving cell for quite some time, all the way to Bunker Hill, Kansas, as it cycled through weak and strong stages. This is the storm that produced the aforementioned string-like funnel cloud. Many a wall cloud came from this storm, but it was just too disorganized of a structure to get things going for a tornado. The storm that would form quite a few tornadoes (including an EF2-rated one near... you guessed it... La Crosse, Kansas) finally got its act together just to our southwest near sunset, but we had to bug out just as that was happening because we were so far away from Oklahoma City where we needed to be so that our tour guests could fly out. It's really too bad that we had to miss these tornadoes, but that's part of having to deal with the logistics of tour guests and the unpredictability of storm chasing. The storm structures were certainly spectacular though and we did see quite a few gustnadoes and dust being blow around. Video from these storms will be processed and uploaded tomorrow night when I get some time.

Yesterday and today have really been the same day for me. After we finished chasing in Central Kansas we had to make a bee line for Oklahoma City, where we made it in to town just after 3:30am this morning. My flight left at 7:35am this morning meaning I had to be at the airport around 6am, so I actually had no time to sleep in the interim. It's good to be back home in Louisville after being so tired! During these three weeks I've been with Storm Chasing Adventure Tours this month we've gone 8,383 miles across Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico, Colorado, Nebraska, South Dakota, Iowa, Missouri, and Kansas. There are so many areas that we visited this season that I've never been to before, especially near the Mexican border in Laredo, Texas and Big Bend National Park. But I'm not done yet. After a few weeks at home and abroad, I'll be back out storm chasing again for a week starting on June 23rd and going through the 30th. This is typically a time where severe weather is found up north in the Dakotas and Nebraska, so I'll be flying out to Denver in about a month's time to meet up with everyone. A photo album of this year's chase so far can be found on my Flickr and Facebook accounts along with the slideshow below:

5/25 - 11:50am CDT - A Grand Finale

Ever since earlier this week we've had our eye on today's setup in Central Kansas. The moisture return, a low developing over Southwest Kansas, and upper-level wind support all kept us coming back to look at the models to see how it was shaping up. For a while it looked like the cap, or a layer of instability-inhibiting warm air aloft, was going to surpress storm formation but now we're seeing a situation where there will be just enough break in the cap to allow for a few isolated supercell storms to form. To get surface heating today to break that cap we need to clear out the clouds across Kansas first. A push of dry air at around 10,000 feet is currently moving from Southwest Kansas to the northeast and is eating these clouds for breakfast as you see in the satellite image to the right. We expect this to keep moving throughout the day and hopefully it will clear out the clouds in time to get some serious surface heating going.

The big story here today is the moisture return. For the first time this week we are seeing a situation where dew points will surge into the mid to upper 60's. Yes! This much-needed moisture will be the fuel for storms this afternoon and should give us a much better show than the moisture-deprived low-precipitation storms we've been seeing lately. While we don't have this moisture in the area quite yet, it's streaming in like crazy right now. Strong easterly and southeasterly winds are blowing this moisture into Kansas from Missouri and Oklahoma and will continue doing so throughout the day. Having mostly easterly winds in Kansas right now is a very good thing because this is creating just about optimal low-level shear for rotating supercell storms.

Speaking of wind shear, this will create quite a bit of helicity, or a corkscrew-like rotation of air in the atmosphere. When you combine helicity with instability in an equation you get the Energy Helicity Index (EHI). As I've said before I think that indicies and parameters can be distracting since human analysis is always better than a formula, but EHI seems to be fairly reliable since it is so basic and relies on two very basic ingredients. This afternoon's EHI values in Kansas will be the highest we've seen out here this season according to the Rapid Refresh model. That's some great news for storm chasers because higher EHI values typically correlate with enhanced tornado potential.

The Storm Prediction Center has a Slight Risk for severe storms today from Iowa to the Texas Panhandle and within that a 5% tornado risk in Kansas. This is quite the change from the previously non-severe "general thunderstorm" outlooks that they had been issuing for today because of the concern that strong capping may inhibit storm development. Today is our last chase day out here for Tour 3 and my last day out here until I come back for a week in June. If we could see some good storms today that'd be a great end to the first part of my trip! Tonight once we're finished chasing we'll be traveling back to Oklahoma City where I'll fly back to Louisville from tomorrow morning.

Follow up-to-the-minute reports on our chase on my Twitter and Facebook accounts!

5/23 - 11:50am CDT - Nebraska or Colorado?

Today we're in the Cornhusker state of Nebraska in search of severe storms. Yesterday's chase in what ended up being extreme southern South Dakota was short-lived as storms that formed up that way south of Murdo, SD quickly dissipated due to a low amount of moisture and contamination of their inflow via a layer of clouds that formed to the south of them. The storm we chased had a nice structure for a few minutes and even put down a bit of a wall cloud before it fell apart.

A cold front situated across the center of Nebraska will be the focus for storms this afternoon. The band of clouds on the satellite image is roughly where the front is located right now and it will slowly sag south and east today. A low forming over Eastern Colorado/Western Kansas should help back the winds out of the east this afternoon here in portions of Nebraska and that will increase low-level wind shear needed for rotating storms as that happens. This low will also create easterly winds in Northeast Colorado, so that may be a secondary target area for today.

We're already seeing some easterly winds beginning to set up in Nebraska this morning and we'll be watching where those develop this afternoon as well. Dew points are still quite low this morning in the upper 50's, but more moisture should move in this afternoon and bump up dew points to around 60 or higher. This is still a bit low for good storms, but we'll probably be better off than we were yesterday in this regard. Dew points in Northeast Colorado won't have to be as high for good storms thanks to the elevation there.

The environment today is rather "capped" as we say, meaning there's a warm layer of air above the surface layer that's prohibiting storm development. As surface heating gets going later this afternoon and into this evening there should be enough energy for updrafts to break through this cap and form storms. This means that storms should be fairly isolated at least starting out, which is a good thing since isolated storms are more organized, more likely to produce a tornado, and easier to chase. Some of these isolated storms may become supercells, and that's exactly the thing we're after since they may produce a few tornadoes today. Storms may condense into one or more lines of storms later this evening as the cap quickly erodes after dark. The Storm Prediction Center has a Slight Risk for severe weather today from Colorado to Minnesota and that includes a couple areas of 5% tornado risk. There's a chance we may bug out on our plans for Nebraska and move to the secondary area you see there in Northeast Colorado, so stay tuned.

Follow up-to-the-minute updates today on my Twitter and Facebook accounts!

5/21 - 11:55pm MDT - Nice LP Supercell Today

Today didn't turn out to be the best chase, but we made the best of it with the sighting of a nice low-precipitation (LP) supercell near Grande, New Mexico. This formed within a line of discrete storm cells that stretched from Southeast Colorado to Central New Mexico. The formation of these cells in a line among an environment characterized by northwest wind flow at 18,000 feet (500 mb) didn't make for the best conditions for severe storms, but a few of them did reach severe limits. Besides this low-profile supercell and possibly a couple others in the same line, an "out of the blue" classic supercell formed ahead of an eastward-advancing MCS (mesoscale convective system - line of storms) just west of Amarillo before being ingested by the actual MCS. It didn't form in the expected environment for this, so we were not in position to see this short-lived storm. More photos of the LP supercell we saw today are available on my Flickr and Facebook albums.

Our tentative plan for tomorrow is to head to the Valentine, Nebraska area to intercept a severe weather threat that may manifest up there as a large-scale trough begins affecting the Northern Plains. Many would consider this an "secondary" target area since higher dew points and better surface winds will be in North Dakota, but in this case the moisture up in North Dakota will likely be confined to an area closer to the surface since there will not be enough time for ample deep moisture to make it up that far north. Northern Nebraska should have some deeper moisture than North Dakota and even though less helicity (spinning motion in atmosphere) will be present in Nebraska, Energy Helicity Index values are still forecast to be elevated according to the Rapid Refresh model. We'll make a final determination based on data coming in tomorrow morning before heading out!

Follow me on Twitter and Facebook for updates on our chase!

5/14 - 12:45pm CDT - Pressing Further Southwest in Texas

Today we're continuing on southwestward in Texas where fast westerly and northwesterly winds aloft and moist, easterly winds at the surface will combine to create a potential for severe weather. These winds should create enough shear for supercells among some scattered storms and more specifically there is a chance for a couple tornadoes down this way. There are a few clouds on the visible satellite view right now from ongoing storms in the region, but areas closer to the Mexican border near Marfa and Fort Davis are pretty much cloud free. There is a field of cumulus clouds we're driving toward south of Marfa that may serve as a focus for development, so we'll see how that pans out. In any case we have lots of direct sunlight and instability already building for storms later this afternoon.

The Storm Prediction Center has issued a Slight Risk for severe weather today across extreme southwest Texas where we're at and they've even included a 5% tornado risk area. This is the best setup we've had so far this week, so we remain hopeful that we'll see some great stuff today! There aren't many roads around the area so this will be a challenging chase day even though the ingredients appear to be coming together pretty well.




Follow me on Twitter and Facebook for the latest today!

5/11 - 11am CDT - A Crazy Chase in South Texas Yesterday

Our timing yesterday was just about perfect. As we surged southward from Carlsbad, New Mexico to the Del Rio, Texas area we began tracking storms that were forming in the mountains of Mexico near the Texas border. One fairly supercell formed along a boundary of converging wind just north of Laredo, TX in Mexico and we knew that this was the storm we needed to chase. It merged with another supercell that was moving north quickly to create a big storm with some intense rotation. We were able to get to the south side (where a tornado would be) just in time so that the hail and intense rain wouldn't cut us off from our road down to that area. Once we were there we saw some definite rotation and a couple wall clouds, but the storm was moving fast so we had to keep moving toward Laredo. We pulled over in a parking area just north of the city and continued to watch a wall cloud form that had a tiny hint of a funnel cloud in it. It was so small that it was barely visible, but it was certainly in rotation and was on the correct part of the storm. That was about all the storm had to offer tornado-wise.

By the time we made it east from Laredo the storm had merged with others to form a line of storms called an MCS (mesoscale convective system). This pretty much killed the tornado risk for this storm so we watched a very impressive lightning show from it as the sun set. Given the excitement that we had while chasing the storm while north of Laredo yesterday, it was a pretty good day! You can find more storm chasing photos from yesterday and earlier this week on my Flickr and Facebook albums.

Today we're traveling back to Oklahoma City so that our guests on Tour 1 can depart on their flights tomorrow. Tour 2 starts tomorrow night with our orientation and then we set out on Sunday for another week of storm chasing!

Follow me on Twitter and Facebook anytime for storm chasing updates.

5/10 - 11:20am MDT - A Change in Plans Today

Our original plan to stay in Southeast New Mexico today has been altered because of some new weather data that came in overnight. We did visit Calsbad Caverns this morning, but we're now on our way to the Del Rio, Texas area where storms are ongoing at the moment. This activity is definitely not making it easy for our forecast this morning because having clouds and storms in the hours before an afternoon severe weather setup is never a good thing. Nonetheless, we'll be looking for holes in this activity and/or for it to die off a bit this afternoon so that stronger storms can develop. The good thing is that wind shear today looks promising due to a cut-off low in Mexico creating strong southwesterly winds aloft that will contrast with the easterly winds at the surface.

The Storm Prediction Center has issued a Slight Risk for severe storms in the region, which includes a 5% tornado risk. Should this pan out today even with the ongoing storms this morning, this could be the best setup we've seen so far this week. Here's an interesting snippet from the SPC's 1630z discussion:

THE EWD PROGRESSION OF MID AND HIGH-LEVEL JET STREAKS ACROSS THE LOWER RIO GRANDE VALLEY WILL RESULT IN PRONOUNCED VERTICAL VEERING OF WINDS WITH HEIGHT WITH EFFECTIVE BULK SHEAR STEADILY STRENGTHENING TO 50-60 KT. AS SUCH...THE ENVIRONMENT WILL BECOME INCREASINGLY SUPPORTIVE OF INTENSE SUPERCELLS CAPABLE OF VERY LARGE HAIL...TORNADOES...AND DAMAGING WIND GUSTS.

Up-to-the-minute updates will continue today on Twitter and Facebook.

5/8 - 12:10pm CDT - Targeting New Mexico Today

We're on the road west today from Fort Stockton, Texas as we move toward Southern New Mexico. This is one of two areas we considered chasing in this morning, with the other being in Southern Texas. The reason we are not in Southern Texas is because there are thunderstorms going on already down there and the cool air and cloud cover from those will act to contaminate the environment for storm development this afternoon. Even though the very same cold front we saw yesterday and the day before will act as a focus for storms down there today, this contamination should rule out most of the chance for nice, isolated supercells.

Even though 500 mb (18,000 foot) winds will be stronger in Texas because a shortwave disturbance on the edge of an upper-level low is moving through the region, they should be ample in New Mexico. The southwesterly flow at that level and the fact that winds will be spreading apart (diverging) should lead to rising air in this region near the surface. These winds coupled with easterly surface winds will create wind shear, which is needed to sustain and cause a storm to rotate.

The Storm Prediction Center has issued two Slight Risk areas for today in Texas and New Mexico. There is a 2% tornado risk in Southern Texas, but this may not play out well down there thanks to the ongoing storms and clouds this morning. There's no tornado risk area in New Mexico, but my hunch is that there might be the potential for one or two little ones there today based on the directional shear that will be present with even a little bit of speed shear. Moisture will be a bit limited today, but you don't need as much in the upslope areas of New Mexico because elevation compensates for a lack of moisture. We're keeping an eye on conditions as they develop and hopefully I'll have more great pictures to share later today!

My constant updates on Twitter and Facebook will continue today during our chase.

5/8 - 12:10am CDT - Today's Texas Storms

Our initial target area near San Angelo, Texas quickly soured as storms fired early in the day just after noon. This was because the environment was not capped enough, meaning warm air aloft was not present to limit storm development and isolate it so only the strongest updrafts would survive. Since all the storms fired at once, and especially in an area where winds were becoming northerly aloft, they merged into a large mesoscale convective system (MCS) that moved toward San Antonio and Austin. Before the MCS formed, the individual storms did have some rotation and supercellular characteristics. Check out this panorama of a severe storm with rotation just south of San Angelo I took earlier today below.

Once we left that batch of storms, we surged westward to the Fort Stockton and Pecos, Texas area where easterly winds and storms forming to the higher elevations to the west had the best chance to become isolated supercells. One of these cells moving due east (a "right mover") looked very promising for quite a few hours, but an outflow boundary from the eastern batch of storms near San Angelo that we were chasing contaminated the environment that the storm was in. This was surprising given that outflow boundaries are almost always a good thing since they can enhance low-level shear and create lift to eithe create other storms or enhance existing ones. The fact of the matter was that this outflow boundary was much too strong because it had a very large area of rain-cooled air from the storms to the east. This acted more like an airmass than a boundary, and the subsequent little isolated storms that formed after the initial right-moving cell we saw in West Texas did not grow as they could have because the environment was contaminated. It was a beautiful afternoon though, and the storm below is the last one we saw before heading to our hotel.

As we headed to our hotel we saw a great lightning show from storms that formed over higher elevations to our south. The lightning was fairly frequent and there were quite a few cloud-to-ground strikes. I was able to get one of my best-ever lightning shots during our time watching these storms, which you'll see to the right. Lightning photography requires patience, knowing your way around your camera, and luck. Tonight's patience paid off!

Tomorrow looks like another day in Texas or one in New Mexico. There are two target areas we're monitoring, one of them in Southern Texas and the other in West Texas and Southern New Mexico. Southern Texas would be a setup where we target storms near the same cold front we've been chasing southward for the past two days whereas New Mexico/West Texas will be more of an upslope storm situation with lower (but not inadequate) dew points. The Storm Prediction Center has outlined these two areas with a Slight Risk in their Day 2 outlook, but this may need adjusting by tomorrow morning. I'll have our latest chase forecast on here tomorrow morning!

Follow me on Twitter and Facebook for the latest storm chasing updates!

5/7 - 10am CDT - On Our Way to South Texas

The same cold front that we targeted yesterday in Kansas and Oklahoma is on the move southward and so are we. We're on our way to South Texas this morning to meet up with where the front, the dry line (boundary between moist air to the east and dry air to the west), surface heating, easterly winds, and moisture all meet up. Storms should fire along the front and/or dry line this afternoon as instability builds. You'll see in the image to the right that there's a sliver of high dew points that will develop in Southwest Texas this afternoon that will be our focus as the cold front moves south.

Due to the threat of severe storms this afternoon, the Storm Prediction Center has issued a Slight Risk area for portions of South Texas with a 2% tornado risk (pictured left). Some of these storms will have large hail and damaging winds. The tornado risk, like yesterday, looks fairly low due to weak winds aloft, but the directional wind shear will help out as well as high instability. There may just be enough ingredients to spawn one or two tornadoes today down there, so we'll cross our fingers and keep driving!

As usual, I'll be posting up-to-the-minute storm chasing updates on my Twitter and Facebook accounts today.

4/11 - 4pm - Quiet Weather Ahead, Storms in the Plains

A stretch of very nice quiet weather is ahead for North Mississippi after a couple days of scattered storms. Cooler temperatures filtering in behind a cold front that came through yesterday will continue to be with us until this weekend and skies will clear out even more too! These clear skies will give us some chilly temperatures tonight in the lower 40's and possibly even upper 30's. The next thing that really will happen with our weather is the approach of a system early next week that could give us clouds and eventually a chance of strong storms by late Monday into Tuesday. This chance is certainly something to keep an eye on. Check out my video at the bottom of this post for more details on this week's forecast.

Speaking of storms, the Plains has a risk of severe weather every day this week through Saturday. Persistent southwest flow aloft coupled with a few shortwave disturbances and eventually a big trough moving through later this week should trigger severe storms in quite a few locations in Tornado Alley. Right now there's a Tornado Watch out for the Texas Panhandle up through Southeast Colorado because of a stalled surface front that is providing a focus for storm development. A supercell that has popped up just north of Amarillo is providing quite a show on radar but has not put down a tornado yet according to the National Weather Service. The risks for severe weather out in that part of the nation will likely become more elevated as the bigger trough moves through later this week. In less than 24 days I'll be traveling the Plains again with Storm Chasing Adventure Tours in my 5th year of being a tour guide with them. I can't wait!

6/27 - 11:15am - More Severe Weather for KY and IN

Had enough storms already? We have one more round to go before we clear things out for a while around Kentucky and Indiana. A few non-severe storms have already moved through the Louisville area this morning and the storms that are still well off to the west are weakening and beginning to take a more southerly turn.


The bit of clearing we'll see this afternoon after this morning's storms pass off to the east should help to destabilize the atmosphere in preparation for development of severe storms this afternoon. If this clearing doesn't materialize and we stay more cloudy than sunny across the area, the severe threat will be much lower. These storms should fire up in the mid afternoon across southwest Indiana and Western Kentucky and impact the Louisville area this evening. While most of these will be your run-of-the-mill severe storms with 60mph winds and hail, a few could have supercell structures or bowing segments. The embedded or isolated supercell structures will be powered by the small amount of wind shear (changing wind direction and speed with height - see 5pm NAM model output left) and helicity (turning in the atmosphere) we'll have in the area as storms form. This means a couple isolated tornadoes are possible.

The bowing segments could produce wind damage as a cold pool of air collects behind some of the more linear storms. These storms will likely last well into the evening and overnight hours and be out of the Louisville area by mid morning tomorrow or earlier. Since there is the risk for wind damage and an isolated tornado or two, the Storm Prediction Center has issued a Slight Risk area for most of Kentucky, Southern Indiana, and portions of Middle Tennessee. A 5% tornado risk exists from Chicago and St. Louis to along the Ohio River, while a 2% risk extends further southward.

6/21 - 12pm - First Day of Summer, Rounds of Severe Weather

A few storms are moving northeastward through Kentucky and Tennessee right now. While not severe, these storms are moving through a very unstable environment (you can see the 2500 J/kg CAPE values on the right) and could reform or strengthen as the afternoon wears on. There's a Slight Risk for severe weather today across Kentucky, Indiana, Tennessee, and more because these strengthening storms could produce wind damage and hail later on today.

Today at 1:16pm EDT summer will officially begin. This marks the summer solstice, or the day when the sun shines at its northernmost point on the earth due to the planet's tilt. Appropriately, today will feature summer-like highs across the Southeast. Here are some of the highs this afternoon for selected cities:

Louisville: 90  Lexington: 89

Cincinnati: 88  Jackson, TN: 90

Nashville: 88  Memphis: 93 

Knoxville: 93  Atlanta: 93

Birmingham: 93  Jackson, MS: 90

The heat will be breaking soon though because a cold front it scheduled to move through Kentucky and Tennessee late on Thursday. Above and behind this front is a upper-level low and trough that will trigger widespread severe storms across the Southeast on Wednesday. These storms could be supercells, which carry a tornado risk (not that big I think), and/or clusters with hail and high wind. The fast upper-level winds with the trough coupled with pretty high instability across the Lower Ohio Valley will provide a healthy environment for these storms, so be on the lookout tomorrow if you're in the Slight Risk area below:

6/3 - 11am CDT - Heading Back to Denver

Yesterday we chased a very picturesque supercell storm northeast of Minot, North Dakota. While it didn't produce a tornado, the cloud formations in the storm were spectacular alone. The first cell we tried to intercept drifted into Canada, but the cell in the picture below stayed just south of the border and we were able to take quite a few pictures as the sun set. The only bad thing about this storm was that it occurred over the flooded fields of North Dakota, so the mosquito swarm was out in force (yes, I'm itching all over this morning). It was very difficult to even hold still for three seconds to take a picture because the mosquitos began covering and biting exposed skin almost immediately after getting out of the van. Keep that in mind as you're viewing the photos below.








It was quite an experience yesterday since most of us haven't been that far north in the contiguous 48 states before. Our overnight stay in North Dakota means a long (700 mile +) trip to Denver, Colorado to day so that we can pick up our next tour group and say goodbye to our guests on tour 5. Sadly, this is also the end of the road for me this season. I'll be flying back to Louisville tomorrow afternoon so that I can spend some time with my family this summer. It's been a great run and I'll post a quick wrap-up of this week's chase and my whole trip here either later tonight or tomorrow.

6/2 - 10:45am CDT - South Dakota Today, Not Looking Very Promising

We saw a small supercell last night near Valentine, Nebraska with a very picturesque sunset behind it. Since there were no road networks in the area we had to stay a good distance away from it and unfortunately it didn't last long either. If it had developed a couple hours earlier it would've been a big storm!


I'm no fan of today's severe weather setup in South Dakota. The main thing this morning that throws up red flags is the cirrus cloud shield over much of the state. This isn't something that burns off during afternoon heating, but is rather persistent. This shield will act to limit instability this afternoon and could keep storms from firing until after dark or not at all. Dew points at the surface are a bit marginal this morning and it's not a sure thing that they'll recover this afternoon because of computer model issues lately. We won't get a true east wind for good low-level wind shear either, so that's another thing to throw in the bin of issues.


Nevertheless, we're going to drive up to south-central South Dakota (short drive) and wait there to see how things develop. Maybe Mother Nature will surprise us. The Storm Prediction Center has a Slight Risk area out for much of South Dakota, but that may be in jeopardy right now based on current conditions.