4/17 - 6:35pm - Severe Weather Tomorrow in Mississippi

A line of severe thunderstorms will move through Mississippi tomorrow, bringing the threat of damaging winds, tornadoes, and hail. The timing on these storms in Starkville will be somewhere near 10pm. Given the uncertainties in this forecast you should be on alert for severe weather in the Golden Triangle between 8pm and midnight tomorrow night. Be sure you have a NOAA weather radio or a smartphone weather alerting app ready to go! All the details on this severe weather forecast are available in the video below.

4/11 - 7pm - Rough Day of Severe Weather, Sunshine to Come

We've had 7 reports of tornadoes so far today across the South as storms really ramped up ramped up earlier in the afternoon. One of these tornadoes caused injuries and a fatality in Kemper County, MS as it moved through there and eventually it moved through Noxubee County into the Macon area. Thankfully the severe weather has pushed off to the east and we'll begin working on clearing out the skies over the next few hours. Check out my latest CampusConnect forecast below for all the details!

1/29 - 5:45pm - Serious Severe Weather Concerns Tonight

Latest Severe Weather Updates

Tweets by @RyanHoke

A severe weather setup that we see normally in the springtime is about to unfold on this late January night across a large expanse of the Southeast. While not "unprecedented" or "once-in-a-lifetime", this outbreak is going to impact quite a few people and it's important that everyone have what they need to be prepared and safe. This post is mainly for folks in North Mississippi and West Tennessee, but you can figure out pretty well how you'll be affected if you're not in these areas by some of the maps and information below. Everyone needs to be aware of what's going on because this will be happening at a very bad time of night when even the night owls are asleep.

Fast Facts

A MODERATE Risk of severe weather has been issued by the Storm Prediction Center for the overnight hours in West Tennessee and most of North Mississippi. Tornadoes, damaging winds, and hail are all on the table for these areas as storms move through. Even though places like the Golden Triangle in Mississippi are just outside of the Moderate Risk area I would treat this as if you were in it because these storms are going to be very, very strong still as they move through this region. Please, please, please have a weather radio or smartphone app that's armed and ready to alert you if a Tornado Warning is issued for your location tonight. This will be hitting when most people are asleep so it's a very dangerous situation.

Timing - North MS and West TN

8pm - Midnight - Small chance for some isolated storms. These would carry a tornado, wind, and hail threat.

Midnight - 2am - Slightly better chance for isolated storms, small line of storms may try to form ahead of main line.

2am - 7am - Main line of severe thunderstorms moves through. This will affect everyone. Tornadoes, severe damaging winds, and hail are a good bet during this time.

Discussion

A line of storms stretches from the Great Lakes to Texas right now and will continue to move eastward through the evening. A few reports of severe weather have come in already from this but the main show will be overnight as this line of storms encounters a more rich environment for severe weather.

The main storm mode for tonight will be a squall line of storms with embedded rotation in portions of it (AKA what's termed a QLCS). Supercell storms will be possible ahead of the main line of storms too and could easily produce tornadoes if they develop. Tornadoes in QLCS lines of storms like the one we'll have tonight are more difficult to identify on radar since they're embedded within the line. While not as strong as supercell tornadoes, QLCS tornadoes can be strong and cause massive damage in the right environment.

While directional shear, which is needed to produce tornadoes, isn't very good for this event, the speed shear or tendency for winds to increase in speed with height will be very good. But, the directional shear may just be enough to cause problems. When you combine helicity (caused by shear) with instability in a formula you get what's called the Energy Helicity Index (EHI). This, in my mind, is a good determinant of tornado ingredients in an environment. The NAM model has increased levels of the EHI throughout West Tennessee and Mississippi tonight as this squall line is moving through so these QLCS tornadoes may have some kick to them if they develop. Not good news at all.


Also, since winds at 850 mb (about 5,000 feet) will be howling it will not take much for any part of this line of storms to pull these winds down to the surface and create straight-line wind damage. I wouldn't be surprised if folks affected by the worst of these winds thought they were hit by a tornado. I'm hearing the word Derecho being thrown around a bit with regard to how this system will develop tonight. That's certainly a possibility with this system but I think it's a relatively small chance.

One more thing to mention, and this is not the least important at all, is the fact that moisture and warm air continues to stream in from the south in advance of this system. When the dry line that's triggering these storms hits this richer air tonight you'll know. The whole line of storms should really begin to light up by then. Having air this warm and moist in January is never a good thing because Mother Nature intends to correct it in a violent way.

Follow me on Twitter and my Facebook page for the latest updates tonight!

8/27 - 9:30pm - Update on Isaac's Expected Gulf Coast Landfall

Tropical Storm Isaac is teetering on the edge of becoming a hurricane this evening with winds of 70 mph as of this writing. The threshold for a Category 1 hurricane is 74 mph. The storm motion has slowed down over the past few hours, now moving northwest at only 10 mph. Issac continues to run into issues that prevent it from rapid intensification, which is certainly good news. The latest issue is a batch of dry air that is currently being pulled into the center of the storm. Without an uninhibited source of moist air the storm cannot form a defined eye or intensify very well. The dry air is why Isaac is lopsided right now with most of the intense winds on the south side.

How long will it be until this dry air is finished working through the storm? Probably a few more hours, possibly lasting into the early morning hours tomorrow if current model forecasts are correct. Speaking of models, the current track from the National Hurricane Center takes Isaac right into the Eastern Louisiana/Mississippi Coast areas late tomorrow night into early Wednesday morning as a weak Category 2 storm with 100 mph winds. With the lack of organization we're seeing right now it may only be a Category 1 at landfall. The latest computer model tracks, the spaghetti plots as you've probably heard about and seen over the past few days, have tightened up on a landfall location somewhere around New Orleans. It's worth noting that some of these models are now trending eastward after a massive amount of successive westward jogs in recent days. It doesn't appear that this landfall will take place further east than Biloxi, Mississippi given the current motion of the storm and model data, but the exact landfall location won't be the big story with this storm.

Storm surge exceedance probabilities

The big story here is how big and how slow this storm is. Sure, there will be some wind damage along the coast as the storm makes landfall, but the large area that Isaac covers means that quite an expansive area along the Gulf Coast will experience other effects from it. Storm surge at or above ten feet is possible in locations from New Orleans to Pascagoula, MS and rainfall amounts over a foot are forecast over much of Central and Southern Mississippi and Eastern Louisiana. Isaac will slow down even more than its current speed once it gets over land so heavy rain will be a good bet across much of the Gulf Coast states until we get into the weekend. Inland flooding will be a problem with the deluge that Isaac with unleash on the region as it crawls northward.

Rainfall through 7pm CDT Saturday

As far as local effects in North Mississippi and West Tennessee, Isaac will bring very heavy rain and winds with gusts in some cases near 40 mph. Starkville, MS may be looking at a six or more inch rainfall scenario through Saturday evening and areas in West Tennessee like Jackson will likely see more than three inches of rain. This highly depends on Isaac's exact track so some areas will see much more rain than others.

With just about any landfalling hurricane you can expect the threat of isolated tornadoes, and Isaac will be no different. The turning of winds with height in a hurricane or tropical storm create favorable wind shear for tornadoes to form in stronger parts of it. Due to this potential threat, the Storm Prediction Center has issued a Slight Risk for most of Mississippi and parts of Louisiana, Alabama, Georgia, and Florida.


So overall we're not looking at Isaac to be a major hurricane at landfall, but the effects from it will be widespread due to it's large size. It's a good thing that folks in a wide area are preparing for this storm since it could be a long haul given the slow motion that's expected from it.

7/7 - 10:30pm - Massive Heat Wave Ends with Storms

Today capped off the longest, hottest stretch of weather in Louisville that most people can remember. Today's 106° high at Louisville International Airport was the hottest it's been since July 14th, 1936 when it got to 107°. That temperature is Louisville's all-time record high and if we didn't have as many clouds as we did this afternoon in the city we would have met or broken it. This ends nine days of 100°+ weather, which is the third-longest stretch of triple digits ever recorded according to NWS Louisville.

Storms that will develop tomorrow will be ushering in cooler temperatures, which is welcome news! The bad part is that some of these storms may be severe due to the incredible amount of energy they'll have at their disposal from all the heat. Temperatures in the mid 90's tomorrow with sunshine and high humidity will power an awful lot of instability, or the tendency for air parcels to rise and create thunderstorms. A cold front sinking down from the north that will be stalling out once it passes just to our south will be the focus for storm chances starting tomorrow in the early afternoon in Louisville and lasting through Monday morning.

The main threats from these storms will be wind and hail, but there could also be a threat for some rotating storms too. While winds don't look favorable for any sort of big tornado problems tomorrow, a couple of these rotating storms may get just enough juice to put down a brief spin-up. EHI values in the adjacent image take into account both instability and helicity, which is a product of wind shear. The elevated values you see are powered mostly by instability and just a little bit of helicity, so again, winds aren't that favorable here. The Louisville area is no stranger to summertime tornadoes as you may remember a series of four of them that touched down in late June of last year.

Given the chances for some severe wind and hail tomorrow, the Storm Prediction Center has issued a 15% Slight Risk area for Kentucky. A better chance for severe weather (30%) exists closer to the East Coast where upper-level winds will be stronger as a trough digs down a bit into that area.

6/26 - 10:40am MDT - Another Day, Another State

Yesterday near the Black Hills of South Dakota we saw a few storms develop but they never got organized enough to be good for chasing. One storm in particular had some promise but it just couldn't get strong enough to leave the elevation of the Black Hills where its updraft was rooted. Today we're going north from the Black Hills and moving into North Dakota where there should be a threat for severe storms this afternoon. In particular, areas near and just west of Williston, North Dakota into extreme Eastern Montana appear to be under the greatest threat since a few isolated storms could produce hail, wind, and maybe even an isolated tornado. The Storm Prediction Center only has a general thunderstorm risk for this area but there's a 2% tornado risk included. You'll see the Slight Risk up there in Montana as well in the map to the right, but that area is very remote and the surface winds likely won't cooperate as well for storms like they will in North Dakota.

Winds aloft are forecast to be stronger in our target area today than they were yesterday in South Dakota since the upper-level disturbance over the northwestern part of the country will be moving east a little. When you couple these stronger southwesterly winds aloft with southeasterly winds at the surface that can create some shear for rotating storms. It's worth noting that the best surface winds could be in Canada just north of North Dakota and Montana since an area of low pressure will be spinning winds around from the east there. Since we can't go to Canada, that's obviously out. Dew points in North Dakota are downright soupy this morning and will likely continue to be that way through the afternoon. Having 70 degree dew points right on the Canadian border is something you don't see too often.

With all the warm air and moisture in place, instability will be plentiful for storms. I talked about the threat of isolated tornadoes today on the SPC's outlook and that may very well verify if the instability and shear come together. A great way to combine those two factors is to look at the Energy Helicity Index, which starts getting higher in an isolated spot in Western North Dakota according to the RAP Model. We'll see if it's enough to get some good storms going this afternoon and evening!

Keep up with our chase today by following me on Twitter and Facebook!

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!

5/24 - 12:35am CDT - We're in... Iowa?

We didn't think we'd be in Iowa tonight. The storms that formed yesterday (Wednesday) rushed eastward as the cold front in the region decided to push further east than expected. Unfortunately none of these storms really did much because they formed in a linear fashion and didn't have the moisture necessary to get too severe. One of the southern cells in the line just west of Omaha, Nebraska managed to be isolated for a while and generated a wall cloud that triggered a tornado warning. Our only option in this environment was to cross the Missouri River in Omaha and wait for the storms to come to us because it would not be good to have the storms outrun us while trying to find a way across the river. The storms slowed down and died out pretty much at that point so we threw in the towel for the day.

Tomorrow will likely be a travel day back to Kansas or Southern Nebraska as we await Friday's potential chase setup. Storms tomorrow will be up near the Great Lakes in Wisconsin and Michigan and we just don't chase there due to the distance from the Plains and lack of good chase environment up there. Strong capping should keep storms from going up in the central and southern Plains, but we'll keep an eye on that in case that changes. Friday's setup may be decent if capping aloft doesn't ruin it. A deepening trough out in California and hopefully some better moisture return from the Gulf of Mexico should create potential for severe weather. A strengthening low in Southeast Colorado/Southwest Kansas should provide ample surface wind support for rotating storms should this pan out as forecast. The Storm Prediction Center already has a 5% risk area for this in their 3-day severe weather outlook. I'm crossing my fingers that this setup will yield some good storms because Friday is my last day chasing in the Plains until late June!

Follow me on Twitter and Facebook for updates this week.

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!

5/22 - 9:45am MDT - Nebraska Here We Come!

Today's storm setup is tricky because we're dealing with, again, a situation where the moisture is not returning to the region as well as we need it to. The good news though is that the trough that is slowly making it's way eastward will finally be in play today, so upper-level wind support will be there for storms. Let's start with the moisture though. The higher dew points will be in the Dakotas today no doubt, but this is at the surface. With such a short time between being dry and having moisture moving into that region, this moist layer is likely very shallow and confined near the surface even though the short-range models this morning show it a little deeper than before (models have not been handling moisture well at all lately). This means that storms up that way would likely be low-precipitation supercells, maybe to the point where some of them are only putting down virga and not ground-falling rain. The better surface wind support near the low will also be in the Dakotas, but you won't get many, if any, tornadoes if the storms can't get any "meat" on them from the lack of moisture. Dew points in Northern Nebraska may be lower at surface, but we may have an overall deeper layer of moisture there.

The upper-level winds as I said before will be more favorable today than yesterday. The trough moving in will provide fast southwesterly winds in the Dakotas extending down to Northern Nebraska. This should bring in some drier air aloft and enhance wind shear for this afternoon's storms. Today we'll stay on the southern end of these winds aloft so that maybe we can get some deeper moisture coupled with the winds. Hopefully some supercell storms can form in this environment.

Because the models are having difficulties resolving moisture issues, today's CAPE (instability) forecast looks rather low in Nebraska with higher values north. This is something we'll be watching throughout the afternoon to see where it actually sets up. The potential lack of moisture and the best shear being removed from deep layer moisture will likely limit tornado potential today, but maybe we can see some high-based photogenic storms!

The Storm Prediction Center has a Slight Risk for severe storms today in the Dakotas extending toward Northern Nebraska. There's only a 2% tornado risk with this and I think this is a good call given the moisture issues here. If dew points were to be higher over a deeper layer in North Dakota I think you could have a pretty decent tornado risk from supercells given the forecast wind environment. In any case, our more southerly target today will put us in great position for tomorrow's chase, which will likely be in Nebraska.

Follow me on Twitter and Facebook for updates today!

5/21 - 11am CDT - A Bit of a Surprise This Morning!

Yesterday evening we saw a wonderful view of the annular solar eclipse just south of Lubbock, Texas. This was my first solar eclipse and even though clouds obscured our view of the maximum "ring of fire" portion of the eclipse, it was a spectacular sight. It was good that we had an eclipse because the storm threat that we were targeting in that area was never realized. A good convergence boundary formed and intensified quite a bit, but it seems the "cap" (warm layer of air aloft) was too strong to get any good storms going. There was one small storm that formed to our east, but it quickly dissipated since it was moving into cooler air.

This morning we're waking up to some very good news. Last night's model runs, particularly of the Rapid Refresh, were quite pessimistic about today's setup in Northeast New Mexico and the western Texas Panhandle but early this morning things changed around considerably. The main difference here that I've noticed is the amount of moisture that will be available in this area. For example, the 4z run of the RAP model late last night had dew points near 50 degrees in Northeast New Mexico. The 13z run of the same run this morning has dew points from 60 to 65 degrees. That's a huge difference! Right now the dew points in the northeastern section of New Mexico are in the mid to upper 50's, so the newer runs of the RAP model with the increased moisture are looking good since higher dew points will move in this afternoon.

Having these higher dew points is so important because this moisture is pure thunderstorm fuel. Putting more moisture into the air near the surface increases instability because you have more latent heat contained in the  air as it rises. As such, the CAPE (instability) forecast on the RAP model has responded very positively to the model's higher "correction" in dew point this morning and we're looking at a situation where instability should be quite good at just under 3000 J/kg in most spots around Northeast New Mexico, parts of Southeast Colorado, and the western Texas Panhandle. This is pretty good!

Now that we've cleared moisture and instability for take-off on this event, let's go over what the winds will be doing. The change in the surface wind forecast between last night and this morning hasn't been as great as the change in dew point, but we're still seeing some differences. Winds today will mostly be out of the south-southeast or southeast in the region, with some places especially in Northeast New Mexico seeing a more easterly wind vector than what models were showing yesterday. Storms today will be forming in what we call upslope flow, so having more easterly winds blowing up the higher elevations in this region should create an ample source of lift. This should also increase wind shear a bit due to a contrast with the northwesterly winds aloft at 500 mb (18,000 ft) and create the potential for more organized, isolated storms. When you couple helicity, which is spinning in the atmosphere that takes wind shear to create, with the increased instability that we'll be seeing in a mathematical formula, you get an index called the Energy Helicity Index (EHI). I usually don't look at indexes and parameters too much since they get in the way of looking at the basics behind a storm setup, but EHI is one I do like because it's simple and gives you a decent idea where a tornado threat may set up since helicity and instability are so important. Values last night were slim to none on the models for EHI in our target region, but today with the increased moisture creating more instability we're seeing a marked upswing in forecast values to 2 or more in places.

Even though these values are higher than previously thought for today, we're still not looking at any sort of severe weather or tornado outbreak here. What we are seeing is increased potential for an isolated, organized chance for severe weather in this region that may carry a bit of a tornado threat with it. Right now we're monitoring current conditions across the area and picking out where storm formation may first occur. We drove through some storms this morning on our way from Lubbock to Amarillo as you see on radar there to the right, but those are clearing and the majority of the western Texas Panhandle and Northeast New Mexico is now clear from the rain. A pretty shallow cloud deck is hanging around in Northeast New Mexico at the moment, but there should be time to burn that off and create instability from the heating of the day this afternoon.

Taking all of these factors into account, the Storm Prediction Center has issued a Slight Risk for severe weather in portions of New Mexico, Colorado, Texas, and even the extreme western Oklahoma Panhandle. The Slight Risk includes a 2% tornado risk due to the increased shear and instability that's expected this afternoon that could create some supercell storms. I'm not a big fan of the northwesterly winds aloft at 18,000 feet today because you generally want southwesterly winds up there to bring in drier air aloft and enhance wind shear a little bit more, but this will have to do today. We've seen decent storms with this kind of upper-level wind situation before so it's not enough to rule anything out. It's nice to be able to chase on a day when we thought we would not be able to, so anything we see today will be icing on that cake!

Follow my updates today on Twitter and Facebook for the latest.

5/19 - 11:30pm CDT - New Tour Group, Chase Tomorrow

This morning Tour 2's guests departed and this evening we just finished up orientation and dinner with the guests on Tour 3. This past week we went 2,402 miles (3,866 kilometers) across Oklahoma, Texas, Colorado, and Kansas. Everybody had a great time as we traveled from the Mexican border near Big Bend National Park in Texas all the way to Denver even though storms may not have been available to chase every day.

A rash of tornadoes southwest of Wichita, Kansas near Harper has us a little down this evening since they happened during our day to switch up tour groups in Oklahoma City. Unfortunately there was damage reported with these tornadoes, which seemed to be all rope-like based on the photos being posted via social media. The rope structure of these makes sense given the low moisture in the area which means that cloud bases were high. For tomorrow the setup does not look as favorable for tornadoes given the still marginal amount of moisture in the region and weaker upper-level winds, but our sights are set on Western Oklahoma and the Panhandle region of Texas as the cold front that triggered today's madness continues southward.

The Storm Prediction Center has a general thunderstorm risk with a 5% severe probability for the area in question tomorrow. They're not real optimistic about severe storms based on the weak upper-level and surface winds, but we'll see how that develops tomorrow. The one thing we have going is that the direction of the winds at the surface (mostly easterly) will contrast well with the mostly westerly winds at 500 mb (18,000 ft) for some directional wind shear. Good storms may be hard to come by on Monday, but as the trough that I mentioned in the previous blog post begins to move in I think our prospects will improve during the week.

Follow me on Twitter and Facebook for the latest on our chase!