Archive for March 24th, 2010
Severe Storm Potential Thursday
March 24th, 2010 | 
Author: This evening we have began looking at a few prospects for the potential for a couple of severe storms on Thursday afternoon across portions of the state…..particularly west of I-65. The factors are not very impressive at this point, but if more low level moisture can become established ahead of the cold front we might deal with a few issues. To the maps….
This map is valid at 7PM on Friday evening. You can see the main shear is exiting the area ahead of the cold front where some surface based instability has developed along the Alabama/Mississippi state line. This is due to a tongue of 60° dewpoints that try to nose northward ahead of the cold frontal boundary from about Reform to Tuscaloosa on southward.
This chart notes where the best low level moisture corresponds with the cooler temps aloft advecting in ahead of the upper trof axis. 0-3KM CAPE values in excess of 200+ J/kg are considered very high. This would lead me to believe that we could have some surface based storm development into Thursday evening. Given the ejecting shear I believe that we could have a couple of supercells with the potential for damaging winds and large hail along with some developing line segments along the frontal boundary. Surface flow will veer ahead of the front really killing low level shear values. However, if the shear lags behind what is currently projected we could deal with a couple of tornadoes. We will need to monitor low level moisture closely….because any increase would allow for higher instability values over a larger area and potentially lead to a more enhanced threat of severe storms.
The Storm Prediction Center in Norman has outlined much of Mississippi, West Alabama, and West Tennessee in a Slight Risk of severe storms for Thursday. Stay tuned for further updates on this impending situation. We will be changing the chase status to slight at this time.
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