Texas Spring 2016

[Brent]

pretty solid agreement right now(and has been for several runs already) from both the GFS and Euro on a widespread heavy rain event next weekend... we will see if it stays consistent.

[gpsnowman]

I had a daughter in 2008. As a father I have tried to pass on as much knowledge to her sponge brain as I possibly can. As she has aged over the years, a lot of what I have taught her has been absorbed in her little brain. This includes my love and limited knowledge of weather. Years ago she took an interest in the weather. She listened to what I was teaching her, paying close attention to local news forecasts, and asking to watch the The Weather Channel. I would press pause on the DVR with the United States on the screen and she would conduct imaginary weather reports with her magic wand. To this day she is still obsessed with weather, especially tornadoes. She is well rehearsed in U.S. geography. Anyway(a dad can boast) the other day she told her teacher, and me, the following afternoon she wanted to be a meteorologist when she grows up and explained the reasons why. I just about cried. Whether or not it happens remains to be seen. The interest she has shown in weather has made me a proud daddy. I know we all do not get too personal on the forum but I thought I would share this with all of you. She is 8 and wants to be a part of Storm2k because her daddy is. Amazing.

[Brent]

GFS gone mad... most of this around the metroplex and I-35 falls next Saturday-Monday Dunno whether this will even come close to verifying, but the signs are definitely there for a big rain event at this very early stage.

[Ntxw]

CPC



CFSv2 and even the Euro weeklies are very wet weeks 1-4. It's just a waiting game at this point to see if the much above avg precipitation forecasts arrives. If some of them are true some areas may receive in excess of a foot of rain the next 1-2 months.

[Brent]

Euro also quite aggressive next weekend(though not as prolific as the GFS)... over 3" of rain at DFW next Sunday/Monday... the GFS officially has about 7" at DFW on the meteogram... almost 10" in Denton... both are in strikingly good agreement for this range on the heaviest rain Sunday Afternoon-Monday Evening

[weatherdude1108]

GFS gone mad... most of this around the metroplex and I-35 falls next Saturday-Monday Dunno whether this will even come close to verifying, but the signs are definitely there for a big rain event at this very early stage.

Wow! Lake Buchanan is almost full, Lake Travis is full. If this were to verify, Lake Buchanan would probably fill up and possibly go into floodgate operations, with all of that water heading downstream through the chain, eventually to Travis, which would also be getting inflows from the Pedernales River and other tributaries, also contributing to a rise into the Travis flood pool. Lake Travis was initially built as a flood control lake. Looks like it could get some practice this weekend(?).

The lakes don't have the "cushion" of being able to take on as much water like they did last year at this time.

[jasons2k]

Morning update from Jeff Lindner:

A slight chance for severe thunderstorms across the northern ½ of SE TX this afternoon.

Large scale upper level flow remains out of the SW across TX with several upper level impulses riding these high level winds across the state. Each of these disturbances is producing a round of showers and thunderstorms. One such disturbance is currently crossing the area with scattered showers ongoing north of I-10 this morning and offshore across the coastal waters.

Big question this morning is what will transpire this afternoon as parameters will be in place for strong to severe thunderstorms, but a strong capping inversion must be overcome for those storms to be realized. Low level stratus deck in place this morning will make it hard to get much heating although some weak subsidence behind the departing disturbance later this morning may help in scattering out the low level clouds…time will tell. Next incoming disturbance will yield some additional lift over areas N of I-10 this afternoon during peak heating and this may be enough to overcome the cap in place a couple thousand feet off the ground. Anything able to get through the cap will have plenty of instability to work with along with decent shear. Will favor the areas north of a line from College Station to Conroe to Liberty for the greatest severe threat…even though SPC has the slight risk area further SW including metro Houston. Think the cap will be too strong to overcome south of I-10 and do not expect any strong to severe thunderstorms in this region this afternoon. Critical surface temperature to watch for this afternoon is between 81-83 degrees for the cap to break.

Main threats in any severe storms will be large hail and damaging winds with the tornado threat a distant second.

Front will cross the area on Tuesday morning allowing a cooler and drier air mass to filter into the region, but this will be short lived as the front stalls just off the coast and the next upper level disturbance quickly approaches from the west. Meso models are wanting to bring showers back toward the coast as early as late Tuesday afternoon with much more significant development overnight into Wednesday as strong lift arrives from the SW over the top of the frontal boundary which will attempt to move northward as a warm front. Instability looks slight so still not expecting much severe weather, but high moisture levels do support a heavy rainfall threat especially along the coast north to about US 59.

Thursday and Friday continue to feature the area between weather systems and overall decent weather. Moisture advection returns in earnest over the weekend with showers and thunderstorms likely back in the forecast by late Saturday.

[jasons2k]

A day of watching satellite loops. Already some clearing noted to the SW. With the April sun, the stratus deck may get burned off. We'll see...

[TarrantWx]

The NAM is showing the dryline setting up further West this afternoon. That seems to be a trend this Spring. The last couple of severe weather events, the dryline was forecasted to push east of the DFW metro but wound up west. The NAM doesn't show the dryline making much further progress to the east from the image below before the cold front begins to overtake it. I wonder if we'll begin to see a westward shift in the severe weather threat for this afternoon?

[TarrantWx]

NWS FTW is sending up an extra weather balloon at noon today to evaluate the environment for this afternoon. Skies are clearing here in Fort Worth.

[Brent]

The HRRR does appear to have a couple of cells around the metro late this afternoon



and FWD expanded the higher risk into the northern areas of the metro:

[1900hurricane]

Low level shear is limiting factor today. The low level jet is already scooting off to the east. I think the tornado threat is fairly low for north Texas, but certainly non-zero. Backing of the surface winds along a boundary could possibly be just enough to put down a tornado or two somewhere (most likely between DFW and the Red River/cold front in my opinion).

[Ntxw]

Per SPC discussion watch is likely coming probably severe thunderstorm watch, hail and winds.

[aggiecutter]

Texarkana just received 60 mile an hour plus wind gusts and quarter sized hail. Looks like there is a decent Tornado threat in deep east Texas this afternoon.

[Texas Snowman]

Graphic with discussion says "Vigorous storm development" possible...


MESOSCALE DISCUSSION 0363
NWS STORM PREDICTION CENTER NORMAN OK
1239 PM CDT MON APR 11 2016

AREAS AFFECTED...NRN TEXAS AND PARTS OF ADJACENT SRN OK

CONCERNING...SEVERE POTENTIAL...WATCH LIKELY

VALID 111739Z - 111945Z

PROBABILITY OF WATCH ISSUANCE...80 PERCENT

SUMMARY...A WATCH LIKELY WILL BE NEEDED ACROSS NORTH TEXAS AT SOME
POINT THIS AFTERNOON...PROBABLY BY 20-21Z...PERHAPS EARLIER.

DISCUSSION...THE RAPID REFRESH SUGGESTS THAT INHIBITION FOR MOIST
BOUNDARY LAYER PARCELS IS IN THE PROCESS OF WEAKENING...IN RESPONSE
TO INSOLATION...AND THE ONSET OF WEAK MID-LEVEL COOLING ACROSS
NORTHWEST INTO NORTH CENTRAL TEXAS. THIS IS GENERALLY TO THE SOUTH
OF A SLOWLY SOUTHWARD ADVANCING COLD FRONT...AND A STALLING
CONVECTIVE OUTFLOW BOUNDARY.

TOWARD AND AFTER 20-21Z...STRONGEST DESTABILIZATION IS EXPECTED TO
BECOME FOCUSED JUST EAST OF A DEVELOPING SURFACE LOW NEAR THE
INTERSECTION OF THE OUTFLOW BOUNDARY...AND AN EASTWARD ADVANCING
DRYLINE...NEAR AND NORTH THROUGH EAST OF THE DALLAS/FORT WORTH
METROPLEX. BENEATH AT LEAST MODEST STEEP MID-LEVEL LAPSE
RATES...MIXED LAYER CAPE PROBABLY WILL EXCEED 2000 J/KG.

ALTHOUGH WIND FIELDS AROUND 850 MB HAVE ALREADY WEAKENED AND VEERED
TO A PRONOUNCED WESTERLY COMPONENT...40-50 KT WESTERLY 500 MB FLOW
WILL PROVIDE SUFFICIENT VERTICAL SHEAR FOR ORGANIZED SEVERE STORMS.
GIVEN THE MAGNITUDE OF INSTABILITY...THIS PROBABLY WILL INCLUDE
INTENSIFYING SUPERCELL STRUCTURES. THIS SEEMS MOST LIKELY LATE THIS
AFTERNOON...AIDED BY FORCING FOR ASCENT ASSOCIATED WITH AN UPPER
IMPULSE TURNING EAST SOUTHEAST OF THE TEXAS PANHANDLE REGION.
HOWEVER...AN INCREASE IN STORM DEVELOPMENT ALREADY IS ONGOING NEAR
THE RED RIVER...PROBABLY ROOTED WITHIN WARM ADVECTION ABOVE THE
BOUNDARY LAYER. AND IT IS POSSIBLE THAT UPPER FORCING COULD SUPPORT
ADDITIONAL STORM DEVELOPMENT WITH AT LEAST A RISK FOR SEVERE HAIL
ACROSS PARTS OF NORTHWEST TEXAS INTO SOUTHWESTERN/SOUTH CENTRAL
OKLAHOMA WITHIN THE NEXT COUPLE OF HOURS.

..KERR/GOSS.. 04/11/2016


ATTN...WFO...SHV...FWD...OUN...SJT...

LAT...LON 32349774 33399979 33619986 34169809 34419726 33959648
33749563 33189485 32379518 31379614 31419701 32349774

[TarrantWx]

Midday FWD Sounding shows over 4000 CAPE and 0 CIN. SVR Watch issued for most of North Texas through 9pm.

[TexasSam]

40% chance of a watch for Southeast Texas.

[weatherdude1108]

Graphic with discussion says "Vigorous storm development" possible...


MESOSCALE DISCUSSION 0363
NWS STORM PREDICTION CENTER NORMAN OK
1239 PM CDT MON APR 11 2016

AREAS AFFECTED...NRN TEXAS AND PARTS OF ADJACENT SRN OK

CONCERNING...SEVERE POTENTIAL...WATCH LIKELY

VALID 111739Z - 111945Z

PROBABILITY OF WATCH ISSUANCE...80 PERCENT

SUMMARY...A WATCH LIKELY WILL BE NEEDED ACROSS NORTH TEXAS AT SOME
POINT THIS AFTERNOON...PROBABLY BY 20-21Z...PERHAPS EARLIER.

DISCUSSION...THE RAPID REFRESH SUGGESTS THAT INHIBITION FOR MOIST
BOUNDARY LAYER PARCELS IS IN THE PROCESS OF WEAKENING...IN RESPONSE
TO INSOLATION...AND THE ONSET OF WEAK MID-LEVEL COOLING ACROSS
NORTHWEST INTO NORTH CENTRAL TEXAS. THIS IS GENERALLY TO THE SOUTH
OF A SLOWLY SOUTHWARD ADVANCING COLD FRONT...AND A STALLING
CONVECTIVE OUTFLOW BOUNDARY.

TOWARD AND AFTER 20-21Z...STRONGEST DESTABILIZATION IS EXPECTED TO
BECOME FOCUSED JUST EAST OF A DEVELOPING SURFACE LOW NEAR THE
INTERSECTION OF THE OUTFLOW BOUNDARY...AND AN EASTWARD ADVANCING
DRYLINE...NEAR AND NORTH THROUGH EAST OF THE DALLAS/FORT WORTH
METROPLEX. BENEATH AT LEAST MODEST STEEP MID-LEVEL LAPSE
RATES...MIXED LAYER CAPE PROBABLY WILL EXCEED 2000 J/KG.

ALTHOUGH WIND FIELDS AROUND 850 MB HAVE ALREADY WEAKENED AND VEERED
TO A PRONOUNCED WESTERLY COMPONENT...40-50 KT WESTERLY 500 MB FLOW
WILL PROVIDE SUFFICIENT VERTICAL SHEAR FOR ORGANIZED SEVERE STORMS.
GIVEN THE MAGNITUDE OF INSTABILITY...THIS PROBABLY WILL INCLUDE
INTENSIFYING SUPERCELL STRUCTURES. THIS SEEMS MOST LIKELY LATE THIS
AFTERNOON...AIDED BY FORCING FOR ASCENT ASSOCIATED WITH AN UPPER
IMPULSE TURNING EAST SOUTHEAST OF THE TEXAS PANHANDLE REGION.
HOWEVER...AN INCREASE IN STORM DEVELOPMENT ALREADY IS ONGOING NEAR
THE RED RIVER...PROBABLY ROOTED WITHIN WARM ADVECTION ABOVE THE
BOUNDARY LAYER. AND IT IS POSSIBLE THAT UPPER FORCING COULD SUPPORT
ADDITIONAL STORM DEVELOPMENT WITH AT LEAST A RISK FOR SEVERE HAIL
ACROSS PARTS OF NORTHWEST TEXAS INTO SOUTHWESTERN/SOUTH CENTRAL
OKLAHOMA WITHIN THE NEXT COUPLE OF HOURS.

..KERR/GOSS.. 04/11/2016


ATTN...WFO...SHV...FWD...OUN...SJT...

LAT...LON 32349774 33399979 33619986 34169809 34419726 33959648
33749563 33189485 32379518 31379614 31419701 32349774

Usually the forecasters use the word "robust." Just a personal observation. Hopefully it won't be too vigorous. 4,000 J/kg with negligible CIN is something to watch.

Google Search for "vigorous:

vig·or·ous
ˈviɡ(ə)rəs/
adjective
strong, healthy, and full of energy.
synonyms: robust, healthy, hale and hearty, strong, sturdy,...

[Ntxw]

Dryline hasn't ignited much thus far, most of it is with attending cold/warm front up north

[EF-5bigj]

There is mean looking supercell near Bowie,TX