Next Few Days Looking Interesting.

As mentioned this morning, things were looking pretty interesting for this afternoon and still are. We have had enough sunshine to heat things up and the capping inversion layer aloft is showing signs of breaking down. If storms do form, they will quickly become severe with large hail, damaging winds, and isolated tornadoes possible for the evening into the early night time hours.

The map on the right from the Ok Mesonet is one way of measuring the moisture and instability present and this particular map also shows the surface winds. Notice the dry line is clearly evident just west of I-35, but notice also that the surface winds only gradually veer from southerly to a more SW component. That implies there is not much convergence along the dry line and so far conditions aloft have been marginal as well. However, given the degree of instability, that may be all that is necessary.

Much the same scenario will be possible for Sunday afternoon and evening. Once again, the question will be if storms can break through the capping inversion aloft, but if they do they will quickly become severe. The dry line will still be well to the west of us, so it will largely be the surface heating and any minimal support aloft that may set off a few storms. That is why the chances of any one location receiving rainfall is being held to around the 30% level for this evening and again late Sunday.

After that, the pattern becomes even more interesting as a stalling frontal boundary is expected to drift down to near the Ok/Ks state line for the Mon and Tue time frame which will provide a better focus for storms to form. As a result, the chances of storms during the evening and overnight hours will be somewhat higher and there will continue to be a threat of severe storms.

The pattern will finally start changing on Wednesday with the frontal boundary finally pushing on through the state during the day. That means another good chance of storms, some likely severe on Wednesday but after that conditions should finally stabilize for the latter part of the week. The surface front sweeping on through the state will be followed by northerly winds and cooler conditions for the latter part of the week and quite possibly on into the coming Memorial Day weekend.

In the meantime, stay tuned, check back for updates, and keep a close eye on the sky.

Dick Faurot