Texas Summer 2012

[Tireman4]

No More High Pressure Ridge of Death....Woo Hooo.....

[Texas Snowman]

It's almost mid June and my thermometer has not officially hit 100 yet!!! Neither has DFW. Don't see it happening in the next 7 days. God bless the summer of 2012! Come on tropics!

Forecast is for 89 next Thursday in Sherman/Denison - 89 degrees! Last year in late June it was a bazillion degrees in the shade! Loving this summer so far.

[Texas Snowman]

NWS confirms EF-0 tornado hit Randolph, Tx (Fannin County) the other night.

------

PUBLIC INFORMATION STATEMENT
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE FORT WORTH TX
916 PM CDT THU JUN 14 2012

...EF0 TORNADO CONFIRMED IN FANNIN COUNTY ON JUNE 13TH...

A NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE TEAM ASSESSED THUNDERSTORM DAMAGE
ACROSS FANNIN COUNTY THIS AFTERNOON. THE TEAM DETERMINED THAT A
BRIEF TORNADO OCCURRED APPROXIMATELY ONE MILE TO THE NORTH OF THE
CITY OF RANDOLPH. THE TORNADO PRODUCED EF0 DAMAGE TO HOMES...BARNS
AND CROPS. HIGHEST WIND SPEEDS IN THE TORNADO WERE APPROXIMATELY
85 MILES PER HOUR. IN ADDITION TO THE DAMAGE TO HOMES...SEVERAL
LARGE TREES WERE SNAPPED IN THE AREA NEAR COUNTY ROAD 4145 AND
COUNTY ROAD 4160.

WHILE A TORNADO HAS BEEN CONFIRMED...THE BULK OF THE DAMAGE IN
FANNIN COUNTY WAS DETERMINED TO BE FROM STRAIGHT LINE WIND DAMAGE. A
LARGE SWATH OF DAMAGE STRETCHED FROM NEAR RANDOLPH TO NEAR LEONARD
IN SOUTHERN FANNIN COUNTY. WITHIN THIS SWATH OF DAMAGE...WHICH
INCLUDED HOMES AND FARM BUILDINGS...THE WIND SPEEDS WERE ESTIMATED
TO BE BETWEEN 85 AND 95 MPH.

$$

FOX / HUFFMAN

[Texas Snowman]

And the DFW/North Texas hail storms produced an estimated $400 million in damage, making them the 6th costliest hail storm disasters in North Texas history.

Softball sized hail in Fannin County (near Leonard); baseball sized hail in Irving; orange sized hail in Parker (Collin County); orange sized hail in Grand Prairie; and golfball sized hail in University Park/Northpark Mall.

-----

Isolated severe storms developed across northern sections of North Texas late in the afternoon on June 13th, 2012. The storms pummeled parts of Dallas, Collin, and Fannin counties with hail the size of baseballs (2.75"), oranges (3"), and softballs (4.25"). Numerous cars and houses were severely damaged by the very large hail. Early damage estimates suggest that this storm may cost 400 million or more, making it one of the costliest hail storms ever in Texas.

The Fannin County storm also produced a brief EF0 tornado and damaging straight line winds. The tornado damage occurred one mile north of the city of Randolph. Damage was done to homes, barns and crops. The highest wind speeds were approximately 85 mph. Large trees were snapped in the area near CR 4145 and CR 4160.

http://www.srh.noaa.gov/fwd/?n=june132012

[Ntxw]

^ Msnbc is reporting that it could be 2 billion or more. And that is as of today so nothing official yet. If this holds true it would not only be among tops in North Texas history but US history as well.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/47836374

Snippet

The AAA said half of all vehicles coming in for a claim were "complete losses," the NBC affiliate added.

Enterprise said it was bringing in 2,500 rental cars from other parts of Texas to help out with the Dallas demand.

The insurance service, a trade group that speaks for property insurers in Texas and Oklahoma, said members have already classified the storm as catastrophic...

"Based upon the claims filed within the past 36 hours, this storm could reach $1.5 to 2 billion in insured losses. This is preliminary and we are hopeful that the damage estimates fall short of what we are predicting," SIIS President Sandra Helin said in a statement..

[Texas Snowman]

A $2 BILLION dollar hailstorm? That's insane. I knew the other night was bad in Big D but I didn't know it was that bad.

Wowza!

[Ntxw]

A $2 BILLION dollar hailstorm? That's insane. I knew the other night was bad in Big D but I didn't know it was that bad.

Wowza!

Yeah I was a bit shocked as well. Heard it on the weather channel too. I guess the storms went over the densest regions of DFW and among wealthiest. Had a hunch it would be costly but jesus...

The storms were back-building too which helped the duration of it at any location. Here I saw maybe 15-20mins worth of rounds of hail but it was only tennis ball-ish.

[WacoWx]

Sorry no pics yet:

I leave work Wednesday in Las Colinas at 535 to see an anvil just to my north on a day with not a 20% chance of storms. I;m not hating on the NWS because outflow boundaries have a mind of there own. The wedge shape lowering was picture worthy, especially for a storm that was not in the forecast. I thought it was just an anomaly that was worth capturing. As I sat in traffic for the next 45 minute on NW Hwy, I noticed an inflow creating significant scud and still not any mention on the radio of significant weather. By the time I get to the toll, the lightning has really ramped up. In my mind, with no news on 1310 The Ticket, I feel a tornado is possible out of this storm, but the players were not in place for a tornado. The inbound winds were incredible (I'm just south of the scud).

By the time I get to I-75, I have unknowingly caught up with a north to south moving storm. The lowering was on the west side which I realized later via radar (on at least 3 cells). No rain has fallen at this point and then a piece of ice hits my car. The radio traffic report chimes in simultaneously with Plano and Richardson getting hail and disrupting traffic. I know the storm is heading south and my condo has no trees, so I find respite under a decent oak tree in a parking lot (ended up saving me $500 deductible).

No rain. Marbles start falling out of the sky so i get out to experience this phenomena first hand, next to a guy caught in the storm. Then I get hit in the face by a golf ball sized piece of ice...under the tree (looked like a fingernail scratch the next day). We got in the car and witnessed 45 minutes of straight up Armageddon. Even under the massive tree we were having to yell at each other.

Little did I know 10 miles south of me every car out in the open in Lakewood was getting demolished. My buddies house lost one window, but his neighbors lost every north facing window. For a fact, greater than baseball size hail hit an upscale neighborhood of Dallas (hence the high $ amount). I drove through today and saw roofs completely worked over (kinda older houses), windshields driving down the street like they had been hit with a hammer, and back windows covered with bubble wrap, or completely gone. The storm really got going after it left my location. All of my neighbors cars that werent under cover have incredible hail damage, worthy of insurance.

There was 0 chance this day of precip. The Office in Fort Worth has been putting out the most descriptive discussions in the past few weeks (if you're reading this, I, and everyone her, thanks you for your descriptive wording). I've learned a lot in the past two - three weeks. But I know everyone on this board wishes they could've witnessed this storm. Without a radar (btw, if you have an app, please let me know), from its inception, this storm turned in to a 6 mile high, baseball + dropping monster that came out of nowhere.

This next part will probably be taken wrong from a meteorologist's fan perspective. The models werent recognizing the instability? Intuition needs to be a small percentage of the equation (which whoever has been writing the NWS. I cant predict poop, from a model perspective. I depend on yall for that. But there had to be someone at Love Field watching the same storm evolve from a oddly shaped wedge (with lowering, which I later saw on the radar on all of the large hail storm on the west side) that something significant was in the making. Yes, a warning was issued during rush hour. The public had no idea. It was too late at that point. Hence, imo, a 10% issued for the first time in recent memory. The models not recognizing trends until it costs $$$ leads to local offices scrambling to follow the NWS, and issue 10% chances in the future:

...SO HAVE
JUST LEFT 10 PERCENT POPS WITH NO WEATHER MENTIONED.

Not upset at all, this phenomenon is unpredictable. We (yall) work with the tools given. The unpredictable is what makes predicting fun. I dont believe Jim Cantores statement that this was a urban heat island scenario (cop out). Nor do I believe in this concept at all.

Here's my overstated point...If you've never been in a massive hail storm, I totally recommend it. This was my biggest and I saw golf ball to racquetball size hail on two different episodes during this 45 mins.. You are at the mercy of the ice....which leads to trees getting shredded, which leads to drains getting clogged, which leads to flooding (what made me a weather junky).

Looking fwd to an Allison-type weekend next week.

tl:dr

I knew it was gonna "get real" with hail, and I saved myself a $500 deductible

[SaskatchewanScreamer]

My sincere sympathy to your city WacoWx!

[Ntxw]

Nice write up WacoWx! Hope you're enjoying the variable weather north of your previous Waco location! These storms were classic forecast nightmares indeed. In fact it wasn't all that different from the April 3rd tornado super cells (also a pair blossoming in Dallas county). Only difference was lower level shear wasn't good for tornadoes so hail was the big threat.

Both incidences the night before MCS/MCV rain occured west, south, and north of DFW (even east) but mostly died out as it reached the metroplex. I think this was they key player vs Cantore's heat island theory. Dallas has been running on some kind of unlucky streak when it comes to leftover boundaries this year. This left a pocket of unstable air over unworked atmosphere from the MCV in a rather localized area. I don't blame FWD because for any one location chances are low for storm ignition (that 10% was warranted and really only about that much of the area was effected anyway). Wrong place at the wrong time.

[WacoWx]

[randge]

No end of strange happenstance.

We had a brief and welcome shower, finally, here in Cypress. Then the sky cleared with just a few rags of cloud here and there. Around 4:00 pm, my wife called me from outside. "Come here and look at this!"

I was standing in the doorway, and she is dancing in the raindrops. "Look," she said, "it's raining here," and then skipping four feet to her left, "but not over here!"

Indeed, as I stepped off the porch, I was standing in rain out of a clear blue sky, but the concrete just a couple feet to the the east was bone dry. To the west, the sun lit up the raindrops, and we had fun stepping in and out of a shower for about ten minutes. "See, raining here, but not here."

Very purdy. Rain in the sunshine. Very odd too.

[vbhoutex]

No end of strange happenstance.

We had a brief and welcome shower, finally, here in Cypress. Then the sky cleared with just a few rags of cloud here and there. Around 4:00 pm, my wife called me from outside. "Come here and look at this!"

I was standing in the doorway, and she is dancing in the raindrops. "Look," she said, "it's raining here," and then skipping four feet to her left, "but not over here!"

Indeed, as I stepped off the porch, I was standing in rain out of a clear blue sky, but the concrete just a couple feet to the the east was bone dry. To the west, the sun lit up the raindrops, and we had fun stepping in and out of a shower for about ten minutes. "See, raining here, but not here."

Very purdy. Rain in the sunshine. Very odd too.

Brings back memories of standing in our yard in FL and watching it pour while our next door neighbor was getting nothing. It literally was raining right down our property line. I've seen it here in Houston too with it pouring four houses away and nothing at our house. Never have figured out how it can be so "precise".

[Portastorm]

In case any of you were wondering, I'm here to report that the Austin Rain Shield continues to work its magic. Last night, I watched a decent sized MCS roll down from the northwest only to take a right turn above Austin, moving to our west and slipping past us with no rainfall whatsoever. Happy for my friends in SAT who got some rain but we got ... nada, zilch, zero.

I've lost count now of the number of MCS systems which have bypassed us in the last few weeks. It's getting ridiculous.

Maybe the Engineers made the rain shield or something (for those of you who have seen "Prometheus," you'll get the reference).

Oh well ... back to summer.

[weatherdude1108]

In case any of you were wondering, I'm here to report that the Austin Rain Shield continues to work its magic. Last night, I watched a decent sized MCS roll down from the northwest only to take a right turn above Austin, moving to our west and slipping past us with no rainfall whatsoever. Happy for my friends in SAT who got some rain but we got ... nada, zilch, zero.

I've lost count now of the number of MCS systems which have bypassed us in the last few weeks. It's getting ridiculous.

Maybe the Engineers made the rain shield or something (for those of you who have seen "Prometheus," you'll get the reference).

Oh well ... back to summer.

I was watching that same MCS last night in disbelief (more of an apathetic expectation at this point) as it moved towards us and just miss us. My dad in SAT said they got a half inch! We didn't even get an outflow from it! I TOTALLY feel your pain Portastorm. Where it did rain in the hill country, most got soaked in by the soil cracks before running off into the Highland Lake system (Common 2012 theme so far for central Texas). I have no idea what is going on(???), but I wish the cruel joke would stop.

[Ntxw]

The PNA is currently very negative. If this were last year we'd be talking baking heat wave. However it is not 2011! Diurnal convection has kept things in check mostly and this should continue another week.

Minus the tropics, models indicate a move to +PNA late month so maybe we can get a cutoff low going. It is summer though so, not expecting much but maybe we can squeeze out a larger scale storm to dampen things up for the start of July.

[weatherdude1108]

I need to move away from central Texas to north, west, east, or even south Texas if I ever want to see rain again apparently. Bob Rose exerpt from today:

"Finally, a tropical area of low pressure is still forecast to develop somewhere over the southeastern Gulf Mexico or Bay of Campeche late this week. But with the development of high pressure over the Plains states late this week, it now appears whatever happens to develop will generally track west toward the north central coast of Mexico and not northwest towards the coast of Texas. The clouds and rain associated with the tropical low may affect parts of the Lower Rio Grande Valley but the rain looks to stay south of Central Texas and the middle Texas coast." 

http://www.lcra.org/water/conditions/we ... olumn.html

[South Texas Storms]

Too much uncertainy exists right now to rule out rain for us from that possible tropical disturbance.

Anyway, here is my latest weather article. Our weather could get interesting by this weekend.
http://www.examiner.com/article/possibl ... -for-texas

[Portastorm]

:uarrow:

Too much uncertainy exists right now to rule out rain for us from that possible tropical disturbance.

Anyway, here is my latest weather article. Our weather could get interesting by this weekend.
http://www.examiner.com/article/possibl ... -for-texas

I definitely agree. South central Texas has a decent shot at rain tomorrow as the upper-level low is in a position to create the most instability in our part of the state. Furthermore, I'm not convinced yet that this supposed super-high pressure dome will squash any and all Gulf moisture to our south for the next week.

[Tireman4]

I am thinking that too Porta and South Texas Storms . I mean they ( models) cannot get a handle on what is going on in the tropics, how in the world can it figure out the mega high that is coming? Just my opinion. So could be wrong.

The preceding post is NOT an official forecast, and should not be used as such. It is only the opinion of the poster and may or may not be backed by sound meteorological data. It is NOT endorsed by any professional institution including storm2k.org. For Official Information please refer to the NHC and NWS products.