Major outbreak of Severe WX expected in the Southeast

[JenyEliza]

Current situation according to FFC



We're inside that white watch box.

[conestogo_flood]

How much longer should all these storms last?

[Brent]

How much longer should all these storms last?

Probably not much longer... within a few hours I'd expect all watches and warnings to be gone. Air is more stable to the east.

[brandybugg4180]

they just issued a tornado watch for all the counties to the west of me including the one right next to me and under me. Have a few nasty looking storms coming in from Ga I think they are gonna blow thru the low country though although i could be wrong. Any one know any other info

[Brent]

WOW... the damage from Fayette County, GA is incredible. I was glued to the WSB News at Noon last hour and the helicopter shots looked really bad. I'm thinking it might have been an F3... it hit a nice neighborhood too, very lucky no one was seriously injured or killed.

http://www.wsbtv.com/index.html

[JenyEliza]

WOW... the damage from Fayette County, GA is incredible. I was glued to the WSB News at Noon last hour and the helicopter shots looked really bad. I'm thinking it might have been an F3... it hit a nice neighborhood too, very lucky no one was seriously injured or killed.

http://www.wsbtv.com/index.html

There are also pictures on http://www.ajc.com

VERY scary stuff here yesterday...although our home was north and west of where the Tornado struck, I stayed glued to WSB as well.

Counting my many blessings today, and offer my prayers for those whose homes were destroyed in Fayette County--a VERY nice suburban area of Atlanta.

Jen

[WaitingForSiren]

To be honest, I was surprised that the SPC had the area under a Moderate risk for day 3...There were way too many negative factors. First of all, the storm system was weaking as it entered the region, thus the warm front didnt advect northward too far and caused a large area of warm advection to remain over the MDT risk area most of the day. Surprisingly most of the severe weather was over Kentucky, but then again that was where the dynamics were the strongest. A pretty big cluster of supercells blew up over northern Geogia later on in the day though, in the area that did actually see sunshine.

I guess the point is that even with situations that appear to be formidable svr wx producers, theres alwaysa lot of things that can go wrong. I always wonder how the SPC would cover the super outbreak or the palm sunday outbreak....hmm.

And as someone else mentioned, SPC has issued two day 3 outlooks with a moderate risk and both have been busts. The other was earlier in June i think, and to be honest I wonder what SPC was smoking when they issued a moderate risk.

[wxmann_91]

To be honest, I was surprised that the SPC had the area under a Moderate risk for day 3...There were way too many negative factors. First of all, the storm system was weaking as it entered the region, thus the warm front didnt advect northward too far and caused a large area of warm advection to remain over the MDT risk area most of the day. Surprisingly most of the severe weather was over Kentucky, but then again that was where the dynamics were the strongest. A pretty big cluster of supercells blew up over northern Geogia later on in the day though, in the area that did actually see sunshine.

I guess the point is that even with situations that appear to be formidable svr wx producers, theres alwaysa lot of things that can go wrong. I always wonder how the SPC would cover the super outbreak or the palm sunday outbreak....hmm.

And as someone else mentioned, SPC has issued two day 3 outlooks with a moderate risk and both have been busts. The other was earlier in June i think, and to be honest I wonder what SPC was smoking when they issued a moderate risk.

Actually, it just so happened that the model runs were agreeing very well on a major severe weather outbreak right until the run right after the SWODY3 MOD came out. So they couldn't change it to SLGT. The first time they used the SWODY3 MOD the conditions did look equally scary, but the cap was too weak and convection fired way too early to allow for a tornado outbreak.

As it turns out, the Jan 2 storm did turn out to be very impressive. The instability was quite strong for Jan., and as always for winter outbreaks, the dynamics were no problem. Perhaps, in the morning, the "junk convection" held on too long and did not allow for ample destabilization, thus keeping the warm front from advancing northward, and leaving the wedge stuck in much of Georgia north and east of an Atlanta to Macon line. This, along with a stronger than expected cap in Alabama (which prevented storms from forming much earlier and actually turning into an outbreak) prevented this from becoming the huge outbreak that was predicted.

One of those times when all the synoptic features were perfect, but the mesoscale features doomed the outbreak. A great case study indeed.

[WaitingForSiren]

Well, the time earlier in the summer where they used the MDT risk day 3 seemed unnecessary. I probably dont have as much weather knowledge as the other people here as I am probably the youngest or one of the youngest ones here (18, almost 19) and all I know about the weather is what ive personally researched, but from what I do know the sypnotic set-up wasnt exactly perfect. Actually I remember thinking that it looked a little more ominous the day after the day the SPC had for a MDT risk on day3. The storm was ejecting sharply northeastward and it looked like a pretty good set up for severe storms. Sure enough a bunch of low topped supercells blew up in Wisconsin and produced F2 tornadoes.

And about sypnotic conditions being perfect, wouldnt a more "perfect" set up be an intesifying low, rather a weaking one? I think, had the storm remained stronger or strengthened, then it WOULD have been a major outbreak. But if a storms weakening you gotta think the upward motion would weaken and thus less of a pronounced dry-slot and a little less moisture being advected.

[wxmann_91]

Well, the time earlier in the summer where they used the MDT risk day 3 seemed unnecessary. I probably dont have as much weather knowledge as the other people here as I am probably the youngest or one of the youngest ones here (18, almost 19) and all I know about the weather is what ive personally researched, but from what I do know the sypnotic set-up wasnt exactly perfect. Actually I remember thinking that it looked a little more ominous the day after the day the SPC had for a MDT risk on day3. The storm was ejecting sharply northeastward and it looked like a pretty good set up for severe storms. Sure enough a bunch of low topped supercells blew up in Wisconsin and produced F2 tornadoes.

And about sypnotic conditions being perfect, wouldnt a more "perfect" set up be an intesifying low, rather a weaking one? I think, had the storm remained stronger or strengthened, then it WOULD have been a major outbreak. But if a storms weakening you gotta think the upward motion would weaken and thus less of a pronounced dry-slot and a little less moisture being advected.

I'm 14.

I don't remember what the models were predicting on May 8, when that MOD Day 3 outlook showed up. But at least NWS Norman OK thought it was scary looking:

AREA FORECAST DISCUSSION
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE NORMAN OK
1037 AM CDT TUE JUN 7 2005

-clipped-

REGARDING LATE WEEK...HAVE A VERY STRONG FEELING THAT SOMETHING
BIG IS BREWING. LOOKING AT PROGGED LONGWAVE PATTERN - WITHOUT
GETTING BOGGED DOWN IN DETAILS - THE SETUP LOOKS ABOUT AS POTENT
FOR WIDESPREAD/SIGNIFICANT SEVERE WX IN THE CENTRAL U.S. AS THIS
FORECASTER HAS SEEN IN NEARLY 25 YEARS OF OPERATIONAL EXPERIENCE.
MODELS HAVE BEEN CONSISTENT WITH UNSEASONABLY STRONG HEIGHT FALLS
INTO THE SW LATE THIS WEEK. LATEST RUNS DEPICT NOSE OF A VERY
STRONG UPPER JET /140 KT AT 300MB/ BLASTING SE ONTO THE W COAST
BY SAT...WHICH SUPPORTS CONTINUING NEG HEIGHT ANOMALIES OUT W AND
THUS KEEPING A VERY DEEP LONGWAVE TROF OVER THE W FOR JUNE...MOST
LIKELY WITH A GENERAL NEGATIVE TILT AS DEPICTED BY A MAJORITY OF
THE MED-RANGE MODELS. UNSEASONABLY STRONG MID/UPPER LEVEL FLOW
THUS LIKELY AT LOW LATITUDES INTO S PLAINS. DETAILS...SUCH AS
EFFECTS OF PROBABLE MCS ACTIVITY OR EVEN A POSSIBLE TROPICAL
CYCLONE IN THE GULF AS SUGGESTED BY THE GFS...ARE MORE ELUSIVE AND
REALLY ARE NOT AS CRUCIAL AT THIS POINT. SCREAMING MESSAGE IS THAT
POTENTIAL WILL EXIST FOR 1 OR MORE SIGNIFICANT CENTRAL-U.S. SEVERE
WX OUTBREAKS...BEGINNING AS EARLY AS THU BUT MORE LIKELY IN THE
FRI-SAT-SUN PERIOD. PLAN TO HIT THIS HARD IN THE NOON HWO.

About that low strength, the parent low of the 1974 Super Outbreak actually was weakening as the outbreak occurred. Yes, as a general rule of thumb, that is true, but do not let a weakening low fool you. But in this case though you may actually have a good point. Perhaps the lift was insufficient to break the cap until the front hit Georgia where the cap had weakened enough.

[WaitingForSiren]

Wow, youre only 14? amazing, lol. Anyway, apparently the area where the supercells did blow up was the only area that got good surface heating. I guess you could say "what if there was good heating and clear skies to the east?", but that wouldnt make sense because if that would have happened the whole sypnotic set-up would have to have been totally different. Yeah, I know the low was weakening during the super outbreak but that was a rather different set-up. The low weakened in Kansas that bombed out that morning but a new one formed in southeast Iowa, and since the storm was moving northeastward the warm front surged northward rapidly, rather than a stagnant weakening warm front. I have to admit, it was actually a pretty potent set up last week. I was concerned because all that dry air in the south/southwest was getting swept eastward and I thought that if a good dryline could get established a major outbreak would be possible. Obviously that didnt happen.

[Brent]

I'm 17... you'd be surprised how many young people there are here.