Saturday, July 11, 2009

SEVERE WARNING!



Northern Tompkins County, and then probably Cortland County, is in for a doozey of a storm. There is a ton of lightning with this one, and hail and strong winds are possible as well. Flash flooding is also a concern with the heavy rain. Take cover now!

Evening Severe Threat

The severe threat is continuing across the area, even though our watch has been canceled and the first round has moved well off to the east. In fact, the SPC is watching a large area of New York and Pennsylvania for a potential watch...and this time, it could be a tornado watch. Right now, most storms are over Pennsylvania. There have been 2 tornado reports down there, and there is another tornado warning out right now. None of those storms will effect us though. However, there is a severe thunderstorm cluster southeast of Buffalo, with additional storms over Lake Erie and north of Lake Ontario. Even though the daytime heating is over, the conditions in the atmosphere are such that the amount of instability will possibly even increase as the evening goes on.

Stay tuned...next update should come by 9pm. Check www.weather.gov/bgm to see if a watch has been issued for the area.

Severe Thunderstorm Watch #570

A severe thunderstorm watch has been issued for all of Western and Central New York until 6pm. The main threat the SPC is outlining is damaging winds. Here are the complete risks from the watch:

Tornadoes
Probability of 2 or more tornadoes

Low (20%)

Probability of 1 or more strong (F2-F5) tornadoes

Low (5%)

Wind
Probability of 10 or more severe wind events

Mod (40%)

Probability of 1 or more wind events > 65 knots

Mod (30%)

Hail
Probability of 10 or more severe hail events

Low (20%)

Probability of 1 or more hailstones > 2 inches

Low (10%)

Combined Severe Hail/Wind
Probability of 6 or more combined severe hail/wind events

High (70%)



And the counties in the watch:

Risks Upgraded

There have been a couple of changes in the forecast this morning as things area already rapidly evolving. Probably the most significant of these changes is that, instead of all the clouds and rain the models had been forecasting for us this morning, skies are clear. This is causing the atmosphere to destabilize quicker and more intensely than had been forecasted. Another thing to look at is the radar. Thunderstorms are widespread just west of Buffalo, and already, there are some storms popping out ahead of this main area...so the question of whether or not storms will form is out the window.

The Storm Prediction Center has us in a 30-30-5% risk for wind-hail-tornadoes, respectively. All three of those are on the upper end of their 'slight' risk category. After looking at a couple things, I moved my hail and win up to moderate, and kept tornadoes at slight. Since storms are already firing, I moved the thunderstorm risk all the way up, which the NWS in Binghamton also did on their threat outlooks.

Here is what I am expecting for each threat:

Thunderstorms: Extreme-
Widespread thunderstorms can be expected with almost everywhere getting a storm. Frequent lightning should accompany the storms, and a fair number of them will likely be severe.

Wind: Moderate-
With the sun out this morning and strong upper level winds, wind damage is likely somewhere in Central New York, with some possibility of widespread damaging winds. 3 to 7 damaging wind reports are possible in the Grotonweather forecast area (Tompkins, S. Cayuga and Cortland Counties), with more elsewhere in Central New York. Should a widespread wind event evolve, this will be increased to high.

Hail: Moderate-
With extra instablity from the sun this morning, and indications of favorable hail formation from both the models, and current observations, hail could become a major factor today. 3 to 7 severe (0.75" of bigger) hail reports in the forecast area is possible, with more elsewhere in Central New York. Hail sizes should stay below 1.5", but an isolated storm could produce up to 2" hail. An upgrade to a high risk is not expected at this time.

Tornadoes: Slight-
Little changes to the tornado forecast have been made. A tornado somewhere in Western and Central New York seems almost likely. Multiple tornadoes could be possible, but this certainty isn't enough for a moderate risk at the time. However, with strong southeast winds at the surface, winds at low levels out of the southwest, and upper level winds coming in from the west, the threat for tornadoes will need to be watched closely.

Friday, July 10, 2009

Friday Afternoon's Severe Weather Outlook for 7/11

I spent the morning and early afternoon down at the National Weather Service in Binghamton, where I am an intern this summer, and used some of their in-house tools to try to get a better handle on the severe weather threat tomorrow. I will mention that the meteorologists there this morning believe tomorrow will be an active day and seem to have a high confidence level.

One of the tools I used this morning was a form called the 'severe weather checklist'. This form has you enter in forecasted values for a variety of severe weather parameters. After doing so, it returns the 5 most similar severe weather days in recent Central New York history. When completing this checklist this morning, it returned 4 days of 'isolated supercells', including May 16th, 2009, which had 3 tornadoes in the area, and May 31, 2002, which had 4 tornadoes. The fifth day was classified as a 'broken line'. Hail was the primary threat from the five days collectively. That tells me that not everywhere tomorrow will see a strong thunderstorm....some areas may barely even get any rain. However, there is certainly potential for some severe weather, and someone will likely have to deal with a damaging storm.

Here is a glance at where I have my threat levels, and an in depth look at exactly what I mean by each threat level, as well as what would need to happen for an upgraded risk:

Thunderstorms: moderate-
Thunderstorms are likely across much of the area. A few places, however, will be missed and get little to no rain. Frequent lightning will accompany some of the storms.

High Winds: slight-
Some storms may contain strong winds. Wind damage will be isolated to scattered, with 3 to 10 reports in Central New York. Sunshine in the morning would increase the chances of wind damage, and could get this bumped up to a moderate risk.

Hail: slight-
Small hail will be possible with stronger storms tomorrow, but most hail should remain uner 1" in diameter. The strongest storms may produce up to 1.5" hail. 5-12 Severe hail (over 0.75") events can be expected in Central New York. This is still rather uncertain, and could be upgraded to a moderate risk should the models show a bit better conditions for hail tomorrow morning.

Tornadoes: slight-
Conditions are favorable for rotating storms, and tornadoes could form. My best current guess is that somewhere in Western, Central and Southern New York will see a weak tornado, but as many as 2 or 3 wouldn't surprise me. This would most likely not be upgraded to moderate unless numerous storms that have already developed are showing signs of becoming tornadic.

Expect the next website update to occur between 9 and 11 am tomorrow. A blog update should occur within 30 minutes of that. There also could be a quick blog update tonight. During the afternoon tomorrow, I plan to have the weather chat open and will be updating th blog and website as needed. Stay tuned!