Target: Mankato, KS by ~4pm
Good morning! Didn’t get a whole heck of a lotta sleep last night… getting everything ready to set out for the chase. Stacie got here about 12:30am, and in a couple hours Jay will be arriving. It appears everything is on track for a decent supercell setup in north-central Kansas. The target appears to be along the Hwy 36 corridor between Smith Center and Belleville. WSW flow at 500mb of 40-50 kts will spread over the remnant Pacific cold front "acting dryline" promoting very healthy deep layer shear. Low level moisture will be marginal at best for tornadoes, but given the shear environment, it is certainly possible to get a tornado especially between 7 and 9pm when the 0-1km shear ramps up significantly.
As it stands now, after today’s chase… we are looking at two down days. Wednesday we will likely drive to Rapid City and Thursday will be a leisure day around the Black Hills. Low level moisture will likely increase enough for decent storms on Friday. One hell of a cap will be in place south of the Dakotas with widespread near-100°F heat expected from western Nebraska into the TX-OK Panhandles. In this situation, it’s best to be near the 700mb baroclinic zone… which will be well into the Dakotas Friday and even into the weekend.
Good luck, Miguel! We’ll see you in a few days. Feel free to call me for arm chairing through 6:00 p.m. today and Friday.
Comment by Jonathan Smith — May 23, 2006 @ 8:59 am