Significant Severe Weather Outbreak This Weekend

Right off the bat, if you are heading to Chili Fest in Snook Saturday, you will not experience any large storms. The wind will be quite busy, it will be very warm and there could be an isolated shower. The severe weather threat for the Brazos Valley will be from Sunday evening to Monday morning. However, the rest of the Plains will experience quite and event Saturday night into Sunday morning.

From this evening though Monday, the Plains, including us in the Brazos Valley will experience hazardous weather as a significant weather event will begin to unfold.

Lets set the stage for you. This evening, severe weather from a storm sitting over the eastern side of the Rockies will continue to produce powerful severe thunderstorms and even a few isolated tornadoes in Oklahoma. The big show and most intense energy that will help grow larger thunderstorms for the weekend sits over the western Rockies.

In the above image, the circled area is where there is strong energy in the mid and upper levels of the atmosphere that needs to be closely monitored this weekend. Once this piece of energy crosses the Rockies Saturday afternoon and enters the Plains, there will be sufficient dynamics to produce widespread significant severe weather.

Because there will be enough moisture in play, heat, energy in the upper levels of the atmosphere, a cold front that will move into the Plains that will help lift the air, the Storm Prediction Center (SPC) in Norman, Oklahoma is expecting a HIGH RISK of severe weather from Oklahoma to Nebraska. Unless there is enough dynamics to produce significant damage the SPC rarely uses their HIGH RISK category.

Areas tomorrow encompassed under the moderate and high risk categories in the image above will experience high straight line winds up to 80mph, very large hail (up to baseball or larger), and large long tracking tornadoes. Timing of this event Saturday will mainly be in the evening and overnight hours. I would not be surprised if tornadoes of EF-3 or stronger are generated from the storms tomorrow in this area of the country.

One of the biggest reasons why this area will see multiple tornadoes is because the jet stream will be on top of this region which will rotate the wind and help to prolong the life of strong thunderstorms.

That's Saturday......Sunday, this severe weather risk will shift to east and southeast Texas.

At the moment, we have a slight risk of severe weather Sunday evening and into Monday morning. Our main threats are for strong winds and hail. As far as tornadoes there might be an isolated one, but we don't have the same dynamics like Oklahoma and Kansas will have Saturday. Nonetheless, keep your guard up because this storm is quite energetic.

Look at the following image which shows the jet stream level on Sunday with the wind speeds around 35,000 feet.

Where the blue color is and especially the darker blue color, illustrates the strongest winds within the jet stream. Notice the this area is well to our north. Therefore, winds in the upper levels of the atmosphere do not have as good of a chance to produce long lived super cell thunderstorms here and our likely hood for tornadic development is much lower because this field of strong winds is north of us. However, there can still be a quick weak tornado here on Sunday evening.

Lets time this event out.....

Around 4-5PM on Sunday, a cold front will approach the Brazos Valley with strong to severe thunderstorms ahead of it. You can expect strong winds, hail and even the possibility for a weak tornado.

Note: It is still too early to call the exact timing, and the forecast can change from now to Sunday, and I will keep you updated on the situation.

Now, here is where the interesting part of this cold front comes into play. By Sunday night and into Monday morning, the cold front will approach the coast and slow down.....

Some computer information shows this front stalling Monday and early Tuesday. Despite the above model illustrating that we will be in the clear by noon Monday, other guidance suggests that the rain may stick around. Therefore, questions remain with the timing and speed of the front. However, the severe weather threat will diminish by Monday morning whether this front stalls or not.

If this front stalls we could be in for a ton of rain and the flooding risk will sky rocket. The following image is the current thinking on rainfall accumulation though Monday.

1" to 2" amounts of rain will be common, but if the front stalls, 3" to as much as 5" or rain will be in our future. That's the way it looks right now....check out this blog and the facebook page for the latest updates.

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