Recap of May 28, 2013

Hey guys,

Storm chasing veteran Steve Jaye and I ventured out into northeast Colorado again on Tuesday 5/28. Convection started early in the day, around 1pm local time, northeast of Denver. In typical Colorado fashion, dewpoints were in the 30's and 40's yet the cells had good structure and were growing fast. We headed northeast on I-76 and were watching cells both to our north and south. Around 3pm, we saw this very high-based storm north of Brush, CO:

We left this storm as there were 3 or 4 discrete cells developing south and east of us with better inflow (dewpoints close to 50). By the time we made it to Sterling, CO, there were 3 cells, aligned north-south that were all rapidly developing. Immediately north of Sterling, the northernmost cell got its act together fast, formed a wall cloud and began to produce funnels. The following video and picture is from that storm, which we basically followed for the next hour or two. The video is long, but interesting points are at 2:40 (funnel) and 6:05 (funnel + possible ground circulation).

After this storm lost its strength and grew upscale, we started heading back home when we encountered this lone mothership, which started dropping 1.5" hail on us. Luckily, the hail was melted on the outside and did not cause bigger problems.

- Dryline

Recap of 5-24-2013

Chasers,

Steve Jaye and I chased yesterday in northeast Colorado and western Nebraska. We did well by not listening to the HRRR which was incorrectly insistent on most activity initializing and mostly staying south of I-70. We caught 4 different supercells, 2 of which accounted for 2"+ inch hail, but the very high cloud bases did not allow for much of a tornado chance. Here's a picture from a cell just east of Lake Mcconaughy (Nebraskans say "who the heck needs Cancun?") just before sunset.

Looks like an active pattern will continue for the next few days, so you may be hearing from me soon.

-Dryline

Upslope machine to get cranking?

Fellow chasers & weather enthusiasts, Mo Nature has given the southern Plains the shaft this spring, with a general lack of tornadoes and severe storm events. Those areas will likely have to wait 'til next year for a renewed hope of crazy weather since the jet stream is quickly weakening, and moving northwards following the sun. But, now is the time that the areas by the front range start to see increasing chances of severe storms as the dryline provides an almost daily convergence line that lights up given even modest upper-level forcing. The last few days have seen diurnal bouts of convection driven high-elevation heating over the Great Basin. Starting in the high plateaus weak to moderate strength t-storms fired as the heating of the afternoon broke the cap. However, things get a bit more interesting as a large-scale upper-level trough progresses east. Myself and fellow UW alumnus Steve Jaye may be heading out Saturday. The following shows my current thoughts:

The tentative target is Sterling, CO. More updates soon hopefully...

-Dryline