Tuesday, May 15, 2012

Severe Weather Targets Chicago, Milwaukee Today

There is a slight risk of severe thunderstorms today from northern Illinois into southern Wisconsin and southwest Michigan. Extreme northwest Indiana and eastern Iowa are also included in this risk.

Current surface analysis indicates a cold front will be sweeping south and east into the area highlighted, bringing what the Storm Prediction Center calls 'supercells and/or severe multicell line segments' to the region.

Considering the area highlighted is within warm temperatures but not so high humidities, these storms should not be incredibly rainy, so flash flooding is not anticipated in most areas. However, heavy rainfall in an area cannot be ruled out.
When the SPC is talking about these 'severe multicell line segments', they are discussing bowing segments of storms.

At around 6:00 PM CDT this afternoon, the SPC's WRF-NMM model is projecting that a line of strong storms will ignite in the region and likely produce some severe activity in the region.

The same WRF-NMM run off a different machine tells that the storms should be based farther west. Considering that the first image is from what I consider the 'operational' forecast, and it seems to be in line with the SPC, I will go with that solution.

Andrew

1 comment:

ERN WX said...

Hello, Andrew. Glad to see you get in on the excitement. My area is in see text today & there is a good chance they will need to upgrade. Clouds are clearing better than expected. Enjoy your thunderstorms!!!/