The Storm Patrol

We sat in Elk County, KS all day for the most part with nothing to show. We got to Severy, KS around 2pm and parked at the gas station on US 400. At the gas station we watched cells fire to our SSE and move NE. This first round of storms produced some severe wind / hail reports but no tornadoes.

20z radar image showing the first round of storms

After the first storm we dropped south on KS highway 99 to Moline, KS where we got on a small storm, and chased it to the east on US 160. That second round of convection just couldn't sustain as several small cells fired just to die 15 - 20 miles NE. It appears in the post mortem that the initial storms added just enough CIN to keep the storms that fired after from becoming established. The SPC Meso Analysis graphics at the time showed 2000 j/kg of CAPE in our target area with very little CIN. continue reading...

We are still waiting for storms to fire, it looks like a nocturnal event at this point 7:45pm CDT. As the upper level wave approaches and the nocturnal low level jet kicks in we should see the tornado risk increase across Eastern Kansas. I just analyzed surface data and we have a slowly retrograding warm front just to our north with dewpoints in the mid 60s to the south. The 0z soundings show a cap over the area, we aren’t sure if its going to break or not over the next few hours. So for now we are going to stay out here and wait and see that’s about all we can do at this point, Welcome to storm chasing! The SPC thinks storms could fire? As per watch update MD #244. Thanks for watching our rather boring stream. Tyler....

Jordan and I are starting our chase here in Severy, KS today waiting on storms to fire along a stalled frontal boundary. We will be live streaming once the storms fire. The SPC is forecasting a moderate risk of severe weather today. The primary threats are Tornadoes (some strong), Large hail, and Damaging winds.  

Jordan is on storm about 10 miles west of Parsons, KS CLICK HERE TO SEE HIS LIVE STREAM. At the time of this post Jordan is sitting at the US 400 / US 169 interchange 8 miles west of Parsons, KS This is one of the events where the nocturnal low level jet kicked and is increasing the tornado risk. Here are a few pictures and graphics concerning the event

Jordan and I will be chasing locally later today. We are going to target extreme Southeast Kansas and Northeast Oklahoma. The RPM / HRRR fire very isolated storms around 23z (6pm CDT) right around the KS, OK, MO tri-state border. Right now we have a decent cu field across the area ahead of slow moving cold front associated with a surface low near Stillwater, OK. Surface dewpoint temperatures are in the mid 60’s across the warm sector and MLCAPE values of 2000 j/kg are some of the enhancing factors. Some of the negative factors for today’s event are low values of ESRH and Southwest surface winds. Since we are basically at the target it might be a while until be start streaming will let everyone know with updated posts on Facebook.com/thestormpatrol and Twitter @thestormpatrol

This is just a snapshot of what we are thinking this is not intended to be used as a forecast!

Here are some links to offical forecasts of today's severe weather event. The National Weather Service The Storm Prediction Center Tyler  

Well March, 25^th was an eventful chase in Oklahoma. We chased a supercell that produced a nice stovepipe tornado in Sand Springs, OK.

3-25-15 GPS Log

We started the day by heading down to Vinita, OK where we grabbed lunch and went over the data. We noticed the warm front was still slowly moving north. The low was very close to OKC so we decided to go west to Bartlesville, OK to get northeast of the low. We sat in Bartlesville for a few min and realized the front wasn’t that far north.

KINX radar image at 1:13pm

Storms began firing near Stillwater, OK so we proceeded south to the Tulsa area.  We then got on a storm near Glenpool which quickly crapped out! As it died we saw the storms to the northwest were intensifying and were located in the sweet spot northeast of the surface low. We cut west to highway 97 and went north to get into position for the storm north of Sand Springs. continue reading...

Jordan and Tyler are chasing a moderate risk in Oklahoma today. We will be live streaming at both SevereStudios.com and TVNWeather.com under Tyler Costantini. Today’s target is a pie shaped area northeast of the surface low that’s where an enhanced tornado exists. At this time that area is forecast to be from Oklahoma City northeast to about Bartlesville, OK around 22z or 5pm CDT.  This is just to let everyone know where we will be for official forecasts check out your local National Weather Service Office or local media. Tyler

Will it ever storm? It’s March 16^th and we haven’t had any significant weather tornado alley what’s the deal! Well it’s a slow start that’s for sure but it’s only mid March while we have had big tornado outbreaks in February and March , April and May are the big months for severe weather in the southern plains. Severe weather tends to shift north towards summer to the Dakotas and into Canada. I know social media is blowing up with long range models and people going nuts over GFS, ECMWF, and CFS model runs it has to be put in prospective. Models just don’t work out that far without getting into a bunch of technical details. Just be patient and it will storm! I’m not worried about it there will always be storms and will be out chasing them.      Tyler

The SPC has issued a day 2 moderate risk for almost all of Nebraska, Most of Iowa, NE Kansas, and Northern Missouri. Quote from SPC "the potential exists for the significant severe weather event Tuesday and Tuesday night with very large hail... Tornadoes and widespread damaging winds" The Storm Patrol will be live streaming from the risk area tomorrow. These images do not update for realtime weather information click here to see the latest from the SPC

We are chasing the mothers day moderate risk in Northern, Kansas and Southeast, Nebraska. We will be live streaming on SevereStudios.com and TVNWeather.com when we have data. The data service is kinda spotty here even with 3 data cards.