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Brian and Scott have been watching a storm in E Colorado that produced hail and wind damage. They commented that the 3DVAR analysis seems to produce a very realistic wind field at the 1.5 km level for the storm of interest.
As we watched the storms move through central Oklahoma today a small, isolated cell developed over Lawton, Oklahoma. This storm conveniently gave us the opportunity to show the effectiveness of total lightning observations in helping gain lead-time ahead of the first cloud-to-ground lightning strike. This small cell turned out to be even more interesting as the PGLM observations gave a 29 minute lead-time over the first cloud-to-ground strike. This was pretty remarkable as the lead time is usually on the order of 5-10 minutes. Below are three images showing the event.
-Geoffrey Stano (NASA/SPORT)
Central Oklahoma had several strong thunderstorms move through the region and the forecasters at the Spring Program had the chance to check out the pseudo geostationary lightning products derived from the Oklahoma lightning mapping array. Most of our time was spent investigating the products and discussing the various pros and cons. The figure above shows a good use for these data in a lightning safety perspective. The 1-minute PGLM flash extent density (and the corresponding NLDN cloud-to-ground lightning data) are tightly clustered with the the stronger convective regions, indicated by strong radar reflectivity. However, unlike the NLDN data, the PGLM flash extent density still showed that lightning flashes were extended anywhere from 8-32 km into the stratiform region. This shows the advantage of seeing the spatial extent of lightning activity available from total lightning observations. This is further emphasized with the PGLM maximum flash density in the upper-right which shows the maximum PGLM for each grid box for the past 60 minutes. This shows that most of central Oklahoma has had lightning activity within the past hour, indicating that the threat of a cloud-to-ground strike still exists.
-Geoffrey Stano (PGLM Principal Investigator)
Brandon has been comparing the 3DVAR data with the regional radars across OUN, specifically max vorticity from 3DVAR vs radial velocity data.
Below is a screenshot from 2111 UTC including max vorticity of about 0.01 s^-2 to storm relative velocity (at 1.8, 2.4, and 3.1 degrees elevation) from KTLX:
-K. Kuhlman
Second tornado warning today, this one from the Goodland localization (Blair).
Earlier, the UAH-CI algorithm had shown some CI ‘yes’ detections for the region. Later updates of this algorithm may be able to incorporate trends and layer CI to more than the current yes/no configuration.
OUN-WRF continues to show trend for robust storm cells around the CO/KS border… missed initial storm warned shown here, but each additional run persists in developing significant convection across the area.
-K. Kuhlman
Brian is noting a good relationship between the 3DVAR vorticity field and low-level radial velocity data on the tornado-warned storm in NE Cleveland/Pott. Counties.
Issued TOR for eastern Cleveland with a shallow but continunous QLCS feature near Pink. TOR area is outside 3DVAR domain and PGLM 1min composite did not appear (qualitatively) to show a jump (or any organized pattern) associated with low level spinup. Values of 1min appear to be low, generally under 20 km**-2 min **-1. Warning basis solely on SRM.
–Curran
Brandon has been observing storms in Oklahoma with the 3DVAR and lightning products. The plot above shows a strong relationship between the maximum updraft intensity over the previous 60 minutes with CG lightning strikes over the same time period.
Brandon also noted that is is difficult to correlate the updraft intensity with reflectivity cores aloft due to the temporal lag in the 3DVAR products.
— Travis Smith
Focus this afternoon is spread across all the projects of the EWP this year (GOES-R, 3DVAR, short-range models).
A few of the forecasters are concentrating on the OUN CWA, analyzing the ongoing convection across the region. These forecasters (Curran/Vincent/Billings) will be issuing significant weather advisories after examining storms using the GOES-R pGLM lightning data and NSSL-3DVAR products in addition to their typical radar analyses.
Our other forecasters (Taylor/Blair) are monitoring the DDC and GLD CWA’s for convection initiation. Experimental products being brought into their analyses include the GOES-R proving ground CI products (UAH-SATCAST) and GOES Nearcast. They are also examining OUN-WRF and HRRR updates as they become available. In the future, a D-Prog/D-time type product might help the forecasters better visualize model trends. Significant weather advisories are also expected from this group as CI becomes evident.
Note: Discussions of forecasters with the GOES-R UAH-CI team have already lead to the modifications of their product remove detections of cloud objects and only display when CI is occurring.
-Kristin Kuhlman (Weekly Coordinator)
AREA FORECAST DISCUSSION
Billings/Taylor/Vincent
