Today is a day we’re going to struggle for severe weather.  We have a risk along a cold front along the southeast coast, but instability and shear are marginal.  Convection in a line is ongoing in South Carolina at the time of our briefing, and the front is expected to move offshore from SC by about 6pm.  Further SW, the front trails to the FL Panhandle.  There is a marginal chance of severe all along the front.  So, we have started the day with one team working the Charleston, SC (CHS) WFO, and the other team working Jacksonville, FL (JAX).  The CHS team is diving into a situation where storms are ongoing (and CAE issued a SVR at the start of ops).  The JAX team will be primarily focusing on CI and nowcast issues if and until storms develop in SE Georgia.

For the evening, we may have one team operate a “CWSU” operation over the northeast Gulf of Mexico, making nowcasts for aircraft routing.  We’ll set them up as a WFO (either TLH or TBW), but “products” will be issued via the blog.  The other team may still work a land mass and issuing warnings.  There is also the outside chance we move back to south Texas if severe storms threaten there (in a “SEE TEXT”).  That decision will be made around 5pm.

Here is the SPC Day 1 outlook map:

Greg Stumpf, EWP2012 Week#1 Coordinator