Lightning Jump Suggestion

Lightning Jump suggestion:  Instead of having blocks/blobs of color that cover up radar and/or satellite imagery, why not have outline rings that are similar to what is displayed in ProbSevere, or at least something that is more transparent in nature?  – J-Money

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Webb County, TX Storm Update

Overall, PROBSvr continues to show high probabilities of severe hail.  So far no reports have been received at the WFO, not surprising considering the low population density in this part of TX.  Otherwise, Lightning Jump data showed a 2 sigma increase approximately 20 minutues before warning went out the door.  Finding little utility with the Convective Initiation products so far.

3-sigma lightning jump.
3-sigma lightning jump.
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Looking at Lightning Jump

We’ve got a lot of action going on across our CWA this afternoon, and most of the storms have had at least a 1 sigma lightning jump. Some of them have had a significant jump, up to 7 sigs.

One cell we were tracking (eventually turning more linear) was moving across Perry Co, PA. We spotted an 80 flash/min jump (from 20-100) in 10 minutes.

jumpPerryCo

This area did receive reports of a tree down (~1950z) and pea-sized hail (~1950z) just before that huge jump. There was still a smaller jump taking place at that time (from 10-20/min over 10 minutes).

1950radarPerry 2005radarPerry

We did notice there were some tracking issues in terms of cells merging and determining a jump. We account this to the amount and speed of convection in our area. Visual jumps were spotted on the time series graph, but it did not show well on the LJDA map.

celldetection2004 LJDA2004

-BT

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Lightning Jump and Cell Intensification

Another significant lightning jump occurred in west Texas (Midland CWA) around 2134Z (434 PM CDT). The jump was 4 sigma – shaded red below.

MAF 4 sigma jump

A time series reveals this was the first in a series of jumps.

MAF 4 simga time series

The second jump around 22Z was 2 sigma. A loop of the 0.5 deg reflectivity shows the cell intensifying after the lightning jumps occurred. The max Z at the 0.5 deg tilt increaed from around 63 dBZ to around 71 dBZ in 8 minutes, or two volume scans.

radar_loop

(click image to animate)

In this case, the lightning jump is a good indicator of imminent storm intensification.

-V Darkbloom

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Lightning Observations at HWT

Total lightning has a large role in the Experimental Warning Program this year.  We are on day 1 of the first week and everyone is familiarizing themselves with the various products.  I have shown an quick comparison of some of the products that we will be evaluating throughout the week.

The storms cooperated by moving into the West Texas LMA domain (Lubbock county warning area) allowing for the first views of the NASA SPoRT pseud-geostationary lightning mapper (PGLM) this year.  The image shows the PGLM (upper left), radar reflectivity (upper right), the lightning jump showing the sigma level change using Earth Networks data (lower left), and the Earth Networks total lightning over a 5 min summation and put on an 8 km grid.

The PGLM is showing a maximum value of 41 flashes over a 2 min window with the Earth Networks showing ~40 flashes over a 5 min window.  The lightning jump indicated the storm in the north as having a 1-sigma change, which is not enough to indicate severe weather is imminent.  The PGLM gives another view of spatial extent of the lightning, which is particularly evident in the northernmost section.  The main advantage of Earth Networks is the coverage, unlike the small domains from the lightning mapping arrays that are used to derive the PGLM.

Lightning observations from the 2 min PGLM (upper left), radar reflectivity (upper right), lightning jump algorithm (lower left), and Earth Networks 5 min data on an 8 km grid.
Lightning observations from the 2 min PGLM (upper left), radar reflectivity (upper right), lightning jump algorithm (lower left), and Earth Networks 5 min data on an 8 km grid.
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Lightning Jump Really Helps!

Another Severe Storm

I once again was watching a cluster of storms and the lightning jump turned to red.  I immediately started to monitor that storm and started to see flash extent density increased.  Then Prob Severe started to jump and I actually issued it before it turned hot pink.  I will have to see if this verifies but I think I got a jump by at least 15 minutes or so about issuing a warning! ~ Vollmar

Update it did produce wind damage! WICKED AWESOME!

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