1/8 – The Chief’s “SEVERE WX THREAT Ahead” Monday Morning Forecast

Heading into this afternoon, a severe storm may not even be a probability but a certainty for some areas. There will be a lot going on through the day with this system. The polar jet alone would cause strong to severe storms with this but the coupling of the sub-tropical jet with the polar jet will provide even stronger conditions and perfect timing for a lot of interesting variables found with this system.

One of those is the depth and amount of moisture running near record values for this time of year. A deep warm rain process will begin as the warm front begins to lift north causing storms and training ahead of the cold front to become an issue. The cold front will move rapidly through and training rain rates ahead of it may be in the 3 to 5 inch per hour range making the flood watch an obvious call. A high wind warning is in place, which means gradient winds will be an issue and could cause power outages in some areas alone. The reason it is easy to say that a severe storm may not be a probability but a certainty is due to the coupling of gradient and storm winds, which could easily cause winds to peak at 60+mph. Southerly winds will easily push enough water to cause coastal flooding issues as well.

Areas with surfaced based t-storm will be capable of producing strong winds and tornado development can reach the surface. This looks to start at the SELA coast by noon today. By 3pm today, this line(sfc warm front) should be found from Thibodaux to Port Sulphur, which means all areas along and south of this line could get some type of severe storm. This line will move farther inland from there and should be well inland along a line from near Liberty MS to near Slidell LA by 6pm. The entire area should be surface based by 9pm. The cold front will then begin to move through the area around or just before midnight with its own storm mode issues. The front should be east of the area by 5am Tue. But strong gradient winds will also be found behind the front area wide, just no storms. Since most of this activity will be evening and overnight, it would be a great idea to know how to get your weather warnings if/when they area issued for your area.