Good morning bloggers,
There is a fast moving storm system approaching our area this morning, but we will get just the backside of the storm as it digs/intensifies. This storm will become much stronger as it moves into the northeastern part of Missouri later tonight.
Forecast timeline:
- Now – 6 PM: Dry with increasing clouds. High: 43°
- 6 PM – Midnight: Cloudy with a 60% chance of rain showers. Increasing northwest winds.
- 10 PM-4 AM: A band of rain possibly mixing with or briefly changing to snow with no accumulation expected. Windy!
Let’s look at the storm as it is now dropping into the plains, digging, and intensifying.
This first maps shows the 500 mb flow valid at 3 AM tonight. The storm approaching will likely intensify just enough to form bands of precipitation, with one final and main band moving across around midnight. This last band will be associated with increasing PVA (Positive Vorticity Advection) that you can see with the black dashed line I drew on the map. As this swings across a strong cold front will move through.
This next map shows the 500 mb flow just 9 hours later at noon Tuesday. A fully mature upper low will be developing just southwest of Chicago and there will be a band of heavy snow near the Windy City on Tuesday. As this is passing by us to our east we will have a cold and blustery day tomorrow. The flow aloft is blocking up over Canada with the two upper level ridges on either side of a developing Polar Vortex. This blocking is forcing the jet stream farther south and another storm is developing off the west coast by tomorrow afternoon. This will likely be our next storm that may affect us by the weekend.
This next map, above, shows the 500 mb forecast valid at 6 PM Friday. An upper low will likely be developing and closing off over California. What happens to this storm at around this point is being forecast by every computer model I looked at, but what happens next varies widely as it moves our way. It does look like we will have a good chance of rain/thunderstorms sometime this weekend.
I would like to thank everyone who watched the Pet Telethon benefitting the Humane Society of Greater Kansas City. There was a touching few minutes, well many of them, but for me it was special when we had our reunion of Stormy’s litter from 12 years ago. Four siblings all together for the first time since they were 8 weeks old. They are now 12 year olds and here is one picture from last night:
Thank you for spending a few minutes of your day reading the Action Weather Blog. We will go over the details of this changing weather pattern on 41 Action News tonight.
Gary
Nice pic o’ th’ litter, Gary!
Any more snow in March for KC/Lawrence?
March has had some big snowstorms. We will see if anything sets up. It does look like we will see some snow tonight, briefly.
Do any of the models show us getting snow with that second storm?
No, not at this time!
What beautiful dogs!! I wish I wasn’t allergic to dogs.
Might we have the potential for a severe weather outbreak with the next system or is it too early to tell that yet? Or is it just going to be some (very needed) rain?
Can we expect any moisture tonight and what is the weekend storm looking like as far as amount of moisture?
Yes, and yes! Tonight’s storm won’t produce a lot, but the weekend storm has much more potential and we will go into that forecast beginning on 41 Action News tonight.
Drought is over!
Dobber,
It’s far from over, however, it has taking a few good slaps since Jan. 25th of this year. The pattern that we’re in should allow for a few more blows this month. One more accumulating snow looks likely this month also. KCI will likely see 30+ inches of snow for the entire winter season when all said and done. Parts of Johnson and Jackson counties are already over 30 inches of snow for the 2012-2013 winter season.
I’m at 29.7 inches up on the NW side of Liberty. 1.19 inches surplus of moisture for the winter season.
Dobber, the drought is not over. We made a debt in it and if moisture continues to fall we can climb out of this. I hate seeing all that moisture miss us to the east. Whether frozen or in liquid form no one should be happy that it is missing us.
At the end of 2012, Lawrence was 30″+ behind over the 2 previous years, being 2011 + 2012 combined.
GFS kind of bullish on precip. tonight. Should it verify, 1 inch or so of snow might happen tonight.
Heat Miser want one more snowstorm before Spring hits!
I took a ground bore and took a sample of the dirt to see how wet it was where the snow had already melted into grass. It was wet 5″ down and then powder dry.
The drought isn’t technically over but we are in a different water “cycle” than we were from Feb 2011 – Feb 2012, and Feb 2012 – Feb 2013.
Again, I am confident that while the LRC does exist and is a factor as it determines upper level cycles, there is another pattern that determins mosisture availability that cycles every February. Look back several years and you can see that dramatic changes in precipitation amounts from storms start every February.
In other news, there is a Learjet that looks to be registered to the USAF that is having landing gear issues and will need to make an emergency landing at St. Louis Lambert airport. The pilot was going to land at a smaller airport on the Illinois side but has since decided to attempt the landing at Lambert. Another station in St. Louis is currently covering the events live.
Why bit land at Scott AFB? Right there outside St Louis and huge runways.
That station made an error in reporting the jet with the issue. It turns out it didn’t belong to the USAF and it was a private jet from a company in Houston Texas. Plane landed safely so all is good. Darn breaking news and misinformation.
so does anyone have any ideas what the month may bring as for moisture here in north central kansas?????
For those of you interested in the actual recorded facts and figures for the drought (from the National Weather Service official reporting stations):
KCI was .40 inches above normal precipitation in Feb. (+.17 Dec-Feb, -.62 Nov-Feb).
From March 1, 2012 to Feb. 28, 2013, KCI is -16.88 inches.
JOCO Exec was .55 inches above normal precipitation in Feb. (+.41 Dec-Feb, -.65 Nov-Feb).
From March 1, 2012 to Feb. 28, 2013, JOCO Exec is -11.62 inches.
Drought ain’t over by a long shot. There is no subsoil moisture.
Sounds like Liberty is close to breaking the drought, though.
“There is no subsoil moisture”
That is true, but we’re working on that. I will be doing a soil test early next week following the full snow melt and maybe the rains this weekend. We’ll see how we are doing. I’m sure the results will be the best since March of last year.
I mentioned a while back that melting snow would be the best for getting our subsoil moisture back. Well, I didn’t expect it all at once, but, hey, it worked out and this is a great thing.
Theo,
How good has my forecasting been of late. Went “boom” didn’t it?? Get use to the wet times, we’ll be wet this month and be just fine throughout the Spring with moisture. This pattern is a good one. March should be loaded with storms, some cold ones.
hey mowermike define “cold ones”
will this wettness have any effects on n/c kansas???
Farmer,
Did you miss the recent snows??? Cold ones would be snow producing ones. I think we have a few snows left yet this winter. Should be a wild March. Hopefully it will set up further west this time. Most of the storms from Jan. 25th and on that have hit KC have been direct hits for the most part, maybe you missed all the good moisture. I haven’t paid too much attention out there.
Looks like you have some moisture heading your way now.
Nice little disturbance heading out of western KS. Could this be a nice little rain to snow event later tonight??? I don’t remember this on the models last night and this morning this far west.
I think N/C Kansas will be more wet than most thru march. Frozen and liquid precip will more than likely inundate that part of Kansas thru March.
I agree that the cycle is turning wet. We could just as easily slip back into the dry cycle as spring enters. But I think march will be wet and we will see a good start to the year.
Also, may be time to stop referring to April last year as our benchmark. There will be no way we make up that moisture deficit and to be honest we don’t want to. Why we want is a above average moisture thru spring so that this year we can have a healthier soil. We don’t want the flooding of 2011 in order to get alot of rain.
Guessing we’ll see more than a few trees not leaf-out this Spring due to accumulated drought over the last 2+ years. Am PRAYING I’m wrong on this. Sorry tree-guys.
Nice outside today, if this carries on and we get a nice rain this weekend, all that’ll be left will be those huge piles of snow the plows left, and those will be greatly diminished.
H.
Mower, that should be the tail trough formed by the low to our north and east. It is holding some good moisture in it for sure. More than the models showed. But the GFS was amped with some moisture last run. I am thinking we will gets good bit tonight.
mower,
yes my county got short changed on both of those big snows
the first one gave about 6″ of snow the second one only gave a dusting
sure would like to have more one way or another
Mike,
We’ll see how this weekend’s storm trends, you could be in for some good rains this weekend along with many in the plains and Midwest. Latest GFS does show a ULL cold core, could be some snow on the NW side of the track. Where is that track, still a good question.
GFS also forecasting some very chilly air for this time of year following Monday next week. Snow around the Snake Saturday parade,(or before) I think so!