682
FXUS63 KDDC 010843
AFDDDC

Area Forecast Discussion
National Weather Service Dodge City KS
343 AM CDT Wed May 1 2024

.KEY MESSAGES...

- Isolated to widely scattered severe thunderstorms possible
  this afternoon and early this evening. Hail larger than 2" and
  strong gusty winds will be the main hazards but isolated
  tornadoes can not be completely ruled out.

- Thunderstorm chances will be possible almost each day across
  some part of southwest Kansas from today through Monday.

- It appears that the best chance for some accumulating
  rainfall for southwest Kansas will be Friday night. There is a
  30-50% chance of 24-hour precipitation of >0.25 ending at 1
  pm Saturday.

&&

.SHORT TERM /THROUGH THURSDAY/...
Issued at 306 AM CDT Wed May 1 2024

A 500mb upper low located over Montana and Idaho earlier this
Wednesday morning will move into the Northern Rockies on
Thursday and then out into the northern Plains on Friday.
Ensembles remain in good agreement with previous runs in moving
two more upper-level troughs around this slow moving upper low
over the next 48 to 60 hours. Each system will take a similar
track, moving from the Pacific Northwest to around the Four
Corners region and then out into the plains.

Our next in the series of upper level systems was exiting the
Pacific Northwest and approaching the Four Corners region. As
this system approaches today, the east to southeast wind will
continue to draw more humid air in the lower levels back into
southwest Kansas as surface pressures begin to fall along the
lee of the Rockies. As this occurs, the surface boundary located
just south of the Oklahoma border will begin to slowly lift
northward back into southwest Kansas during the day. How far
north this boundary will move today will be key to when and
where the chance for severe weather will occur later today
across southwest and south central Kansas. As of 2 am this
Wednesday morning, confidence is high (>80%) that this front
will not move as far north as what the models indicated last
night, but confidence is low (<30%) on exactly how far it will
move into southwest Kansas today. The main reason for the low
confidence is is the uncertainty of how deep our layer of
low level moisture will be north of this boundary between 12z
and 18z today and what the impact of the overnight convection
across northern Oklahoma might have. In addition, it still looks
like there will be a chance for some elevated convection later
this morning, given the 850mb-700mb moisture and warm air
advection developing near the northern edge of the mid level
warm layer that will be moving northward towards the Nebraska
border. Given the latest CAMS and latest satellite loop, it
currently appears that the best chance for this elevated morning
convection will be near and north of the I-70 corridor and east
of a Hays to Coldwater line. Should we get some convection
early this morning, then the potential exists that a few of
these storms may be capable of producing hail up to around one
inch.

As elevated convection ends around noon, the next round of
severe weather potential will be focused along and east of a
dryline and near a warm front. The dry line will extend south
of a warm front, across southwest Kansas and into northwest
Oklahoma. At this time given the low confidence on where these
boundaries will be late day have decided to use the majority of
the CAMS as a guide. Based on this the dryline will be the to
be east of Highway 283 and the warm front will be located
somewhere between Kinsley and Hays. Also, given the
shear/700-300mb mean winds perpendicular to the dryline along
with the morning clouds limiting the warmup today and the
forecast 700 mb temperatures of around 9C, it appears that if
we do get some convection to develop then these will be
isolated to widely scattered and discrete. Along the warm front
the flow is more parallel so this storms may form more of a
line. Any storm that does develop late today will be in a
favorable environment to produce very large hail (>2) and
strong gusty winds. A few tornadoes also cannot be ruled out
near our dryline/warm front given the enhanced low level shear
late day/early evening.

Low confidence of where the warm front will be this afternoon
be will not only impact the late day storm chances but it will
also impact temperatures. Areas north of the warm front will
see afternoon temperatures in the 60s to lower 70s. South of
this front, it will be another warm afternoon with highs in the
80s.

As these storms move into central Kansas overnight, a cold
front will cross southwest Kansas between midnight and 7 am as
the upper-level trough exits the Central Rockies and moves out
into the West Central High Plains. This will result in scattered
convection lingering through Thursday afternoon. This area of
possible convection during the day is not expected to be severe,
but strong thunderstorms, some capable of producing penny-sized
hail and wind gusts up to 55 mph, will be possible. Even with
this said, I am not totally able to rule out an isolated
quarter sized hail or 60 mph wind gust east of Highway 183.


&&

.LONG TERM /THURSDAY NIGHT THROUGH TUESDAY/...
Issued at 306 AM CDT Wed May 1 2024

Thursday night and Friday, the upper level trough will lift
north into the Northern Plains, and this will be quickly
followed by our next upper level system. The latest short range
models currently have this upper trough located over the
Central Rockies by 18z Friday. As this next system follows a
similar track as the previous upper wave, there will be another
opportunity for precipitation for all of southwest Kansas as
convection is forecast to develop late day across northeast
Colorado and then spread east into western Kansas along a mid
level baroclinic zone/area of 0-1km thetae advection. This
Friday night system may be of interest measurable precipitation
given that the latest ensemble means were showing a 30-50%
chance of 24-hour precipitation of >0.25 ending at 1 pm
Saturday and a 20-30% chance of 24-hour precipitation of >0.5.
Granted, this chance is not very high, but it is better than
what we have seen over the past 3-4 weeks.

Once this Friday night system lifts northeast, some weak
ridging aloft crosses western Kansas as the upper low over the
Northern Plains moves into Canada. This will allow for a brief
break in the precipitation chances, but the chance for
thunderstorms will return Saturday night and then continue through
Monday as our next, more significant, upper level low/trough
exits the eastern Pacific and begins to move across the western
United States towards the Central Plains.

&&

.AVIATION /06Z TAFS THROUGH 06Z THURSDAY/...
Issued at 1218 AM CDT Wed May 1 2024

NBM and HREF are in good agreement this morning with low clouds
in the 1000 to 2500ft AGL spreading into southwest Kansas after
09z this morning as an east southeast flow draws moisture back
into southwest Kansas. Satellite already indicating stratus was
trying to develop near the Oklahoma border as of 05z so may end
up being a little slow on the onset of this stratus at Dodge
City and Liberal. Will monitor this closely and update
accordingly. These low clouds will linger through the morning
but a warm front lifting north today will erode these low clouds
from south to north between 12z and 18z today. The exception
will be in the Hays area where low clouds are expected through
early Wednesday evening. Isolated severe thunderstorms will be
possible between 21z Wednesday and 03z Thursday but the
probability of it moving near any of the TAF sites are so low
will not include a mention of convection in the TAFs this
morning.

&&

.DDC WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES...
None.

&&

$$

SHORT TERM...Burgert
LONG TERM...Burgert
AVIATION...Burgert