353
FXUS63 KDDC 172200
AFDDDC

Area Forecast Discussion
National Weather Service Dodge City KS
500 PM CDT Tue Sep 17 2024

...Updated Aviation...

.KEY MESSAGES...

- Severe thunderstorms with a wind threat mid to late Tuesday
  evening, west and northwest of Dodge City.

- Drier forecast Wednesday and Thursday.

- More storm potential over the weekend.

&&

.DISCUSSION...
Issued at 222 PM CDT Tue Sep 17 2024

Late afternoon and evening storms are expected to form across the
high plains of Colorado later today. These storms should
eventually bear down on the Colorado/Kansas state line in the 5
to 7 pm time frame. The storms are expected to move east and
weaken as time goes forward. The pops will start out the highest
across the western zones and then gradually dampen with time
across central Kansas. For the SE counties, they might not see
much in storm potential as the line weakens as it moves east.
The boundary layer is expected to be very warm and mixed, so the
formation of DCAPE is likely. The main threat with the storms
are strong/damaging winds of 50+ mph. There is a 2 of 5 severe
risk located across the far western counties to account for this
possibility. Storms should exit the entire region towards the
midnight hour, with the highest confidence of residual storms
located across central Kansas.

We will be between weather systems Wednesday and Thursday.
This asa large low carves out across the western United States.
The net result is a drier forecast for southwest Kansas with
temperatures still above normal. Highs in the 90s still looks on
track for the FA. Lows will be mild with a mix of 50s and 60s
from west to east. The small exception to the drier forecast is
mainly across the SE counties, where there is only a 15-20% of
evening storms. Otherwise, it should be clear for the majority
of the FA.

Attention then turns to the Friday evening through the weekend time
frame. This as the mentioned low start to eject out across the
plains and potentially impact our weather. It should be noted
that there is considerable uncertainty with the second system.
This is confirmed by both the GEFS and EPS, with a wide range of
QPF potential the ensemble members. To add more complexity to
this, the grand ensemble does have fairly high probabilities of
QPF > 0.10" over the weekend. The GEFS and EPS QPF plumes also
show considerable spread over the weekend, further complicating
the forecast. To summarize, there is both too much spread in
both the deterministic models as well as the ensemble models to
have any confidence in storm potential over the weekend. The
blended approach seems to be the way to go given this
uncertainty.

&&

.AVIATION /00Z TAFS THROUGH 00Z THURSDAY/...
Issued at 500 PM CDT Tue Sep 17 2024

VFR will continue to prevail through this TAF period, with
increasing midlevel clouds expected this evening. Scattered
thunderstorms are expected to reach a GCK-LBL line in the
03-06z Wed time range, some of which will likely produce strong
erratic outflow winds. Just enough model consensus to maintain
a VCTS/CB mention in the TAFs, but confidence on thunderstorm
evolution tonight, particularly at the specific airports, is
not great. Strong south winds gusting to near 35 kts currently
will only gradually subside this evening, then trend south 8-14
kts overnight. VFR/SKC is expected on Wednesday. After 15z Wed,
S/SW wind gusts of 25-30 kts are expected at all airports.

&&

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

&&

$$

DISCUSSION...Sugden
AVIATION...Turner