468
FXUS64 KAMA 281841
AFDAMA

Area Forecast Discussion
National Weather Service Amarillo TX
141 PM CDT Mon Sep 28 2026

...New KEY MESSAGES, SHORT TERM, LONG TERM, AVIATION, HYDROLOGY...

.KEY MESSAGES...
Issued at 1155 AM CDT Mon Sep 28 2026

- Forecast remains on track for the upcoming week with heavy rain
  and flash flood concerns. There is the potential for this to be
  a high end to historic rain event.

- Potential for isolated severe weather Tuesday through Wednesday
  morning across portions of the panhandle. This includes damaging
  wind gusts and tornados.

- Drier and cooler on Friday of next week with highs only in the
  upper 60s to low 70s.

&&

.SHORT TERM...
(This afternoon through Tuesday night)
Issued at 1155 AM CDT Mon Sep 28 2026

High pressure remains across the area leading to fair and
partially sunny weather across the panhandles. Temperatures for
today will see a slight cooldown as the high pressure currently
over the area shifts to the east. There will be an increase in the
cloud cover through the later afternoon and evening which heralds
the switch in weather from calm to stormy.

Tonight the weather will shift drastically as a deepening weather
system slowly moves eastward across the desert southwest towards
the southern plains. As it does so it will ingest Hurricane Polo
into itself vastly increasing its moisture. This will make it such
that the moisture this system is packing is historically high
putting it in the top 0.5%, or greater, for this time of year.
This system will first impact the panhandles early on Tuesday
morning as the warm sector of the system pushes moisture into the
western panhandles. This will start off with isolated to
scattered rain showers that will spread eastward through the rest
of the morning. By sunrise increasing instability will allow for
more extensive rain showers and areas of steady rain. The first
thunderstorms associated with the weather system will also likely
form just around or not too long after sunrise. There is a very
low chance for these morning thunderstorms to become severe and
capable of producing damaging wind gusts. However, the shear and
instability during this time is not the greatest which really
limits such an occurrence. Instead the main threat will be firmly
with the rain as the extreme amounts of moisture will allow any
rain shower, area of steady rain, or thunderstorm to produce heavy
to even torrential rain. Then towards the afternoon the upper
level jet associated with the spreads more across the southern
plains. This will allow for increased diffluence aloft leading to
an overall increase in instability over the southern plains.
Further heating will also allow for increased instability across
the region. The increase in instability will allow for more rain
showers, areas of steady moderate to heavy rain, and thunderstorms
to develop. The cold sector of this system will arrive in the
panhandles during the evening providing even more instability and
dynamics. As such the rain showers, areas of steady heavy rain,
and thunderstorms will likely reach their zenith in intensity and
coverage during the evening. During the afternoon and evening the
low level shear will increase across the panhandles as the system
progress to the east. Such shear coupled with the instability and
extreme amounts of moisture will allow for low top tropical
supercells to develop. Such storms will most likely be embedded
within the areas of rain showers and thunderstorms vs being
discrete storms that are by themselves. These storms will bring
the threat of damaging wind gusts and tornados to the panhandles
for the afternoon and evening of Tuesday. With so much rain and
thunderstorms expected there is a risk of flooding in the
panhandles so see the Hydrology section of this discussion for
more details.

&&

.LONG TERM...
(Wednesday through next Sunday)
Issued at 1155 AM CDT Mon Sep 28 2026

The weather system will continue its slow passage from the desert
southwest and across the southern plains Wednesday and Thursday.
For Wednesday the cold sector of the system will still be passing
across the eastern panhandles during the morning hours. This will
continue the high chance for rain and thunderstorms in the
eastern panhandles. There will remain the threat for low top
tropical supercells within the cold sector as it moves across the
eastern panhandles. This means that there is the risk for
nocturnal to morning tornados even if the chances are very low. As
for the western panhandles there is a high chance for dry air to
move in behind the cold sector. This would serve to clear out the
moisture leading to calmer weather within the dry sector with a
low chance for rain shower and thunderstorms. This dry sector
would move eastward to encompass most of the panhandles by the
afternoon to evening. Still, moisture will be wrapping around
this system so the northwestern panhandles will see an increasing
chance for rain showers and thunderstorms Wednesday evening. This
wrap around will then most likely move to the south and east
through the overnight and all of Thursday. This will reintroduce a
medium chance for more rain showers and thunderstorms across the
panhandles for Thursday. As this will be secondary moisture
rainfall accumulations for Thursday will most likely be lower,
especially when compared to Tuesday through Wednesday morning.

Come Friday the weather system will most likely be ingested within
the broader flow aloft and quickly shunted off to the northeast.
This will likely wrap up the rain during Friday morning as the
moisture finally departs. That will leave the rest of Friday as a
calmer and fairer weather day.

As for the weekend the pattern becomes less certain but overall it
does favor higher pressure returning to the southern plains. This
makes it more likely than not for the upcoming weekend to have
fair and calmer weather.

&&

.AVIATION...
(12Z TAFS)
Issued at 1155 AM CDT Mon Sep 28 2026

VFR conditions and fair weather will last through the rest of
today. Then tonight and Tuesday morning a powerful weather system
will impact the whole of the panhandles. This will spread rain
showers and thunderstorms across the panhandles in a west to east
fashion starting early Tuesday morning. Extreme amounts of
moisture will allow any rain shower or thunderstorms to produce
heavy to torrential rainfall with severely reduced, or to near
zero, visibilities. Further, the cloud bases will most likely be
low to very low with IFR to VLIFR ceilings. There is also a low
chance for severe thunderstorms capable of producing damaging wind
gusts and tornados. The rain showers and thunderstorms along with
the low cloud decks will persist over the panhandles, and all
terminals, through all of Tuesday. Overall the flying conditions
during the passage of this system will be very bad and can be
dangerous to aviators.

&&

.HYDROLOGY...
Issued at 1155 AM CDT Mon Sep 28 2026

Tuesday and Wednesday will have a weather system passing across
the southern plains that will have ingested Hurricane Polo. This
will increase the moisture associated with this weather system to
the top 0.5%, to max, for this time of year. That firmly put this
system in the extreme to historic category in regards of
moisture. So when the system pushes into the southern plains come
Tuesday through Wednesday it will allow any rain shower, area of
steady rain, or thunderstorms to produce heavy to torrential
rainfall. This will likely see the average rain rates at 1 to 3
inches and hour and strong to severe storms producing higher rain
rates of 3 to 7 inches and hour. This system as it passes through
will likely have multiple round of rain and thunderstorms. The
first starts Tuesday morning in the western panhandles spreading
across the whole of the panhandles. Then the warm sector passes
through during the afternoon bringing even more rain showers and
thunderstorms that overall will be stronger than the morning rain
and thunderstorms. Then the cold sector pushes through bringing
most likely the strongest and largest extent of rain and
thunderstorms. Any of these rounds of rain and thunderstorms will
be capable of producing the previous mentioned rain rates. Overall
the northwestern panhandles will have the highest chances of
seeing rain from any of these rounds. The chances of rainfall from
any of the round then diminish towards the southeastern
panhandles. This makes it such that there could be fairly wide
spread 1 to 2 inch rain accumulations for the southeastern
panhandles and 2 to 6 inches in the northwestern panhandles. Given
that there is a heavy convective component for this rain there
can be small localized strips of far higher rainfall, in excess of
8 inches. While there is a very low chance for areas to see lower
rain amounts the overall setup of this system favors getting more
not less. The biggest issue with this rain is just how fast it
will accumulate, with the majority of accumulation occurring
within a 12 to 24 hour window. As for antecedent conditions the
panhandles is still very wet from the previous heavy rainfall that
occurred just a week ago. This will make it far more likely for
water to quickly run off or pond as the ground will not be able to
absorb the new rainfall. Further, city drainages can struggle
with such a copious amount of rain within a short duration
increasing the risk of urban flooding. As such, this system poses
a moderate chance for dangerous flash flooding across much of the
panhandles with the best chances for flooding being the western
panhandles. This can be all forms of flash flooding from quick
rises in streams to the swamping of urban areas or roads. Even as
water drains away it can lead to longer duration river flooding in
the rivers across the panhandles. It will be very important to
prepare for this event as flood waters can be deadly. Turn Around,
Dont Drown.


&&

.AMA WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES...
TX...Flood Watch from Tuesday morning through Wednesday afternoon for
 TXZ001>003-006>008-011>013-016>018-317.

OK...Flood Watch from Tuesday morning through Wednesday afternoon for
 OKZ001-002.

&&

$$

SHORT TERM...98
LONG TERM....98
AVIATION...98