Area Forecast Discussion
Issued by NWS Northern Indiana
Issued by NWS Northern Indiana
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224 FXUS63 KIWX 280443 AFDIWX Area Forecast Discussion National Weather Service Northern Indiana 1243 AM EDT Sun Apr 28 2024 .KEY MESSAGES... - Showers and thunderstorms will be possible this afternoon and tonight with heavy rain that could lead to flooding as well as strong gusty winds being the main threat. - Additional chances for showers and thunderstorms occur Sunday night through Monday night and again mid to late week next week. - Temperatures remain in the 70s Sunday into the next week with 80s possible in southern areas Sunday and Thursday. && .DISCUSSION... Issued at 309 PM EDT Sat Apr 27 2024 An upper low pressure system continues to move northeast into Eastern Canada from the Western Great Lakes today and tonight. Meanwhile, the low level jet allows for a moisture stream to arrive north of a US-24 line with an instability axis of around 1000 J/kg MUCAPE just slight farther north as it resides north of a line from Monticello to Hillsdale. DCAPE above 900 J/kg does look to work into similar axis as the instability axis with more like 700+ J/kg south of there. Given how little forcing is available, showers will be more scattered with forcing more relegated to areas of surface convergence and/or upper divergence. An area of these ingredients materializes between this evening and around midnight and moves into the aforementioned instability axis area. Before then, much of the showers are being models as moving through areas south of that Monticello to Hillsdale line, which would likely point to their lack of severity. However, once we get to perhaps 22z, but probably more like after 00z, high res models start producing storms in the northern area. The issue by that point is the DCAPE and to a large extent the MUCAPE has shifted northward. So if the timing is right, perhaps there`s a strong storm that forms, but still don`t have confidence that that`s the case. On the other hand, could see a flood scenario where training of storms occurs in this moisture axis especially if we are able to get an outflow boundary to come in as well as some upper divergence to help focus storms. HREF has PMM QPF totals 1 to 3 inches or so in this area, which is slightly north of where the higher precip has been across our south and west across the last 7 days. For Sunday, the rain axis has shifted so that areas north of US-6 have the greatest chance to see any rain as that is where the surface warm front appears to draped. There are splotches of shear and instability to work with west of IN-15 and north of US-6 in the morning time frame and north of US-6 during the afternoon. Perhaps a strong storm could be had during that time. Otherwise, areas south of that will struggle to receive rainfall with the lack of forcing. We`ll have to wait until later Sunday night and into Monday morning for the next chance for rain as the cold front shifts eastward. Even still, much of the low level convergence appears to dissipate on the ECMWF and the GFS loses much of the omega across the area. With it being a cold front, still thinking this is much more of a chance to maybe likely PoP scenario than a likely to categorical PoP scenario. Meaning there will be breaks in the showers as opposed to being widespread and we`ve also lost much of the instability so the most these showers will be is light to moderate rain. One thing of note is that the moisture axis stalls over our east Monday afternoon and it appears instability may be around ahead of the thermal boundary along with some shear. There may be a wind threat with storms that form then. That looks to swing out of the area overnight Monday night with Tuesday remaining dry. As our second low pressure system, which helped push the front through Monday into Tuesday, moves into Central Canada, yet another area of low pressure follows it into Central Canada and that pushes a cold front into the area later Tuesday night. The forcing for it is diminishing so while a few thunderstorms are possible, the column looks much drier restricting coverage. There is some instability being forced to its south and east as it progresses through the area Wednesday, but if it moves through too fast it could be out of the area before storms are able to fire then. Have retained some slight chance PoPs for this chance for showers/storms. The waters become a little bit more muddied for the end of the week as far as timing goes, but a trough in the west and ridge in southeast would point to continued precipitation chances with waves pushing off the Plains having a chance to tap into Gulf moisture out ahead of a baroclinic zone. Temperatures through this period all look to be able to reach the 70s for highs with Sunday and mid to late week next week having a chance to see 80s for highs. It trends cooler for next weekend behind a wave of low pressure. && .AVIATION /06Z TAFS THROUGH 06Z MONDAY/... Issued at 1240 AM EDT Sun Apr 28 2024 We are beginning to see an increase in shower/storm coverage. At this time, much of the shower/storm acivvity is located along the US 30 corridor. Into the overnight hours, expect this activity to progress north with the help of the low level jet. Additional influx of moisture into the area with increased convergence may aid in an increase in chances of thunderstorms with some training of cells possible overnight, especially in northwest Indiana including KSBN. Once rain/storms exit (which should be before 12Z), expect VFR conditions to prevail alongside gusty winds up to 25-30 kts throughout the day Sunday. && .IWX WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES... IN...None. OH...None. MI...None. MARINE...None. && $$ DISCUSSION...Roller AVIATION...Johnson