580
FXUS63 KSGF 142025
AFDSGF

Area Forecast Discussion
National Weather Service Springfield MO
325 PM CDT Tue May 14 2024

.KEY MESSAGES...

- Scattered showers to continue through the evening, bringing
  very localized and short-lived pockets of heavy rain and
  reduced visibilities.

- Potential for dense fog again Wednesday morning, especially
  west of Highway 65 and within the insulated pockets of the
  eastern Ozarks near lakes and in valleys.

- Additional shower and thunderstorms are expected at times from
  late Wednesday evening into Friday. A few strong to marginally
  severe storms may be possible, along with locally heavy
  rainfall and a minor localized flooding risk.

&&

.SHORT TERM /THROUGH WEDNESDAY/...
Issued at 323 PM CDT Tue May 14 2024

Current conditions and synoptic overview:

Isolated showers are persisting through the morning hours in parts
of southwest Missouri on the backside of a cold front that passed
through overnight. These showers are causing a short-lived, rapid
deterioration in local conditions as they pass. Aloft, a trough with
vertically stacked closed lows sits right over Missouri, indicating
occlusion. With the warm, moist airmass being undercut by the cold
front overnight, temperatures dropped without an equal drop in
moisture content, bringing widespread fog to the early morning
hours. Pockets of the most dense fog persisted until late morning,
though scattered clouds are in place with some pockets of drizzle
and light rain underneath.


If you don`t care about the science:

Isolated, short-lived showers/heavy rain and/or drizzle-y conditions
through the rest of the afternoon, with cloud cover expected to
become a little less suffocating with the sun peeking out more and
more. High temps around 70 degrees Tuesday, lows in the mid- to
upper 50s Tuesday night, temperatures rising Wednesday to highs near
80. Expect dense fog on Wednesday morning, especially the further
west you get. Some showers Wednesday also aren`t completely out of
the question, depending on what models you feel like taking at face
value.


If you care about the science:

Scattered pockets of post-frontal drizzle, showers, and even short-
lived heavy rain will persist through the afternoon hours. High low-
level relative humidities paired with CVA bubbles aloft instigating
rising motion is the support for this convection, but the isolated
nature of the CVA from the closed lows is causing the updrafts to
remain very discrete. The updrafts are well represented in early
afternoon satellite imagery, with small areas of cloud top
temperatures between -15 and -25C indicating that the strongest
updrafts with the heaviest precip underneath really are localized,
making the discernment of the PoPs a not-very-fun game of Whack-A-
Storm. The strongest of these low-topped storms are producing around
1.25"/hr rates per the SGF radar as well as MRMS, but with residence
times of 15-20 minutes over a single area, accumulations are around
a half an inch at best. There`s not any lightning with these storms
due to lack of sufficient depth of ascent, so severe weather seems
incredibly unlikely today as a result. Satellite has also shown
the cumulo-form (?) cloud field to be patchy and disconnected,
and even here at Springfield the sun has been coming and going.

Tonight, dew points remain high near the surface as winds calm with
the eastward progression of the low and associated pressure gradient
reduction. Crossover temperatures around 57-58 with lows getting to
56 and lower means in the pockets around lakes in the eastern Ozarks
and in the western portion of the area, dense fog will develop in
the 2-3am timeframe and likely persist through the morning commute
on Wednesday.

On Wednesday, an upper-level ridge axis passes across the region,
and with some help from jet-level divergence, some showers could
reach east enough to impact the Ozarks, though global models and
ensembles don`t seem to be as big of fans of that as say, the RAP or
NAM. Leaving PoPs low for Wednesday due to lack of output from the
most recent HREF LPMMs.


&&

.LONG TERM /WEDNESDAY NIGHT THROUGH TUESDAY/...
Issued at 323 PM CDT Tue May 14 2024

As the next disturbance moves in from the High Plains late Wednesday
night into early Thursday morning, the development of a low-level
ridge over the Gulf Coast will send a moisture surge with the LLJ
through central Texas and into NE Oklahoma. Dew point depressions of
5 or below are being hinted at by CAMs getting into range, with
MUCAPE within that corridor being sustained overnight, feeding into
convection with a messy mode moving Thursday morning. LREF shows
around a 50% chance of PWAT in excess of 1.4", and with strong deep
layer ascent and model soundings indicating humped hodographs and
sufficient mid-level instability, an MCS Thursday morning seems
increasingly likely. Depending on the development and evolution of
this complex through the day Thursday, any remnant outflow
boundaries or mesoscale interactions could introduce the potential
for severe storms in the afternoon prior to development of
convection along the cold front in the evening. Hail the size of
quarters and wind gusts to 60mph appear to be the primary hazards
due to expected storm modes and the elevated nature of the
instability at initiation in the morning, but deep layer shear could
introduce a tornado potential in the afternoon and evening if the
instability is able to get rooted near the surface on a boundary or
the like.

The higher confidence hazard for Thursday appears to be heavy rain
and flooding, with an MCS being most well known for its flood-
causing tendencies. Already saturated soils from all the recent
rainfall will need to be able to take at least another inch of rain
over the course of a day. Rain looks to be fairly consistent over
the area (though breaks are possible in between waves) Thursday and
Friday as the upper-level trough makes its way through.

Temperatures through the end of the week will remain in the mid- to
upper 70s and are trending towards warming into the weekend, with
cloud cover reducing in the wake of the Thursday/Friday system to
bring a May-like sunny and warm weekend.

&&

.AVIATION /18Z TAFS THROUGH 18Z WEDNESDAY/...
Issued at 1239 PM CDT Tue May 14 2024

Quite a bit of variability and uncertainty in potential
conditions through the afternoon...satellite shows inconsistent
cloud fields across Missouri, with some sporadic deeper
convective clouds dropping very isolated pockets of short-lived
heavy rain. SGF seems to be the most likely TAF site to see more
of these heavy rain pockets causing reduced visibilities, but
BBG isn`t out of the question either; the short lived conditions
suggest TEMPO rather than a prevailing condition, but
amendments will be made as needed, if rain persists over these
TAF sites longer than expected/doesn`t continue moving eastward
as anticipated. Confidence is high in isolated modes, but low in
precise location for those afternoon showers.

Relatedly, flight categories are really bouncing around, and it
will unfortunately seems like a TAF-chasing afternoon. The AWC
website shows most of SW MO is likely at least MVFR, but obs are
not consistently reflecting this; the peeks of sun
transitioning quickly to heavy rain is changing localized
conditions faster than we can keep up. It`s good to consider
this especially for VFR pilots- there may only be small breaks
with VFR conditions at airports in the region. Winds are
northwesterly and fairly light (<10kts) and expected to remain
that way into the evening.

Later this afternoon, cloud bases should rise enough for a
period of VFR conditions before lowering again overnight. Light
winds will calm even further as well, and with high RH and
light winds, fog seems imminent. TEMPO group was introduced for
moderate to high confidence (forecaster gut feeling of 70-90%
based on pattern recognition) in conditions deteriorating
overnight as fog develops, but confidence in details regarding
timing and extent of deterioration isn`t quite as high.

&&

.CLIMATE...
Issued at 323 PM CDT Tue May 14 2024

Record High Temperatures:

May 20:
KUNO: 89/1964

&&

.SGF WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES...
KS...None.
MO...None.

&&

$$

SHORT TERM...Camden
LONG TERM...Camden
AVIATION...Camden
CLIMATE...Camden