In mid-March storm chasers starting paying close attention to long-range forecast runs showing a very dynamic system that would progress into the central plains. Everything appeared to be shaping up for a major tornado event – but what first appeared to be a classic setup turned out to be classic dud.

The big day came on March 23 and chasers turned out in droves to chase the event with storms firing from southern Oklahoma into northern Kansas. The biggest play of the day was a supercell that started in Oklahoma moved across into SE Kansas and later created a small spin-up tornado near Arkansas City.

The event was witnessed by several chasers, including Danny Neal and Adam Lucio. I emailed Danny to congratulate him on his catch and he stated, “That was the weakest spin up ever. It’s like the guy who catches a 2 inch minnow and frames it…but it’s still a fish!” I couldn’t agree more, and again kudos to Danny, Adam and all the other chasers who caught it.

I myself decided to not chase the event. I’m picking my battles much more carefully in the pre-season after experiencing the harshness of $4.00 per gallon fuel last year and that threat is still looming over our heads for the upcoming season – I just don’t trust the powers that be to keep the fuel prices reasonable during the “driving season” which coincides with the spring tornado season. I have to consider that I’m essentially purchasing about 120 gallons of fuel a day during the chase season – every day! Besides all other things, I consulted with the 8-Ball 8000 Forecasting Center and when asked if it was a day worthy of chasing – it said “No”. How could I possibly go against such modern technology?

So, what happened? Why did this event just not shape up when it looked so promising on paper just a few days before hand? The answer – there simply wasn’t enough moisture to really drive this event with great dynamics into a tornado outbreak.

Here is the 12Z run (RUC) from the day of the event, the dewpoint values are shaded and anything not in red is 50F or less. You can get some great storms from this type of moisture in the high plains and along the front-range, but not in the central plains. You know it’s bad when you’re applying balm to chapped lips early in the day – a tell tale sign that it’s not a day worth wearing down the tire threads.

Had moisture advected into the plains, this would have been a different day altogether. This system seemed to have a lot pulling for it as indicated in the 500 mb chart from the same RUC run below. As the low deepened in eastern Colorado and moved into Nebraska, a surface cold front began digging into the plains while only very modest dewpoints formed ahead of a dryline in the moist sector (or perhaps it is better called a Pacific Cold Front in this scenario).

The Arkansas City tornado/spin-up was a result of surface heating combined with cold, mid-level temperatures and steep lapse rates in a heavily backed wind field that occurred ahead of the approaching low. It appears that just a tiny plume of moisture was in place when the jet max intersected the flow in SE Kansas enough energy was then present for the supercell to create a brief tornado that you could easily miss if you blinked.

I recommend reading Danny’s chase account for the day – he’s taken a lot of time to write it up and has a lot of great videos posted as well. You can find it here: http://northernilstormchaser.com/March-23rd—Southern-Kansas.php

Tags: storm chasing