Two experimental techniques, including Storm-Net (below) indicate a high probability of one or more tornadoes from northern Kentucky to central Ohio during the next 3 hours.  Please make sure you are monitoring the weather in this area! Follow me on Twitter   @usweatherexpert for updates. 

 [This posting is primarily for meteorologists and weather aficionados.] Five years ago today, the HAZWX model (a company that was later acquired by AccuWeather) made one of the most amazing forecasts I have ever seen. It caused me to change my opinion as to the potential of mesoscale meteorological modeling. While I had seen some good forecasts, they seemed quite inconsistent. I thought the scale of observations available to feed the models was too course create forecasts at a 4 kilometer scale. This forecast caused that opinion to change.  Major tornado outbreaks are rare in November. A high risk in the High Plains in mid-November would have been unprecedented. The 7am NWS Storm Prediction Center's (SPC) forecast (below) showed an enhanced risk of tornadoes near the border of Oklahoma and the Texas Panhandle with a significant risk (brown) farther north and south.  The HAZWX model, which became available about 11am, forecast something stunningly different: a major outbr...

An amazing rainfall event, which caused serious flooding, occurred in a tiny area of eastern Kansas between 10pm last night and 7am this morning. There were two spots of more than a foot of rain (white). The heaviest rains were just southwest of Lawrence. What makes this event so unusual is that Manhattan (40 mi west) had no rain and downtown Kansas City (25 mi. east) recorded 0.15 inches. However, the KC area is geographically very large and the 12" amounts were within 20 miles of the forecast. To give you an idea of how small the area affected by the torrential rain was, here is a regional map. On this blog yesterday you read this: Unusually heavy rain event is likely... In the blog post I mentioned the Kansas City area was especially at risk and that amounts could range up to eight inches. I separately sent two tweets ( @usweatherexpert ) with forecasts of more than five inches. The result included an armored truck being swept off the road in north Lawrence. ...

There is a major tornado research program pertaining to tornadoes in the Southeast. I would like to offer a suggestion for some serious research. I have been viewing weather radar on a virtually daily basis for 48 years. This afternoon, I saw a phenomena I've seen only one other time which was in the late 1970's in Kansas (I don't remember the date): a gigantic (as these things go) rotating mesoscale vortex that was not associated with a supercell thunderstorm that was apparently spawning multi-vortex, violent, tornadoes. I'm bringing this to research meteorologists' attention because I have not seen any coverage of it in the Mississippi media, so far. Why is this important? The answer can be easily seen in a video here . A screen capture is below. It is rare for non-supercells to cause tornadoes of EF-3 intensity which the above image suggests.  Here are some images of the radar data from this unusual storm. The "donut" centered just west of ...

Here is an experimental snapshot of the location of thunderstorms and the risks they pose for the period 6pm to 8pm. Please note the locations are approximate. Please keep up on the weather in these areas. 

As discussed ten days ago , this is a new, and rapidly advancing, area of weather science. We had another amazing example yesterday. Below is a forecast map showing the path of a strong supercell thunderstorm, the type that produces large hail and tornadoes. The forecast was made about 2pm. Here is the actual path of the hail storm (yellow and orange lines). Hailstones up to 3 inches in diameter fell from the storm. click to enlarge This is a nearly perfect forecast. This area of meteorology didn't even exist (other than in some research labs) a decade ago. Just amazing. There is considerable business and societal value to these forecasts.