We're Going To See A Lot of Severe Weather Risks Soon...
Big days are more uncertain, but at the very least...a lot of little days.
As we head into late May, the current pattern is straight out of June or July, with hot temperatures over the Southwest and a northerly flow over the Plains around this ridge.
But, as we’ve been talking about for what feels like forever, that pattern is short-lived as we’re in a transition to what will become the dominant pattern through late May and much of June. And if you are a severe weather chaser like me, it looks busy.
1. Current Situation
Currently a large ridge of high pressure is sitting over my house here in New Mexico right now.
This won’t last forever though, as this high weakens and shifts south over the next few days, allowing modest flow to arrive over pretty meager moisture by late this week.
By the weekend, a trough will be entering the picture to the west with some subtropical flow over Texas and Oklahoma. While I suspect we’ll have daily risks of severe weather this week, this will bring the first ‘more serious’ looking day of this late May run. I’m not thinking big tornado event, but hailers seem pretty likely.
2. Then Next Week…
As we move into next week, one thing is becoming clear on models: consistent SW flow aloft, increasing moisture with time, and what will be a steady drumbeat of severe weather setups over the Plains for a week or two…at least.
The nature of the flow suggests that this will be a day-to-day mesoscale type of situation, where large areas aren’t favored for major severe weather, but things could come together in small regions to allow for significant severe weather. Where? I couldn’t tell you at this range…but that’s what this pattern looks like to me.
I’m seeing some subtleties in the surface patterns too, with stalled fronts, drylines, and more appearing depending on the day and the model's run. I don’t want to oversell late month: I don’t see a large-scale regional outbreak type of event on the horizon just yet — but I do think a lot of people will experience severe weather the last 15 days or so of this month.
For storm chasers like me, this is about as favorable a pattern for daily active severe weather as you could imagine for late month. For most of you, this is a good reminder to clean out those storm shelters if you haven’t done so recently, and to replace the batteries in your weather radio.
Yes, there will be severe weather — but it’s May. You know the drill if you’ve been on the Plains long enough. There’s no reason to panic, and there’s no reason to fall into hype doom loops from social media.
Stay tuned, we’ll have a lot more on this pattern in the coming days.