After last week’s very active run, this week promises to be much tamer through at least Thursday before we start considering the possibility of severe weather again by the weekend.

Tuesday

The only day we for sure have a risk of severe weather on the Central/Southern Plains is Tuesday. Some moisture will be hanging around the Southern High Plains and upslope flow off the mountains of New Mexico should help widespread storms get going.

There should be lots of storm coverage from the Panhandles back to New Mexico.
There is enough shear to see some storm organization and even a weak supercell or two as possibilities. Hail and damaging winds are the threats.

The Jet Stream Goes Away Otherwise

We are starting this week with very weak flow on the Southern Branch of the jet stream, with N/NW flow over the eastern and northern parts of the Plains. A trough is coming ashore out west, and some big rain totals are possible out there, but that won’t become a player in the middle of the country for several days.

How we begin the week: N/NW flow in the middle of the country, weakening dramatically with Southern extent.
By Thursday, that trough will have weakened and began to shift east. However, you can see the bulk of the Central/Southern Plains are under almost no flow in the upper levels.
Despite the flow to the North, it looks like the bulk of the country will remain pretty dry through Thursday.

The Change Into the Weekend

We will start to see the pattern change by quite a bit into the weekend, with troughing beginning to dig south and east into the Desert Southwest.

A big trough will begin to cut off into Saturday. There will be enough flow spreading east possibly to create an environment favorable for severe weather.
I think Saturday is a day to watch with storms spread over Eastern New Mexico and Eastern Colorado. It is too early to tell if we can get enough flow over the Plains for storm organization but I suspect Saturday is a supercell day somewhere on the Central/Southern High Plains.
We’ll need to watch how this evolves into next week. Right now the GFS wants to amplify the ridge a bit and send flow packing to the north. But if troughing can emerge out east over the Plains there will be enough moisture for a bigger severe weather event.
As it stands, there may be a day on Monday to watch for severe weather/supercells on the Plains before the ridge fully amplifies and while there’s some decent flow still.

The Bottom Line

We know for sure there won’t be much to write home about the next few days. Confidence decreases markedly by the weekend, but I do suspect we’ll see a return of severe weather risks.

Depending on how the troughing behaves to the west, we could see a string of severe weather setups over the Central/Southern High Plains this weekend into early next week.

This isn’t a mega fall pattern, but I do suspect this is beginning the move into something that might result in a very notable day later this month. Stay tuned.