Severe weather threat for 10/22/10

[Xander]

We have a high probability of severe thunderstorms firing up over the Texas Panhandle before moving into Oklahoma today with the most severe cells firing up in the afternoon.

Here's the current Mesoscale discussion :

ONCERNING...SEVERE POTENTIAL...WATCH POSSIBLE

VALID 221503Z - 221700Z

THE RISK FOR SEVERE STORMS MAY INCREASE THROUGH MID DAY. THE NEED
FOR A WW IS UNCERTAIN...AS THE LONGEVITY OF THIS POTENTIAL THREAT IS
STILL IN QUESTION...BUT TRENDS WILL BE MONITORED.

STRONGER MID-LEVEL FORCING FOR UPWARD VERTICAL MOTION ASSOCIATED
WITH SUPPORTING SHORT WAVE IMPULSE APPEARS LIKELY TO LIFT AWAY FROM
THE RED RIVER VALLEY...INTO THE CENTRAL PLAINS...THROUGH EARLY
AFTERNOON. BUT LOWER/MID TROPOSPHERIC WARM ADVECTION IN ITS WAKE
MAY MAINTAIN VIGOROUS CONVECTIVE DEVELOPMENT ACROSS PARTS OF SOUTH
CENTRAL OKLAHOMA...PERHAPS ADJACENT NORTH CENTRAL TEXAS... THROUGH
AT LEAST THE 18-19Z TIME FRAME. THIS MAY COINCIDE WITH WEAK TO
MODERATE BOUNDARY LAYER DESTABILIZATION...IN RESPONSE TO SURFACE
HEATING AND NORTHWARD ADVECTION OF LOWER/MID SURFACE DEW
POINTS...PRIOR TO THE ONSET OF MID-LEVEL HEIGHT RISES AND
SUBSIDENCE. NEAR AND BENEATH 50+ KT SOUTHWESTERLY 500 MB FLOW...AND
A SLOWLY STRENGTHENING 30-50 KT SOUTHERLY 850 MB JET AXIS...STRONG
DEEP LAYER SHEAR AND SIZABLE CLOCKWISE CURVED LOW-LEVEL HODOGRAPHS
WILL BE FAVORABLE FOR ORGANIZED STORMS...INCLUDING SUPERCELLS...WITH
POTENTIAL FOR DAMAGING WIND GUSTS...PERHAPS AN ISOLATED TORNADO.

Quite a few of my good friends will be out chasing today, so if you'd like to watch them, be sure to check out these sites, they have live streams of the storms.

http://severestudios.com/livechase

http://chase.tornadovideos.net/pages/full_screen - this site has a neat interactive radar where you can see the lightning strikes, direction of the storms, and the little cars you see, you can click on them and see the live streams.

If anyone lives in the area of the Okalahoma/Texas border region, be on alert today because things are looking to turn nasty!