Day 159: An Upcoming West Coast Trough
VORTEX 2 operated in standby mode today before eventually calling things off early this evening without targeting a storm. Ironically, after dark, a tornado was reported 20 miles west of where they armada waited all day. Who says Mother Nature doesn’t have a sense of humor!
In any event, as VORTEX 2 heads into the final days, the crew is hanging its hopes on a storm currently moving on shore (circled in yellow) along the west coast. This storm has a very strong jet (circled in blue below) which should help to provide decent shear over the central plains in the coming days. As you can imagine the forecast is for several good chase days coming up for the VORTEX 2 crews. Let’s hope the field campaign of VORTEX 2 goes out with a bang!
I’m sure I’ll have more to say about this in the coming days.
About Patrick
Patrick Marsh is a Ph.D. student at the University of Oklahoma's School of Meteorology. He earned a Bachelors of Science in Mathematics and Physics (cum laude) from the University of Arkansas in 2005 and a Masters of Science in Meteorology in 2007. In addition to working on his doctorate, Patrick serves as the National Severe Storms Laboratory Liaison to the Hazardous Weather Testbed where his research interests lie in working with operational forecasters, data mining, data visualization, and all things high-impact weather. For more about Patrick's work, check out his complete CV!
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