 Photo Credit: Glacier National Park Service Discussion: Although astronomical summer has started and meteorological summer is right around the corner, portions of the Northern Rockies are still experiencing snow. This should not come as a surprise as the western United States has seen quite active this spring ranging from snow to thunderstorms.  Notice on the satellite imagery above the large trough swinging through the Northern Rockies. This is the system that brought the lift and energy to the region and has triggered the snowfall. Scattered storms are shown across portions of the Southeast and Mid-Atlantic as well on this imagery. A potent trough dove into the Pacific Northwest late this past week and is now moving through the Northern Rockies (shown above). The cool air and energy from this trough along with a favorable location of the jet stream has produced several inches of snow across the higher elevations of Idaho, northwest Wyoming, and western Montana. South-central Montana is under a winter weather advisory until Sunday morning for this system with around half a foot of snow accumulation possible.  Beyond this system, conditions turn warmer and more convective in nature across portions of the Northern Rockies and Great Basin according to major global models. A bit of moisture and instability in addition to energy aloft will push into the region mid to late week which will trigger showers and thunderstorms. Rain, lightning, and perhaps some gusty winds will be possible hazards with this activity. An image above from Windy.com shows the ECMWF’s early depiction of the thunder activity across this region Thursday afternoon. Stay tuned to your local National Weather Service Office for more details in the coming days.
To learn more about North American weather click here! ©2019 Meteorologist Joe DeLizio
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A Closer Look at Deep Oklahoma Convection via GOES-East! (Imagery Credit: The Weather Channel)6/5/2019 
DISCUSSION: When it comes to severe weather, there is no debate that there several different hazards which come into play with a variety of different genres of severe weather events. Moreover, it is also very well known that some of the more common and more apparent severe weather hazards include (but are certainly not limited to) lightning, hail, and tornadoes. Having said that, one of the underlying threats from severe weather events which is often substantially more overlooked involves the threat tied to flooding and/or flash flooding threats which come into play under various circumstances. Moreover, a key method by which meteorologists identify evolving flooding and/or flash flooding threats is by considering various types of satellite-based indications of such events getting ready to occur.
More specifically, in looking back to May 21st of this year, the GOES-East satellite came in handy in a major way through providing real-time insights into the smaller-scale convective evolution of intense convective storms. That is, the convective storms which formed and evolved over the state of Oklahoma at the start of the final week of May. In looking back to May 21st, you can see (in the Tweet attached above) how there were persistent bursts of deeper convection which fired up over portions of northern as well as northeast Oklahoma as indicated by the areas of grey to white-colored cloud tops. It is worth noting that this satellite imagery being shown was longwave infrared satellite imagery which allows cloud-top temperatures to be readily interpreted even towards the evening and overnight hours in any given location. Thus, longwave infrared satellite imagery is most definitely a helpful tool when it comes to diagnosing the threat of flooding and/or flash flooding on a real-time basis. Just this one example of how flooding and/or flash flooding event anticipation as well as detection has become more effective and reliable is a perfect reason for why it is that much more important to always remain weather-ready. That way, you are never caught in a potentially dangerous situation without enough lead-time and so you can always have an opportunity to make relatively quick and critical decisions. To learn more about other high-impact weather events occurring across North America, be sure to click here! © 2019 Meteorologist Jordan Rabinowitz |
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