First and foremost the folks in Mississippi need to be remembered this Saturday morning after the horrendous tornado damage Friday night. There were a number of chasers who apparently stopped to help victims. I continue to shun nocturnal chasing since my purpose and desire is to actually see the storms, but kudos to those who rendered aid as literally first responders. As for Old Dominion chasing today lookie here: I had speculated in an earlier blogpost that Virginia might see a Marginal Risk today. But after poring through several convective allowing models this morning I was scratching my ..read more

After reviewing more model data it doesn’t look like tomorrow – Saturday 3/25 – is going to pan out as a chase day. Showers will roll across Virginia during the morning, and by the time the cold front arrives late in the afternoon the moisture will be scoured out. Thus I turned my attention to Friday afternoon as a small upper air shortwave crossed the Appalachian mountains and forced its way up and over a cold air damming wedge east of the Blue Ridge. SPC had the very western part of the Old Dominion under a general thunder overlay for the Day 1 convective outlook, and the morning sounding at ..read more

This time of year wind shear is typically not a limiting factor for severe weather in Virginia given the proximity of the jet stream. What usually limits storms is a lack of moisture return and the annoying tendency of surface cold fronts to cross the state after sunset. This coming Saturday, 3/25, the setup may well overcome these limitations. First, the SPC Day 3 outlook is for general thunder across the Old Dominion: Yet another low pressure center chugging northeast up the Ohio valley will drag a cold front across the Appalachians on Saturday. Southwesterly flow ahead of this system will ..read more

This morning’s 12Z GFS run still holds faint promise of convection this weekend. These 3 panels (surface temps & wind, dew points, and 700 mb vertical velocity) are each valid at 18Z Saturday. Moisture return looks decent with a cold front pushing across Virginia providing lift. We’ll see if this trend holds over the next several days. Still, I’m not yet motivated to prep my chase gear ..read more

This weekend’s Arctic blast may well be the last gasp of winter here in Virginia. Temperatures will moderate by mid-week, and longer ranged CPC outlooks support a warmer regime. However, moisture return to support convection is still looking sparse. It’s possible that something could happen as early as next weekend, but I’m not holding my breath. Here’s the GEFS ensemble CAPE forecast for Saturday, March 25th: That’s the most promising look for convection in the next couple of weeks. April ..read more

My storm chasing “career” began in 2002, so I now have 21 years under my belt here in Virginia. While the weather outdoors is gray, wet, and chilly on this last Saturday of February I delved into my historical chase records to get a feel for what the odds are for a March stormchase in the Old Dominion. I came up with a total of 22 events, some of which are somewhat rather loosely defined as a chase vs. a local storm spotting opportunity. This is a bit subjective, of course, since there are times I can’t get out to chase when conditions are favorable. The earliest in the month was on March 1st ..read more

During the second Hokie Storm Chase trip we stopped in Sikeston MO to eat dinner at Lamberts’ Cafe, home of the “Throwed Rolls”. We wound up scarfing down – or in some cases abandoning – our meals when a supercell rolled into town. After quickly retreating several miles westward we stopped on a side road to observe the storm and its awesome lightning display. Reviewing videos like this help alleviate rampant SDS, so enjoy ..read more

Saturdays are often known on storm chaser social media as “Supercell Saturday”. Today I was reminded of the Virginia supercell that got away from me. On June 25th 2015 I had driven south from a lunch meeting in Charlottesville to await convection along U.S. Route 460 near Appomattox. The lee trough east of the Blue Ridge wound up firing 3 discrete supercells over the Old Dominion, and I wound up stuck roughly halfway between #1 and #2 on this annotated SPC storm report graphic: Since supercell #2 was aimed directly at the busy Richmond metro area I chose to intercept #1. This storm quickly bl ..read more

On this Groundhog Day as wintry precipitation is outperforming model predictions here in the Old Dominion I’ve been looking through some of my 2022 chasing photos. This one was snapped after a somewhat frantic search for a vantage point from which to observe the fiery red sunset colors on the back side of a Bedford county storm I’d been chasing. July 12 2022 near Montvale VA The only edit of this image was to lighten the foreground. It really was this red ..read more

I typically chase in Virginia, but occasionally an opportunity arises to leave the boundaries of the Old Dominion. In 2022 these two convective setups led me to do just that. On May 3rd I ventured northwestward to Ohio, where my son and I wound up chasing – or being chased by – a half dozen rapidly moving storms. The first one produced this funnel near Leesburg OH: Photo by Nathan W. A few days later on May 6th my chase partner and I wound up intercepting several tornado-warned storms in North Carolina. The first couple were rain-obscured messes in and around a warm front, so we retreated nort ..read more