June 24th was the final day of a week long chase vacation and this worked out since I had to be back in Iowa for the weekend. The storm system that we tracked the previous day had made its way eastward and a surface low was expected to move from South Dakota northeast while a cold front draped behind it extended into Iowa and Kansas to Colorado. This front would be the focal point for severe weather.
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June 23rd featured a favorable setup for isolated supercells, especially in Southeastern Wyoming. Moderate daytime heating coupled with an increase in deep shear from an ejecting shortwave would provide a good thermodynamic environment while cyclogenesis would cause low level curvature in the hodographs to increase.
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June 22nd featured two target areas. An MCS that traveled into Texas would leave an outflow boundary that stretched back into Northeastern New Mexico. Meanwhile easterly surface flow again would be present transporting moisture into the foothills from Southeastern Wyoming into Colorado. While the better tornado chances appeared to be in NM, I decided to hang around the Cheyenne-Denver corridor to be closer to Wyoming for the following day.
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The second day of a week long chase vacation in late June featured strong easterlies advecting very moist air into the Central High Plains across Colorado and Wyoming. Some places were expected to reach low 70°F dewpoints which is pretty nuts for the area. The Denver Cyclone was expected to be active but really anywhere from Douglas to Denver was looking pretty good. When you get 3,000 J/Kg of CAPE in Wyoming or Colorado, you figure out how to be there.
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June 20th was the week I finally decided to head out and roam the plains for a whole week. While I wasn’t expecting anything spectacular, it did appear we’d get storms everyday for the next five days, so that’s pretty good. Anyway, way up north a cool front was extending from Northern North Dakota down into South Dakota. As the upper level energy began to encroach on the Northern Plains it appeared there’d be a decent chance at severe weather.
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