Start
October 15, 2021 - 3:00 pm
End
October 15, 2021 - 4:00 pm
Categories
Convective Meteorology (Mesoscale Dynamics)Convective Meteorology (Mesoscale Dynamics)
Predictability and analysis of the 13 April 2020 Central Savannah River Area tornado outbreak
Christopher Kerr
Friday, October 15
3:00pm
CIWRO/NSSL FRDD
Tornadoes. Observations. Model guidance. Storm dynamics. Societal impacts. This talk has it all. An early morning generational tornado outbreak occurred on 13 April 2020 in the Central Savannah River Area where multiple significant tornadoes were reported resulting in fatalities and injuries. While the detection-based tornado warnings had positive lead times, the convective mode (QLCS) increased the warning decision complexity. The timing of the event (5-6AM local time) also made NWS-to-public communication difficult. The NSSL Warn-on-Forecast system (WoFS) was run retrospectively for this case. The WoFS is comprised of 3-6-hour ensemble forecasts initialized every 30 minutes. The goal of the system is to bridge the gap between severe weather watches and warnings and to increase warning lead times. Multiple WoFS forecasts were initialized leading up to the first tornado report. These forecasts will be presented. From the WoFS forecasts, kinematic and thermodynamic storm-environment relationships are analyzed using ensemble sensitivity analysis.