Identification

Title

Severe convective storms in limited instability organized by pattern and distribution

Abstract

Severe convection occurring in high-shear, low-CAPE (HSLC) environments is a common cool-season threat in the southeastern United States. Previous studies of HSLC convection document the increased operational chal-lenges that these environments present compared to their high-CAPE counterparts, corresponding to higher false-alarm ratios and lower probability of detection for severe watches and warnings. These environments can exhibit rapid destabili-zation in the hours prior to convection, sometimes associated with the release of potential instability. Here, we use self-organizing maps (SOMs) to objectively identify environmental patterns accompanying HSLC cool-season severe events and associate them with variations in severe weather frequency and distribution. Large-scale patterns exhibit modest varia-tion within the HSLC subclass, featuring strong surface cyclones accompanied by vigorous upper-tropospheric troughs and northward-extending regions of instability, consistent with prior studies. In most patterns, severe weather occurs immedi-ately ahead of a cold front. Other convective ingredients, such as lower-tropospheric vertical wind shear, near-surface equivalent potential temperature (ue) advection, and the release of potential instability, varied more significantly across patterns. No single variable used to train SOMs consistently demonstrated differences in the distribution of severe weather occurrence across patterns. Comparison of SOMs based on upper and lower quartiles of severe occurrence demonstrated that the release of potential instability was most consistently associated with higher-impact events in comparison to other convective ingredients. Overall, we find that previously developed HSLC composite parameters reasonably identify high-impact HSLC events. SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT: Even when atmospheric instability is not optimal for severe convective storms, in some situations they can still occur, presenting increased challenges to forecasters. These marginal environments may oc-cur at night or during the cool season, when people are less attuned to severe weather threats. Here, we use a sorting al-gorithm to classify different weather patterns accompanying such storms, and we distinguish which specific patterns and weather system features are most strongly associated with severe storms. Our goals are to increase situational awareness for forecasters and to improve understanding of the processes leading to severe convection in marginal environments.

Resource type

document

Resource locator

Unique resource identifier

code

https://n2t.org/ark:/85065/d7qj7nd2

codeSpace

Dataset language

eng

Spatial reference system

code identifying the spatial reference system

Classification of spatial data and services

Topic category

geoscientificInformation

Keywords

Keyword set

keyword value

Text

originating controlled vocabulary

title

Resource Type

reference date

date type

publication

effective date

2016-01-01T00:00:00Z

Geographic location

West bounding longitude

East bounding longitude

North bounding latitude

South bounding latitude

Temporal reference

Temporal extent

Begin position

End position

Dataset reference date

date type

publication

effective date

2024-01-01T00:00:00Z

Frequency of update

Quality and validity

Lineage

Conformity

Data format

name of format

version of format

Constraints related to access and use

Constraint set

Use constraints

Limitations on public access

None

Responsible organisations

Responsible party

contact position

OpenSky Support

organisation name

UCAR/NCAR - Library

full postal address

PO Box 3000

Boulder

80307-3000

email address

opensky@ucar.edu

web address

http://opensky.ucar.edu/

name: homepage

responsible party role

pointOfContact

Metadata on metadata

Metadata point of contact