Alert archive / Kansas / Severe Thunderstorm Warnings in 1999

Severe Thunderstorm Warning 95, NWS Wichita, KS

May 20, 1999Harvey County, Kansas

NWS Wichita, KS issued this severe thunderstorm warning at May 20, 1999, 8:56 PM CDT for Harvey County, Kansas. It was in force for 64 min. No storm report in the archive falls inside the area while it was in force.

The area

The counties it named.

The facts

Issued: May 20, 1999, 8:56 PM CDT (01:56 UTC)
Expired: May 20, 1999, 10:00 PM CDT
In force: 64 min
Issued by: NWS Wichita, KS
Area: Whole counties; the outline is the Mesonet’s reconstruction

County Harvey County, KS

The radar

The Wichita radar (KICT), 43 km from the middle of the area, began a volume at 01:55 UTC, the scan nearest the moment this went out.

Open the radar archive at this moment

The archived warnings, watches and discussions in force at that minute are drawn over the scan, this one among them.

The watch it was issued in

The SPC watch in force over the same counties when this warning went out.

Issued	Product	Office	Lasted
May 20, 7:30 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Watch	SPC	5 hr

The nearest sounding before it

Topeka, KS (KTOP), launched 00:00Z, 1.9 hours before the alert went out and 188 km from the middle of its area. This is the routine balloon launch nearest before it, the air the forecaster had in hand, not a measurement taken for the alert.

Skew-T log-p

Temperature in red, dew point in green, the mixed-layer parcel dashed.

Hodograph

The wind turning with height, colored by layer: ground to 1 km, 1 to 3 km, 3 to 6 km, 6 to 10 km.

Mixed-layer CAPE: 434 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN: -16 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL: 1199 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear: 37 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity: 110 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity: 191 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter: 0.2
Supercell composite: 3.6

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The text

The text of this product is not in the archive. The NWS text archive before 2002 is incomplete.

What forecasters said that day

The local office's own words before this severe thunderstorm warning went out, as it sent them, from the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service text.

NWS Wichita, KS wrote its last area forecast discussion before this severe thunderstorm warning went out at May 20, 3:50 PM CDT, 5 hours 6 minutes earlier.

Area forecast discussion, May 20, 3:50 PM CDT, 5 hours 6 minutes before

AREA FORECAST DISCUSSION
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE WICHITA KS
350 PM CDT THU MAY 20 1999

MAIN FOCUS WILL BE ON LIKELYHOOD OF CONVECTION ACROSS THE FCST AREA
TONIGHT INTO FRIDAY.

WATER VAPOR/VISIBLE SATELLITE IMAGERY DETAILS A SIGNIFICANT
SHORTWAVE TROUGH MOVING SLOWLY EASTWARD OVER THE OK/TX PNHNDLS AND
WRN KS AS OF 18Z. SFC LOW WAS NEAR GUYMON OKLAHOMA WITH A STATIONARY
FRONT EXTENDING NWD FROM THE LOW ACROSS NWRN KS THRU CENTRAL NE. A
DRYLINE EXTENDS SWD FROM THE LOW. TSTMS WERE DEVELOPING ALONG THE
COLD FRONT IN AN AREA OF LOW LVL MOISTURE CONVERGENCE WITH STRONG
UPPER LEVEL DIFFLUENCE ALSO AIDING IN PRODUCING LARGE SCALE UVV'S TO
WRN KS. LOW LVL MOISTURE AXIS IS SPREADING EAST ACROSS CNTRL KS
AHEAD OF THE SHORTWAVE TROUGH. LAPS SOUNDINGS CONFIRM 12Z MODEL DATA
WITH ATMOSPHERE BECOMING MODERATELY UNSTABLE THIS AFTERNOON INTO
TONIGHT ACROSS CNTRL THRU SERN KS. THIS IN RESPONSE TO WEAK MID LVL
CAA AND INCREASING SFC DWPTS. EXPECTING CONVECTION TO BECOME FAIRLY
WIDESPREAD AS WEAK LOW LVL MOISTURE CONVERGENCE OCCURS WITH COLD
FRONT MOVG EWD ACROSS THE STATE TONIGHT. WL LIKELY SEE AN MCS EVOLVE
BY EVENING AND MOVE ACROSS THE FCST AREA. WITH PRECIPITABLE WATER
VALUES OF 1 TO 1.5 IN AND SOME POTENTIAL ECHO TRAINING ALONG
FRONT...WL RETAIN MENTION OF LOCALLY HEAVY RAINFALL TONIGHT.
ATTM...LOOKING FOR WIDESPREAD 1-1.5 INCH RAINS ACROSS CNTRL AND
S-CNTRL KS TONIGHT WITH UP TO 1 INCH OVER SERN KS LATER TONIGHT.
FLASH FLOOD GUIDANCE VALUES ARE FAIRLY HIGH MOST AREAS TONIGHT. SOME
CONCERN A FEW RIVERS IN S-CNTRL KS COULD SEE SIGNIFICANT RISES FROM
TONIGHTS RAINS. HAVE COORDINATED WITH RFC TULSA AND WILL HOLD OFF ON
ANY FLOOD WATCHES ATTM. WILL SEE HOW EVENING MODELS HANDLE FCST QPF
AND CONTINUE TO MONITOR.

EXPECT LIKELY TO CATEGORICAL POPS AREAWIDE TONIGHT SIMILIAR TO
PREVIOUS FCST. FOLLOWING THE NGM MODEL WHICH SEEMS TO HANDLE THE
COLD FRONT THE BEST THRU THE PD WITH ETA TOO AGGRESSIVE AND AVN
PSBLY TOO SLOW. NGM ALSO DID WELL WITH WRN KS/WRN OK PRECIPITATION
FCST LAST NIGHT COMPARED TO ETA/AVN. OTHERWISE...CLEARING OVER CNTRL
SECTIONS FRIDAY WITH MENTION OF MORNING RAIN PSBL SERN KS. COLD
FRONT SHOULD EXIT SERN SECTIONS FRI PM. FRONT IS INDICATED TO STALL
OUT OVER OK INTO THE TX PNHNDL FRI NIGHT...THEN WEAKEN OUT AS SRLY
FLOW RETURNS TO KS SATURDAY. AVN 60-72 HR INDICATES LOW LVL THETA-E
RIDGE BUILDS NWD BACK INTO KS SATURDAY INTO SAT NIGHT AHEAD OF NEXT
COLD FRONT IN NW FLOW ALOFT. A CHANCE OF SHOWERS/TSTMS APPEARS
WARRANTED SAT NIGHT WITH FROPA...THEN CLEARING AND DRY FOR THE
EXTENDED PD.

FCSTID = 9/CARUSO
ICT   60  76  58  83 /  80  20   0  10
HUT   58  76  58  83 /  80  20   0  10
EWK   59  76  58  82 /  80  20   0  10
EQA   61  76  58  82 /  80  20   0  10
WLD   61  76  58  83 /  80  20   0  10
RSL   55  75  56  83 /  80  10   0  10
GBD   55  75  56  83 /  80  10   0  10
SLN   56  74  56  82 /  80  10   0  10
MPR   58  74  56  83 /  80  10   0  10
CFV   63  78  60  83 /  70  40   0  10
CNU   62  77  59  82 /  70  40   0  10
K88   62  76  59  81 /  70  40   0  10

.ICT...NONE.

In the hours before

Local storm report, May 20, 5:36 PM CDT, 3 hours 20 minutes before

PRELIMINARY LOCAL STORM REPORT
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE WICHITA KS
536 PM CDT THU MAY 20 1999

TIME(CDT)  .....CITY LOCATION.....STATE   ...EVENT/REMARKS...
           ....COUNTY LOCATION....

0415 PM    3 SSW BUNKER HILL         KS   0.75 INCH HAIL
05/20/99   RUSSELL                        REPORTED BY PUBLIC

0425 PM    2 NE HOISINGTON           KS   0.75 INCH HAIL
05/20/99   BARTON                         REPORTED BY AGTAP SPOTTER

0525 PM    ELLSWORTH                 KS   0.75 INCH HAIL
05/20/99   ELLSWORTH                      REPORTED BY AGTAP SPOTTER

WIGHTMAN

Local storm report, May 20, 5:36 PM CDT, 3 hours 20 minutes before

PRELIMINARY LOCAL STORM REPORT
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE WICHITA KS
536 PM CDT THU MAY 20 1999

TIME(CDT)  .....CITY LOCATION.....STATE   ...EVENT/REMARKS...
           ....COUNTY LOCATION....

0415 PM    3 SSW BUNKER HILL         KS   0.75 INCH HAIL
05/20/99   RUSSELL                        REPORTED BY PUBLIC

0425 PM    2 NE HOISINGTON           KS   0.75 INCH HAIL
05/20/99   BARTON                         REPORTED BY AGTAP SPOTTER

0525 PM    ELLSWORTH                 KS   0.75 INCH HAIL
05/20/99   ELLSWORTH                      REPORTED BY AGTAP SPOTTER

WIGHTMAN

The office that day

Everything else NWS Wichita, KS issued on the same UTC day.

Issued	Product	Office	Counties	Lasted
May 20, 7:41 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	ICT	McPherson	64 min
May 20, 8:24 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	ICT	Kingman	66 min
May 20, 9:07 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	ICT	Sedgwick	53 min
May 20, 9:35 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	ICT	Butler	55 min
May 20, 9:55 PM CDT	Flash Flood Warning	ICT	Sedgwick	3 hr

Nearby

Severe Thunderstorm Warnings in Kansas, 1999 Every severe thunderstorm warning in 1999

Sources

The product and its follow-ups from the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service and Storm Prediction Center text; the sounding from the Mesonet's radiosonde archive; radar from the NEXRAD Level II archive.