Alert archive / Virginia / Mesoscale Discussions in 2003

Mesoscale Discussion 2290

August 27, 20034 states

The Storm Prediction Center issued this mesoscale discussion at Aug 27, 2003, 5:03 PM EDT for 4 states. It was in force for 87 min.

The area

The outline as issued.

The facts

Issued: Aug 27, 2003, 5:03 PM EDT (21:03 UTC)
Expired: Aug 27, 2003, 6:30 PM EDT
In force: 87 min
Issued by: the Storm Prediction Center

All 91 counties

Allegany County, MD, Anne Arundel County, MD, Baltimore County, MD, Calvert County, MD, Carroll County, MD, Charles County, MD, City of Baltimore, MD, Frederick County, MD, Garrett County, MD, Harford County, MD, Howard County, MD, Kent County, MD, Montgomery County, MD, Prince George's County, MD, Saint Mary's County, MD, Washington County, MD, Bedford County, PA, Fayette County, PA, Franklin County, PA, Fulton County, PA, Greene County, PA, Somerset County, PA, Washington County, PA, Arlington County, VA, Augusta County, VA, Caroline County, VA, City of Alexandria, VA, City of Charlottesville, VA, City of Fairfax, VA, City of Falls Church, VA, City of Fredericksburg, VA, City of Harrisonburg, VA, City of Manassas, VA, City of Manassas Park, VA, City of Staunton, VA, City of Winchester, VA, Clarke County, VA, Culpeper County, VA, Essex County, VA, Fairfax County, VA, Fauquier County, VA, Frederick County, VA, Greene County, VA, Highland County, VA, King and Queen County, VA, King George County, VA, Loudoun County, VA, Louisa County, VA, Madison County, VA, Orange County, VA, Page County, VA, Prince William County, VA, Rappahannock County, VA, Richmond County, VA, Rockingham County, VA, Shenandoah County, VA, Spotsylvania County, VA, Stafford County, VA, Warren County, VA, Westmoreland County, VA, Barbour County, WV, Berkeley County, WV, Braxton County, WV, Brooke County, WV, Calhoun County, WV, Clay County, WV, Doddridge County, WV, Gilmer County, WV, Grant County, WV, Hampshire County, WV, Hardy County, WV, Harrison County, WV, Jefferson County, WV, Kanawha County, WV, Lewis County, WV, Marion County, WV, Marshall County, WV, Mineral County, WV, Monongalia County, WV, Morgan County, WV, Ohio County, WV, Pendleton County, WV, Pocahontas County, WV, Preston County, WV, Putnam County, WV, Randolph County, WV, Roane County, WV, Taylor County, WV, Tucker County, WV, Upshur County, WV, Webster County, WV

The radar

The Pittsburgh radar (KPBZ), 172 km from the middle of the area, began a volume at 21:07 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 watches that followed

Watches SPC issued over any of the same counties within four hours of this discussion.

Severe Thunderstorm Watch 905Aug 27, 7:30 PM EDT

The nearest sounding before it

Pittsburgh, PA (KPIT), launched 12:00Z, 9.1 hours before the alert went out and 157 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: 1234 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN: -53 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL: 728 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear: 39 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity: 107 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity: 172 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter: 0.2
Supercell composite: 1.2

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The text

As transmitted, in the capitals the NWS used until 2016.

<!doctype html>
<html lang="en">
<head>
  <meta charset="utf-8">
  <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1">
  <title>Service Notice</title>
  <link rel="stylesheet" href="index.css">
</head>
<body>
  <main class="wrap">
    <section class="card" role="status" aria-live="polite">
      <div class="status" id="status">Temporary Notice</div>
      <h1 id="headline">This service is currently unavailable.</h1>
      <p id="message1">
        The site you requested is temporarily down for maintenance or an unexpected outage.
      </p>
      <p id="message2">
        Please try again in a few minutes.
      </p>
      <p class="small" id="detail">
        If you are an administrator, restore upstream service and remove the redirect/fallback rule when normal operations resume.
      </p>
    </section>
  </main>
  <script src="index.js"></script>
</body>
</html>

SPC that day

Everything else SPC issued on the same UTC day.

Issued	Product	Office	Counties	Lasted
Aug 26, 9:20 PM EDT	Severe Thunderstorm Watch	SPC	Allegany, Garrett	6 hr
Aug 26, 10:18 PM EDT	Mesoscale Discussion	SPC	Allegany, Garrett	57 min
Aug 27, 12:22 AM EDT	Mesoscale Discussion	SPC	Charles	53 min
Aug 27, 6:11 AM EDT	Mesoscale Discussion	SPC	Allegany, Garrett, Washington	2 hr
Aug 27, 9:23 AM EDT	Mesoscale Discussion	SPC	Allegany, Anne Arundel, Baltimore, Calvert, Caroline, Carroll and 17 more	2 hr
Aug 27, 9:40 AM EDT	Severe Thunderstorm Watch	SPC	Harford	5 hr
Aug 27, 10:35 AM EDT	Severe Thunderstorm Watch	SPC	Allegany, Anne Arundel, Baltimore, Calvert, Carroll, Charles and 8 more	5 hr
Aug 27, 2:10 PM EDT	Mesoscale Discussion	SPC	Allegany, Anne Arundel, Baltimore, Calvert, Carroll, Charles and 8 more	65 min
Aug 27, 3:09 PM EDT	Mesoscale Discussion	SPC	Allegany, Anne Arundel, Baltimore, Calvert, Carroll, Frederick and 7 more	66 min
Aug 27, 3:30 PM EDT	Severe Thunderstorm Watch	SPC	Allegany, Anne Arundel, Baltimore, Calvert, Carroll, Charles and 9 more	7 hr
Aug 27, 6:56 PM EDT	Mesoscale Discussion	SPC	Anne Arundel, Baltimore, Calvert, Caroline, Carroll, Cecil and 15 more	64 min
Aug 27, 7:30 PM EDT	Severe Thunderstorm Watch	SPC	Caroline, Cecil, Dorchester, Kent, Queen Anne's, Somerset and 3 more	4 hr
Aug 27, 11:48 AM EDT	Mesoscale Discussion	SPC	Adams, Allegheny, Beaver, Bedford, Cambria, Columbia and 18 more	87 min
Aug 27, 2:05 PM EDT	Severe Thunderstorm Watch	SPC	Fayette, Greene, Washington, Westmoreland	5 hr
Aug 27, 12:52 PM EDT	Mesoscale Discussion	SPC	Barbour, Braxton, Cabell, Calhoun, Clay, Doddridge and 16 more	113 min

Nearby

Mesoscale Discussions in Virginia, 2003 Mesoscale Discussions in West Virginia, 2003 Mesoscale Discussions in Maryland, 2003 Every mesoscale discussion in 2003

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.