Alert archive / Colorado / Mesoscale Discussions in 2015

Mesoscale Discussion 1696

August 17, 20156 counties in Colorado; 6 counties in New Mexico

The Storm Prediction Center issued this mesoscale discussion at Aug 17, 2015, 1:06 PM MDT for 6 counties in Colorado; 6 counties in New Mexico. It was in force for 2 hr.

The area

The outline as issued.

The facts

Issued: Aug 17, 2015, 1:06 PM MDT (19:06 UTC)
Expired: Aug 17, 2015, 3:30 PM MDT
In force: 2 hr
Issued by: the Storm Prediction Center
Chance of a watch: 40%

Counties Costilla County, CO, Crowley County, CO, Huerfano County, CO, Las Animas County, CO, Otero County, CO, Pueblo County, CO, Colfax County, NM, Harding County, NM, Mora County, NM, San Miguel County, NM, Taos County, NM, Union County, NM

The radar

The Pueblo radar (KPUX), 226 km from the middle of the area, began a volume at 19:06 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.

Tornado Watch 490Aug 17, 2:30 PM MDT

The nearest sounding before it

Albuquerq/Krtlnd, NM (KABQ), launched 12:00Z, 7.1 hours before the alert went out and 224 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: 131 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN: -246 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL: 1819 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear: 38 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity: 100 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity: 150 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter: 0.0
Supercell composite: 0.0

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The text

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

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SPC that day

Everything else SPC issued on the same UTC day.

Issued	Product	Office	Counties	Lasted
Aug 16, 9:04 PM MDT	Mesoscale Discussion	SPC	Prowers	86 min
Aug 17, 1:59 PM MDT	Mesoscale Discussion	SPC	Adams, Arapahoe, Broomfield, Cheyenne, Denver, Douglas and 8 more	2 hr
Aug 17, 2:32 PM MDT	Tornado Watch	SPC	Adams, Arapahoe, Baca, Bent, Boulder, Broomfield and 20 more	7 hr
Aug 17, 4:41 PM MDT	Mesoscale Discussion	SPC	Adams, Arapahoe, Bent, Cheyenne, Crowley, Elbert and 11 more	94 min
Aug 17, 4:08 PM MDT	Mesoscale Discussion	SPC	Curry, De Baca, Doña Ana, Guadalupe, Harding, Lincoln and 6 more	2 hr

Nearby

Mesoscale Discussions in Colorado, 2015 Mesoscale Discussions in New Mexico, 2015 Every mesoscale discussion in 2015

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.