Alert archive / Texas / Mesoscale Discussions in 2023

Mesoscale Discussion 673

May 4, 2023Cotton County, Jefferson County, Tillman County, Oklahoma; 17 counties in Texas

The Storm Prediction Center issued this mesoscale discussion at May 4, 2023, 1:43 PM CDT for Cotton County, Jefferson County, Tillman County, Oklahoma; 17 counties in Texas. It was in force for 2 hr.

The area

The outline as issued.

The facts

Issued: May 4, 2023, 1:43 PM CDT (18:43 UTC)
Expired: May 4, 2023, 3:45 PM CDT
In force: 2 hr
Issued by: the Storm Prediction Center
Concerning: Severe potential...tornado watch likely
Chance of a watch: 80%

Counties Cotton County, OK, Jefferson County, OK, Tillman County, OK, Archer County, TX, Baylor County, TX, Childress County, TX, Clay County, TX, Cottle County, TX, Foard County, TX, Hardeman County, TX, Haskell County, TX, Jack County, TX, King County, TX, Knox County, TX, Montague County, TX, Stonewall County, TX, Throckmorton County, TX, Wichita County, TX, Wilbarger County, TX, Young County, TX

The radar

The Altus AFB radar (KFDR), 74 km from the middle of the area, began a volume at 18:46 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.

The nearest sounding before it

Fort Worth, TX (KFWD), launched 12:00Z, 6.7 hours before the alert went out and 228 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: 32 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN: -455 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL: 1236 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear: 49 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity: 58 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity: 19 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter: 0.0
Supercell composite: 0.0

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The text

As transmitted.

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SPC that day

Everything else SPC issued on the same UTC day.

Issued	Product	Office	Counties	Lasted
May 4, 2:54 PM CDT	Tornado Watch	SPC	Carter, Cotton, Harmon, Jackson, Jefferson, Love and 2 more	6 hr
May 4, 5:05 PM CDT	Mesoscale Discussion	SPC	Cotton, Jefferson, Tillman	85 min
May 4, 2:48 PM CDT	Mesoscale Discussion	SPC	Callahan, Coke, Coleman, Concho, Crockett, Edwards and 16 more	2 hr
May 4, 4:57 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Watch	SPC	Bandera, Bell, Bosque, Brown, Burnet, Callahan and 62 more	7 hr

Nearby

Mesoscale Discussions in Texas, 2023 Mesoscale Discussions in Oklahoma, 2023 Every mesoscale discussion in 2023

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.