Chase status...

We've been watching today for the last few days via the GFS and NAM, and it appears that there is still a good chance for storms this afternoon and into this evening across much of eastern North Dakota. With the weekend off, my chase status is pretty much a go. I've come into the office to look at things a little more closely and Turcotte will be joining me shortly. We've decided to rendezvous here to straighten out logistics for the afternoon.

I'm still leaning on my initial target area; around the Cooperstown area. Any area from Cooperstown, to Valley City, to Crookston (MN), to Detroit Lakes (MN) looks good, though - particularly over the western and northern portion of that area. The warm front is hanging up in that region right now and I'm not sure how much further north it's going to surge. If it can hang around there, backing winds along the boundary will result in a much greater sheared environment for rotating storms.

Impressive to see LI's at -12 and lower and CAPE values nearing 7000 (wow!) near the Jamestown and Valley City area towards 00z on the 18z RUC. I'm not quite buying into that, but it's still impressive!

Will likely be taking off here within the next hour or two.