KSHB: Weather: Action Weather Blog: Cold Front Moving Through!

The cold front is moving through the area as I type this! I drew it in on our surface observation map:

Winds are shifting in from the northwest, and that will help to usher in some cooler air. So far, the high temperature at KCI is 76... and that seems like it will stand, as we have already fallen to 67 at this hour!

There is not much in the way of showers/thunderstorms with this front. Most of the activity is very spotty. We will keep a slight chance in the forecast through the afternoon... but what you'll REALLY notice is the drop in temperature. We will likely be in the 50s as many of you leave work this evening!

I wanted to pass along some great viewer photos today, too. Here is a sunset picture from last Sunday:

Karl Hammerberg took this in Olathe. The clouds we saw overhead on Sunday were actually feeding in from Tropical Storm Otis, which was spinning in the Pacific Ocean, near the Baja Penninsula. The clouds sure made for a beautiful sunset!!

In other tropical news... TROPICAL STORM TAMMY formed this morning, along Florida's east coast. Here are the latest stats:

MOTION: NORTH-NORTHWEST NEAR 14 MPH
WINDS: MAXIMUM SUSTAINED WINDS ARE NEAR 45 MPH...WITH HIGHER GUSTS.
SOME ADDITIONAL INCREASE IN STRENGTH IS POSSIBLE LATER TODAY.
PRESSURE: 1003 MB...29.62 INCHES

Tammy is basically moving parallel to the coast right now, so it's hard to say where the storm will make landfall! Here is the TPC's forecasted track:

Moving on to some more pictures.... these are of weekend flooding on highway 24 near Grantville, Kansas (Jefferson County):

Brenda Bohanann sent this one in... saying that the flooding closed quite a few schools! It really is a GOOD thing that today's cold front is not a big rain-maker!!

But the same storm that is affecting us in KC is bringing blizzard-like conditions to the Northern Plains! Check out the Mesoscale Discussion they just put out:

MESOSCALE DISCUSSION 2321
NWS STORM PREDICTION CENTER NORMAN OK
0112 PM CDT WED OCT 05 2005

AREAS AFFECTED...ND

CONCERNING...HEAVY SNOW

VALID 051812Z - 052245Z

HEAVY WET SNOW WILL CONTINUE ACROSS WCNTRL INTO NE ND FOR MUCH OF
THE AFTERNOON...WITH RATES OF 1.0-1.5 IN/HR POSSIBLE...IN ADDITION
TO VERY STRONG NLY WINDS.

OBSERVATIONAL DATA PORTRAYS OCCLUDING LOW ACROSS THE ERN DAKOTAS
INTO WRN MN. ON THE NW PERIPHERY OF THIS CYCLONE...HEAVY WET SNOW IS EXPECTED TO CONTINUE THIS AFTERNOON WITHIN DEFORMATION ZONE/ON SRN
PERIPHERY OF MID LEVEL FRONTOGENETICAL FORCING. IN SPITE OF MARGINAL
LOW LEVEL THERMODYNAMIC PROFILES...HEAVY WET SNOW WILL REMAIN
PREDOMINANT PRECIP TYPE COINCIDENT WITH HIGHEST PRECIP RATES. AMPLE
OMEGA THROUGH DEEPLY SATURATED DENDRITIC LAYER WILL BE FAVORABLE FOR
SNOW RATES OF 1.0-1.5 IN/HR...ALTHOUGH ACTUAL ACCUMULATIONS WILL BE
HINDERED BY MILD GROUND TEMPS/MARGINAL BOUNDARY LAYER TEMPS.

IN ADDITION...VERY STRONG WINDS WILL PERSIST ACROSS WCNTRL/NE ND
THROUGH THE AFTERNOON...CREATING NEAR BLIZZARD CONDITIONS AT TIMES
AMIDST THE HEAVY WET SNOW. VAD DATA FROM MINOT WSR-88D EFFECTIVELY
SAMPLES 50-65 KT NELY WINDS WITHIN 1-3 KM LAYER...WITH LATEST RUC
GUIDANCE SUGGESTING THIS CORE OF VERY STRONG WINDS WILL PERSIST INTO
EARLY EVENING.

..GUYER.. 10/05/2005

Have a good afternoon!
Jamie

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Jamie, Where did Tammy come from? I haven't even heard of it til today and its like it came out of nowhere. We love watching the entire Action News Team up here in Chillicothe!

HI CRYSTAL:
Tropical Storm Tammy formed from a large area of disturbed weather north of the Bahamas, and over northern Florida. Basically... the stormy area gained some organization... and TS Tammy was born!

Once sustained winds reach 39 mph, a storm can be declared a TROPICAL STORM. This happened for Tammy yesterday (Wednesday) morning. Tammy is still a tropical storm today, but the storm is weakening, as it has already made landfall over Florida!
Jamie

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Question about the forecast e-mails. I opened today's e-mail (thu, 10-6) and the forecast text was the Tue/Wed forecast. Same way yesterday. the text hasn't changed in two days although the weather graphic was up to date and correct. I know that the graphic is altomatically updated. What gives with the text?

Tracy

TRACY:
Hello, there... we have gotten a couple of emails regarding this problem. The text IS being updated, but for some reason it is not getting sent out. We think the delivery system might grab the message too early, before it is updated. But it is weird that the GRAPHIC is correct. We will continue to investigate!