Severe Big Country weather brings threat of hail storms

ABILENE, Texas ( BCH Weather ) – Tuesday started off with a bang in the morning as severe thunderstorms from Monday night continued in Haskell and Throckmorton counties.

Severe storms brewed up once again around 8:45 a.m. in Fisher County. Just an hour later at 9:45 a.m., yet another severe thunderstorm warning was issued for Haskell, Jones, Shackelford, and Throckmorton counties.

That storm led to a flood advisory in Haskell County, and a Flash Flood Guidance for Central and East Texas. As storms in the northern Big Country left the region, the radar for the Big Country was fairly quiet for about an hour or so.

Around 11:00 a.m., we only had one storm in the Big Country and that was in Nolan County near Sweetwater. At 11:12 a.m. that storm became severe, but weakened to below severe limits around 11:45 that morning.

There was a total of eight severe thunderstorm warnings issued between midnight and noon Tuesday. That’s pretty active for a 12-hour period, especially during the overnight hours with no daytime heating.

Believe it or not, that was just the beginning of the severe weather for the day in the Big Country. At 11:30 a.m., the Storm Prediction Center issued a Mesoscale Discussion for parts of the area.

The discussion was according to the 11:00 a.m. surface observations. It showed a front draped across
west into north-central Texas, with a dryline extending south from the front towards the Big Bend vicinity.

Radar and visible satellite trends indicated another thunderstorm that developed north of San Angelo near the front-dryline intersection. The airmass downstream appeared favorable for supercells, with moderate instability and strong deep-layer shear likely to support updraft organization.

Most high-resolution models showed additional supercells developing through early afternoon. Given the presence of steep mid-level lapse rates and soundings at mid/upper levels, scattered large to very large hail (1.5-2.5 inches in diameter) is expected be the main severe threat.

The second round of storms Tuesday afternoon and early evening will be mainly across the Big Country. Most of these will be elevated with large hail the main threat.

To the south of the cold front, and east of dryline across the eastern Concho Valley, Heartland, and Northwest Hill Country, a few surface based supercells may develop mainly between 4:00 and 10:00 p.m.

These storms will have the best potential to produce very large hail, in addition to damaging winds and isolated tornadoes due to moderate and locally strong instability, and strong vertical wind shear in the mid and upper levels. This is where the enhanced risk for severe storm comes into play.

Storms should be out of the area by late Tuesday night at around or after midnight. Any of the storms overnight are expected to move out to the east by the morning for most of the area, with a few storms lingering into the early afternoon in the Big Country.

Any activity late Wednesday morning and early afternoon are expected to stay sub severe at this time.

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