353 
fxus63 kddc 180749 
afdddc 


Area forecast discussion 
National Weather Service Dodge City Kansas 
249 am CDT Friday Jul 18 2008 


Discussion... 


Days 1-2... 


The primary forecast concerns this morning are probability of precipitation and quantitative precipitation forecast. 


The latest surface analysis from 07z showed a weak cold front 
dropping south through Kansas...with a stationary front farther 
north stretched west to east across Nebraska. A low pressure center 
was near the Colorado/Kansas border east of klaa. The low had a 
trough trailing to the south. Both the low and trough will move 
little over the next 24 hours...and the same for the Nebraska 
front. With this in mind...there will will be precipitation chances 
continuing through at least Friday night. The stronger cells 
started moving at 25kts or so as they entered ddc's County Warning Area...and thus 
rainfall amounts were substantially lower than farther north. 
Since most of our has not received saturating rains of late...no 
areas were in imminent danger of flooding or flash flooding. 
Rainfall reports in the morning will paint a better picture of the 
overall rain received...but from radar estimates...it appears our 
north and northwest tier of counties received the most rain... 
anywhere from 1 to 2 inches northwest of a line from Syracuse to 
Lakin to Scott City to Dighton to Ness City to Trego Center to Hays. 


As for today...will keep probability of precipitation highest in the Ellis...rush...Trego 
and Ness County areas. The GFS model handled the ongoing precipitation the 
best...even better than the RUC model...and have stayed close to 
the GFS guidance. As mentioned above...with the fronts moving 
little over the next 36 hours...there could be repeated rainfall 
events due to numerous boundaries wandering around. The boundaries 
will serve as focus regions for convergence and rain. Do not 
expect any severe weather...as the atmosphere has become fairly 
worked over and not offering much in the way of deep instability. 
Did undercut FWC and met temperature guidance quite a bit...clouds 
and precipitation will hold down surface heating today. 


Clouds and precipitation will be decreasing on Saturday and warm air 
advection will be in full swing. The GFS is bring 850 temperatures into 
my western and southern counties in the 24 to 28c range...which 
could result in a couple of 100f maximum t's in my southern most 
locations. Friday night should be warmer as well with mins only 
dropping to the upper 60s west to the middle 70s in my southeast zones. 


Days 3-7... 


Hard to pinpoint the best chances for thunderstorms in the extended 
period with the models showing an upper ridge in place over the 
central Continental U.S.. the GFS and Canadian are hinting at the possibility 
for storms Monday night as they show a weak shortwave moving over 
the top of the ridge and down through the Midwest. This should push 
a boundary into the Central Plains which would focus thunderstorm 
development. The 00z European model (ecmwf) also hints at a shortwave but the models 
are not as clear with the low level features. The northern plains 
will be under the right entrance region of an upper jet which would 
help sustain thunderstorm activity into the nighttime. Thunderstorm 
chances will depend on where the surface boundary sets up. Will add 
some small probability of precipitation to northern and western sections of the County Warning Area for the 
nighttime hours Monday night. 


&& 


Aviation... 


Scattired thunderstorms around the taf sites in southwest Kansas 
will gradually diminish through the early morning hours. Some 
pockets of IFR ceilings will persist through sunrise but VFR 
conditions should prevail across the area by 15z. 


&& 


Preliminary point temps/pops... 
ddc 90 68 98 70 / 50 40 10 10 
gck 89 66 98 68 / 50 30 10 10 
eha 93 67 98 67 / 40 30 10 10 
lbl 94 68 100 68 / 40 30 10 10 
hys 87 68 98 69 / 70 50 10 10 
p28 92 71 97 73 / 30 40 10 10 


&& 


Ddc watches/warnings/advisories... 
none. 
&& 


$$ 


Fn12/02/02