Hawk Point, MO Supercell – April 23, 2010

Posted on 26. Apr, 2010 by Jesse in Uncategorized

I began my chase day on Friday traveling to Macon, Missouri, hoping for some warm front convection to fire prior to dark. Due to work commitments, I was unable to reach what appeared to be the best play on the northern target in NW MO/SE NE.

Ongoing convection and cloud cover during the day precluded a more significant severe weather threat along the eastern flank of the warm front, though enough lift and low level instability allowed a few severe storms to fire in Missouri in the later afternoon and early evening hours.

As I made my way back towards Hannibal, a TOR warning was issued for a cell that had formed near the Warren/Lincoln County, MO line. Due to the slow movement of the storm (app. 20 mph), I was able to travel down U.S. 61 from Hannibal and intercept the storm in less than an hour. While I did not witness any tornadic activity, I did see an impressive wall cloud, great structure and some respectable low level rotation.

The first photo shows the 500 mb map from 02z, accompanied by a 0-1 km SRH mesoanalysis synopsis. A few radar grabs also appear below, along with the 20z Day 1 Convective Outlook from the Storm Prediction Center.