Update on tomorrow's storm and LR

Tomorrow's storm may be limited by the Gulf action I pointed out yesterday. Once again, SLGT risk looks to prevail. I am concerned the warm front may still lift farther north than expected, and one cannot discount the underestimation of instability that the models have struggled with throughout the winter. So tomorrow's threat is still there despite a more benign look on the 0Z models. I'm not really interested in it though, so I'll skip the details that I planted yesterday.

EDIT (italicized portion): Never mind, I will do some analysis. The latest SPC SWODY1 has peaked my interest.
Right now the dewpoints are meager at best, however. The LLJ is not strong at all - the best dynamics are still far out to the west in western portions of TX. I saw that they wrote of a dynamics driven event, again, I just do not think that is true. However, I am torn.

First of all, moisture transport looks to be not very rapid until 12Z tomorrow. The warm front is still offshore of Houston right now. With that said, by that time, the LLJ could indeed finally start picking up. Either it picks up later and this becomes a nocturnal concern, or it picks up earlier and we get an event from 18Z-3Z. Both options are quite viable, and due to the stability right now, there is concern that the models could underdo the 850mb LLJ. The system in the GOM is already halfway through. One more thing - sats do indicate a possible N-S oriented long outflow boundary left behind in the western Gulf. That could become a significant factor in focusing "junk" convection, or "good" convection (if it lifts north).

Now, the speed shear isn't that great. And there could still be a mini cool front left over in the Yucatan Channel. So, pretty much, it's going to be all dependent on mesoscale features. Boom or bust, I say. When it's dependant on mesoscale features, 9 times out of 10 it will underperform.

The last thing that leads me to err on the side of caution: 10% nonhatched tornado probs at 6Z SWODY1 has never verified.

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Onto the next event, which I will revise my outlook. There are two systems IMO, the first of which seem to be well-modeled on the ECMWF and its ensembles. GFS, I really would not agree as it has been overly trigger happy with cutting off lows the past few days. The second system IMO will be the bigger one. I think that following the second one, a break will arrive in terms of severe.

Approximate dates:
First system...18th thru 20th
Second system...22th thru 26th

I am a bit concerned as the timeframe has been trending later and later, so more than likely, the events may materialize during the latter parts of the timeframes given.

Pattern recognition continues to support major potential. Several things I look for:
1) Polar Vortex breaking down, western ridge undercut, zonal flow
2) Support of amplification of a ridge in the Aleutians vicinity in order to induce a trough digging in the west.
3) An earlier shortwave which allows a slight trough to take hold in the west, which allows the next disturbance to dig more and possibly become negatively tilted.
4) When the time comes, a zonal flow across the Atlantic with slight perturbated shortwave just east of Newfoundland (teleconnects to pos. height anomalies along the east coast)

Note that one more thing, the Nino is switching to a Nina at this time. Indications are that the Nina is going to be strong, as the PDO values were never really strongly positive. That means that the Nino, didn't really act like a Nino. Similar to the 72-73 strong Nino, which was followed by the strongest Nina on record. What does that have to do with this? A Nina favors amplification in the Aleutians vicinity and favors a -PNA. This may be a part of that overall change.

Many of the signals are there. The ensemble mean has been fairly consistent with the following solution.
Starts out with polar vortex reasserting itself after the Eastern snowstorm. That lifts out and the NAO switches to negative.
Pacific energy begins to undercut what is now a very negative AO styled high latitude block. Eventually, some energy makes it to the Pacific NW, but cuts off.
One shortwave does make it through and picks up the cutoff, flinging it east. This produces storm #1.
Second wave comes thru and digs deeply in the wake of storm #1. If this materializes as expected (and I do believe it will), this is the bigger storm.

Now, this is still 2 weeks away granted, but the potential is there. Here's what some pro mets are offering.

Mr. Ed Berry:

At this time most of the CONUS has below normal temperatures with an active storm track from California into the eastern states. During weeks 2-3 I would expect all of this to slowly shift northwest meaning by late this month an active southwest flow storm track across from the Rockies into the Plains would be probable. Cold and moist energetic troughs would be expected to dig into the western and central Rockies and then lift northeast into the Mid/Upper Mississippi Valley. Given the South Pacific signal (and we need to monitor the east Pacific where there are still warm SSTs – at least for now remembering the cold subsurface), a moist subtropical jet with closed lows may interact with this storm track (GSDM 4-1 instead of Stage 1). While late winter storms would occur in the cold sectors, heavy rain and severe storms would be probable for much of the Deep South into the eastern states. In general, this would be an active pattern for much of the lower 48 states. There would be cold to the northwest and warmth for the far southeast. Alaska may stay under the ridge while closed lows may develop near/west of Hawaii. Finally, with variations in amplitude, I could see this type of pattern persisting well into spring.

Mr. Brian Lovern:

One other thing I will throw out, and I'm glad it was brought up earlier, is that this pattern, should it hold into spring, is classic for severe weather. I won't be shocked to see one more cold period in early March after the late February milder turn, but then we should see things flip after that IMO. I also agree with you that a nino is typically not a SE ridge promoter. A nina, all other things equal, is much better for this.

One final note - 0Z OP GFS run shows a massive severe wx outbreak on the 24th. It's the OP GFS, but does support the idea of a severe wx outbreak that I've been harping on for 5 days now.