Strong Storms For the Weekend? Ingredients Coming Together.

Typical early Spring Weather for the South Central Plains states as a pretty active pattern is in place. Here in North Texas we have been influenced the past few days by a nearly stationary Cold Front that has been wobbling back and forth, from North to South. This will continue into the first part of the weekend and will lead to isolated, mostly afternoon and evening rain chances almost anywhere in North Texas. The chances of you seeing rain are small and it should not interrupt any outdoor plans. That all changes this weekend.

The Storm Prediction Center in Oklahoma has placed parts of North Texas under a Moderate Risk for Severe Weather, beginning late Saturday. This should not be taken lightly this time of the year.
A very strong storm system will be featured over the Four Corners area and this system will have whats called a "triple point axis". To simplify, this means that a Low Pressure System will include a Stationary Front (the one we've had all week), a Cold Front, and a Dry Line.

This generic map shows a Triple Point System

The counterclockwise rotation around the LOW will first cause the warm front to rapidly lift North allowing warm moist air to rush in. That will be followed by the Dry Line and then the Cold Front. It's like adding ingredients to a recipe and in this case it will cause lots of LIFT, Wind Sheer (winds changing direction and speed with height), a clash of air-masses, and that will all result in SuperCell Thunderstorms which lead to violent weather including Tornadoes.
The greatest Tornado threat will be near the axis of the Triple Point and on the image above that's where the arrow is pointing to. That's where the greatest areas of wind sheer will be and that's where storms are most likely to rotate. On Saturday this area will be in most of Oklahoma and into the Northwest portions of North Texas, west of DFW. On Sunday the entire system will shift further East and I don't want to predict at this point what Sunday will be like except to say that thunderstorms are a very good bet. I would like to see another couple of computer model runs before we get a good handle on Sunday. We will have another post by Friday afternoon.