So far this severe weather season, we haven't seen too much in the way of bad weather. Sure, there have been a few events that have brought large hail and some gusty winds, along with heavy rainfall and flooding. I can only remember off the top of head 2 reports of weak spin up tornadoes in Montague county. Montague county has been the hot spot this year. Especially Nocona. Just Friday night large hail struck the town for the second time this year and a few tornado warnings. Fortunately, nothing touching down.
Weather systems were very strong early in the year. March and April feature a line up of strong storm systems, but these brought dry, windy weather to Texoma and storms to the east of us.
Since, weather systems have been much weaker. Jet stream winds have been fairly weak over us and storm systems haven't been strong enough to create strong low level wind shear, thus limiting tornado potential. Most of what we've seen has been a result of strong instability. That in itself can bring very large hail and small tornadoes. Big severe weather events with large violent tornadoes need stronger winds throughout the atmosphere and especially the lower levels of the atmosphere to spin.
Weather models indicate that weak wind fields will continue across Texoma through the middle of this month as the strong jet stream winds shift into the northern and eastern U.S. A large ridge of high pressure looks to control us for the most part, meaning mostly dry, warm to hot weather.
This is good news as it takes us through the later part of our severe weather season. I'm not saying there won't be thunderstorms with fronts at times, but a high end severe weather event seems very unlikely. This isn't the news storm chasers want to hear. Believe it or not, some people save their money all year and plan their vacation around this time of the year to come out this way to chase storms. The last thing they want to see is a ridge of high pressure, cramping any ideas of capturing a tornado.
Of course things can change. The peek of the U.S. tornado season is around Memorial Day weekend, which is typically at the end of May. So late May/Early June would be the peek of it. This time of the year, Kansas and the Texas and Oklahoma Panhandle are the main areas to look at for tornadic activity.