The most important part of a thunderstorm to you.

What is the most important part of a thunderstorm to you?

Here is a hard question imo, as I have seen a lot of different scenarios. With instability and limited dynamics, you may have some storms pop and briefly become severe but with no forcing, they will not become very strong.

While if you have a lot of dynamics, but get socked in clouds and rain all day long, you are not going to have any severe storms form either obviously. My question to you guys is what is the most important part of the development of a thunderstorm?

[dean]

that second scenario you can still get severe weather. the most important part is getting an updraft to support itself and not get destroyed by winds. the other most important part to me is getting good upper level winds that will blow the downdraft downwind so that it doesnt fall back on the updraft and kill the storm. a lot of times the reason a storm dies is because there is a lack of upper level winds to push the updraft downwind and the downdraft falls back on the updraft.

[Josh Richardson]

In my opinion there is a different answer for about every situation to that question....

That's true Josh but I was wondering more, from your experience which of those two were more valuable to you.

[Josh Richardson]

That's true Josh but I was wondering more, from your experience which of those two were more valuable to you.[/b]

Again, every situation is different but dynamics have always seemed the most important from the question your asking.

[MatthewCarman]

What is the most important part of a thunderstorm to you?

Here is a hard question imo, as I have seen a lot of different scenarios. With instability and limited dynamics, you may have some storms pop and briefly become severe but with no forcing, they will not become very strong.

While if you have a lot of dynamics, but get socked in clouds and rain all day long, you are not going to have any severe storms form either obviously. My question to you guys is what is the most important part of the development of a thunderstorm?[/b]

The second scenario is not true as I have had big rain events here in Iowa and have actually had lines of severe storms on the west side of the rain as it moved east. Also sometimes severe storms are embedded within heavy rain. To answer your question the first scenario would be "Pulse severe storms" and weak thunderstorms. The second scenario would most likely be embedded thunderstorms with rain.

I think the most inportant part of thunderstorm development would be instability and moisture and a front or boundary or forcing for the thunderstorms to form. Without ethier of those it is difucult to have thunderstorms. The most inportant part of a thunderstorm to me would be the tower or updraft. Without a good tower or updraft storms cant stay strong for very long in most scenarios.

Or you just say the "cumulus" cloud is the most inportant part of a thunderstorm because cumulus clouds form into swelling cumulus and then the cumulonimbus clouds form from that so without cumulus clouds you cant have a thunderstorm.

Sorry for bring this from the dead lol

[dean]

in reality all parts of the thunderstorm are essential to its life, if one or two of the elements arent good, the storm wont be able to live for a long time (most likely case is weak upper level winds not pushing the downdraft far enought downwind a.k.a. pulse type storm).

[kystormchaser]

It really depends on what you're looking for.* You can get low instability high shear events (as mentioned before with updrafts sufficient to sustain updrafts) that produce epic tornado outbreaks. Those type events, most common in the fall/winter are the scariest propositions to me because you can get violent tornadoes moving at speeds up to 70 mph.

You can get extreme instability, low shear events produce violent tornadoes (Jarrell, TX)

You can then get high instability sufficient shear events that produce more of the same.

It's really about what type of weather you are looking for. To me though, high instability, with a breakable cap, good convergence and sufficient shear usually put on the most interesting shows.* If i could only have one though it would be epic instability SBCAPE >6000 j/kg* I've seen some pretty incredible things happen when you start launching parcels up in that kind of airmass.

[Frozen_Signal]

when it has exited the area!!

(not a big fan of severe wx..lol)

[Dustin Wilcox]

This question completely depends on the time of year, during the transition Months when strong neg tilted troughs come crashing into the plains CAPE and instability is certainly not required to be very impressive due to the much more favorable wind profile i.e. wind shear.* However during the Summer when troughs are unable to dig into the plains states and we are lucky to see a settle wave CAPE and instability becomes the saving grace as the wind profile certainly lack the more favorable shear seen with the strong troughs.* My personal favorite and most likely get you a good Tornado are the events that overlap conditions from both seasons these setups are VERY limited I would say your lucky to get a handful of them each year, good example is March 28th this year we had a STRONG trough with large amounts of wind shear, during peak heating instability became quite unseasonably high with CAPES close to 4000j/kg, this day was quite impressive I alone witnessed 5 tornadoes one over half mile wide, however storm motions were quite unfavorable, a similar scenario unfolded on April 21st when I witnessed a strong tornado in Tulia TX, strong trough with decent instability, its these days with the best of both worlds that are quickly making April my favorite Month to chase.* Since these setups are limited often you have to settle for other setups, to me it depends on what your looking for as to what conditions I favor.* If I am looking for tornadoes (which is usually the case) the early high wind shear low instability setups seem to produce more then the extreme instability and low shear events of the summer, although during the early season your often chasing un-photogenic fast moving storms, while the summer HP beasts are often slow moving and quite photogenic.