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Thundersnow in the Upper Midwest, and 30-second imagery of severe thunderstorms across the Deep South

By Scott Bachmeier •

GOES-16 Mid-level Water Vapor (6.9 µm) images with GLM Flash Extent Density and plots of hourly surface reports [click to play MP4 animation | animated GIF]

GOES-16 (GOES-East) Mid-level Water Vapor (6.9 µm) images with an overlay of GLM Flash Extent Density (above) covered part of a widespread winter storm event — which included thundersnow in parts of Nebraska, Iowa, South Dakota and Minnesota — that occurred on 03 January 2023. Areas that reported thundersnow experienced convectively-enhanced snowfall rates of 2-3 inches per hour; storm total snowfall amounts were as high as 27 inches in southeastern South Dakota and 18 inches in northeastern Nebraska (NWS Sioux Falls event summary | WPC storm summary).

Ahead of the cold front associated with this winter storm (surface analyses), severe thunderstorms produced tornadoes, large hail and damaging winds (SPC Storm Reports) from the Upper Midwest to the Deep South. Overlapping GOES-16 Mesoscale Domain Sectors provided imagery at 30-second intervals over parts of Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia and Tennessee where some of the severe weather occurred — “Red” Visible (0.64 µm) and “Clean” Infrared Window (10.3 µm) images that include time-matched plots of SPC Storm Reports are shown below. With some of these thunderstorms, pulsing overshooting tops exhibited infrared brightness temperatures as cold as -70 to 75ºC.

GOES-16 “Red” Visible (0.64 µm) images, with time-matched SPC Storm Reports plotted in red [click to play MP4 animation | animated GIF]

GOES-16 “Clean” Infrared Window (10.3 µm) images, with time-matched SPC Storm Reports plotted in blue [click to play MP4 animation | animated GIF]

Categories: GLM, GOES-16, Lightning, Severe convection, Winter weather