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Extreme turbulence over Lower Michigan

By Scott Bachmeier •

GOES-19 Water Vapor imagery with contours of Moderate Or Greater (MOG) Turbulence Probability and plots of Pilot Reports of turbulence, from 1150-1900 UTC on 20 November [click to play MP4 animation]

10-minute Full Disk scan GOES-19 (GOES-East) Water Vapor images centered over the southern Great Lakes (above) included contours of Moderate Or Greater (MOG) Turbulence Probability (yellow contour = 40%) and Pilot Reports of Turbulence on 20 November 2025. Note the appearance of one report of Extreme Turbulence over the southwest portion of Lower Michigan.

Products from the Aviation Weather Center allowed cursor samples of two closely-spaced Pilot Reports of Extreme Turbulence — apparently from the same aircraft, as it was flying southeast (below).

Cursor sample of a Pilot Report of Extreme Turbulence at 1450 UTC on 20 November [click to enlarge]

The second encounter of Extreme Turbulence occurred at 1505 UTC, causing minor injuries (below).

Cursor sample of a Pilot Report of Extreme Turbulence (causing minor injuries) at 1505 UTC on 20 November [click to enlarge]

A toggle between the 1501 UTC GOES-19 Water Vapor image and a 3-hour NAM40 model forecast of 250 hPa winds valid at 1500 UTC (below) indicated that the initial 1450 UTC Pilot Report of Extreme Turbulence (red symbol) occurred in an area of strong speed shear just north of the axis of a 150-knot jet streak (shades of orange).

Toggle between the GOES-19 Water Vapor image at 1501 UTC and a 3-hour NAM40 model forecast of 250 hPa Wind Speed valid at 1500 UTC on 20 November; the 1450 UTC Pilot Report of Extreme Turbulence is plotted in red [click to enlarge]

An animation of 5-minute CONUS Sector GOES-19 Water Vapor images with Pilot Reports of Turbulence is shown below.

5-minute GOES-19 Water Vapor images with plots of Pilot Reports of turbulence, from 1121-2001 UTC on 20 November [click to play MP4 animation]

Categories: Aviation, GOES-19