Scattered Strong To Severe Thunderstorms Are Still Expected This Afternoon

Scattered Strong To Severe Thunderstorms Are Still Expected This Afternoon: It’s going to be a very busy afternoon for me in terms of tracking and warning you of any strong to severe thunderstorms. At the time of this post, there were already two strong thunderstorms that are pushing eastward along the Route 2 corridor. One is located between Greenfield and Athol and the second was located northwest of Cheshire. These storms will head to the northeast and will push into parts of southern Vermont and southern New Hampshire in about an hour or so. As for this afternoon’s severe weather threat – Currently, there is an abundance of clouds across the entire area. In addition, some showers are now pushing eastward across the Berkshires. This activity is tied to a surface trough out ahead of the main cold front. A second area of developing showers and thunderstorms are now beginning to develop along the actual cold front that’s located over central New York State. This means it’s possible that some parts of the area may see two rounds of strong to severe thunderstorms this afternoon. The current environment across the region is already quite unstable and this will help to feed, sustain and intensify the thunderstorms that’ll be developing. The first round of showers and thunderstorms will progress across Western and Central Mass over the next 2 to 3 hours or so (this is the activity now pushing into far western and far northern Mass). One area that’s associated with the first round of activity that I’m really watching is now located over southeastern New York State and northeastern Pennsylvania. This activity is forecast by the weather guidance to intensify significantly and be a severe weather problem for areas near and especially south of the Mass Pike between 1 pm and 3 pm. It’ll be something that I’ll be keeping a close eye on. It’s the second round of potential thunderstorms that I’m much more concerned about. The intensity of the thunderstorms will hinge on how much the atmosphere reloads and how unstable it gets once the first round of showers/storms move out by early afternoon. The amount of wind shear in the atmosphere is expected to become quite strong this afternoon and will be supportive of sustaining supercell severe thunderstorms if the atmosphere becomes quite unstable again. At this point, it appears that the second round of thunderstorms associated with the cold front will push through between about 3-4 pm and 7-8 pm or so. These storms will be capable of producing wind gusts of up to 50-70 mph, a tornado or two, frequent lightning and heavy downpours. All thunderstorm activity should push out of the area by about the 8 pm time frame. I am keeping an extremely close eye on the potential severe weather risk and will have many more updates as needed.