Coming into Carolina on a January Subtropic Jet

Forecasts
Excerpted with permission from Short Range Forecast Discussions for 01/0401/06/2007, NWS Hydrometeorological Prediction Center, Camp Springs, MD, http://www.hpc.ncep.noaa.gov/ discussions/pmdspd.html.

Scenes
From a road trip: Mobile, AL, to Winston-Salem, NC, via Asheville, NC, Thurs.-Fri., Jan. 4-5, 2007, during a coupled phase of a weak El Nino and a positive North Atlantic Oscillation that held sway in early January 2007.

Reports
Derived with permission from NOAA NWS data, esp. the Storm Prediction Centers Storm Reports for 01/04-01/05/2007; http://www.spc.noaa. gov/climo/reports.

223 AM EST THU JAN 4 2007 A DIFFLUENT UPPER-LEVEL FLOW...40-50KT SOUTHERLY LOW-LEVEL JET PUNCHING INTO THE GULF STATES...AND INCREDIBLY HIGH LOW-LEVEL MOISTURE STREAMING INTO THE REGION WILL RESULT IN HEAVY RAIN ADVANCING FROM THE NORTHWESTERN GULF OF MEXICO.

I. 8:00 am, CST, Thurs., Jan. 4, 2007, I-65, Bridge system over the Mobile/Tensaw River Delta, north of Mobile, AL. North in dense fog, from the bridges apogee stretch away shrouded ranks of tupelo gum and cypress, the Mobile River bending, side streams winding traceless into vine-straggled, bearded woods. On a low levee inside this labyrinth stand eighteen shaded mounds, forms of a force unleashed when corn was trained to trap the sun. A tangled, talon-tested crown, rigged in greenbriar, rises from the mist that sweeps toward a distant mills vaporous discharge, on to the grey vaults rim and greyer ledges lowering in the West. II. 8:00 pm, EST, Thurs., Jan. 4, 2007, Swannanoa River, Swannanoa, NC. Across the moon, the laden tankers ply. Their bow waves run with molten silver. Ingot white churns in their wakes. At a gap in their advance, thin light reaches the valley floor, glowing through saturated air, outlining ridges, a barn roofs onion dome vents, trunks of river birches canted over water. Then the sky congests again. Alls still beneath the chiaroscuro screen except for cars intermittently swishing over a bridge, and in the lull behind, the rush of rapids fills the Swannanoas darkened curve. A cool pocket of air drifts off the river, brief contrast to the dank warmth layering the fields. Did Pisgah dwellers here confront such equatorial surge on winter nights? No ice crystals halo the moon, no seamless roil of thickening gray, but heavy swags process, taut with moisture, as though building over New Guineas Owen Stanley Range. A plane drones above the cloudsa ghost bomber back at last from Rabauls fiery caldera? Rabaul, key to South Pacific oil, death magnet to Allied, Japanese troops, smothered now beneath volcanic ash, what faint signal from your tropic zone transmits encrypted in this approaching storm?

235 PM EST THU JAN 4 2007 THURSDAY AFTERNOON RADAR INDICATES WIDESPREAD HEAVY RAIN IS FALLING ACROSS THE MISSISSIPPI VALLEY/GULF COAST...A WIDE OPEN MOISTURE RETURN FROM THE GULF OF MEXICO WITH A 50 PLUS KNOT LOW LEVEL JET...AND STRONG UPPER LEVEL JET COUPLING... WITH SUCH A WARM AIRMASS FORECAST TO INVADE THE MID ATLANTIC... THUNDERSTORMS ARE FORECAST FROM THE SOUTHEAST ALL THE WAY INTO THE EASTERN GREAT LAKES.

2 FATALITIES, AT LEAST 15 INJURIES, F1 TORNADO BEGINNING 3:45 PM CST, THURS., 01/04/2007, NEW IBERIA, LA.

EARLY MORNING HOURS OF 01/05/2007: NUMEROUS REPORTS OF WIND DAMAGE IN MS AND WESTERN AL, WITH 6 TORNADOES CONFIRMED IN EAST CENTRAL MS, INCLUDING AN F2 TORNADO NEAR BLACKWATER, MS, AT ABOUT 1:40 AM CST, WHICH INJURED 9.

321 AM EST FRI JAN 05 2007 THE UPPER LEVEL PATTERN WILL FEATURE A CLOSED LOW OVER EASTERN TEXAS THAT WEAKENS SIGNIFICANTLY AS THE LOW TRAVELS ALONG THE GULF COAST... AT THE SURFACE ... ANOTHER FRONT EXTENDING FROM THE UPPER GREAT LAKES TO THE SOUTHWEST WILL MOVE TO THE EAST COAST AND THE GULF COAST BY THE END OF THE PERIOD. ASSOCIATED WITH THE WEAKENING FRONT IS AN AREA OF RAIN AND THUNDERSTORMS EXTENDING FROM THE EASTERN GULF COAST TO THE LOWER GREAT LAKES...THE MOISTURE ASSOCIATED WITH THE CLOSED LOW WILL GET CAUGHT BY THE SECOND FRONT BY SATURDAY MORNING.

III. Morning, January 5, 2007, Swannanoa River valley and Blue Ridge Parkway, north of Asheville, NC. Monsoonal rain breaks suddenly over a hemlock line. Branches stream and sag beneath the roaring fall. A thousand-spiked, rebounding splash leaps from pooling water. The deluge gives way to mist. A furrowed ceiling packs against the mountains, hiding their crests, as twisting smokes lift off the valleys sides. The East thins briefly and, exotic to winters terse light, mirage of equinox, a rainbow forms above a greening pasture. At four thousand feet, toward Craggy, the sun intensifies a clouds encasing gloom that hides all but the trees nearest the road. Mist, drizzle, gouts of drops on leaves and pocked asphalt. At a gust, the cloud splits into streamers rushing up the slope, leaves flipping end over end down the yellow line, the wind lapsing, the fog closes down. In grass bordering the road, a group of large, rain-slick rocks appearsunanchored, schooling slowly uphill together, yet each shape making its own tack, slightly left then right. The forms ovate, left then right they shift, surfaces, iridescent, bluish black, seams and bevels of sharply incised quartz, free of earths forge, distilling muffled light. One stone tilts, beneath extends a thin, black cane, and a second, spring-loaded, angled, alternately bearing the quarried shape forward, then a stem lifts up in front, and turns revealing on either side of its knobbed peak, a small, intense, black globe, and hanging below an outcropping of red lichen. IV. 3:30-5:30 pm, EST, Fri., Jan. 5, 2007, I-40 East, Old Fort to Winston-Salem, NC. Late Friday afternoon, two streams of light passing each other unbroken through clouded hills, rearward the Blue Ridge hidden, nimbostratus inking the low mantle eastward, fields deep olive, trunks black drenched walnut, high aprons of spray flying back from trucks, wiper blades metronoming, wheels low whine, a radio voice preaching: instant messaging has leveled the deck to all competing for insider deals within the data stream. A sudden downpour, cars pulling over, wind raking, an undulating line of water bowing back and forth across the lane, a night on Ocracokes road
2:30 PM EST, FRI., 01/05/07, SUSPECTED TORNADO, LIBERTY, SC, 15 INJURIES, 8 CARS PILED ON TOP OF EACH OTHER. 3:10 PM EST, FRI., 01/05/07, POSSIBLE TORNADO, MOORE, SC, PROPERTY DAMAGE. THROUGH FRIDAY AFTERNOON AND INTO EARLY EVENING, WIDESPREAD WIND DAMAGE REPORTS IN NE GA AND UPSTATE SC, AND 3 REPORTS IN NORTHERN FL. 10:05 AM EST, FRI., 01/05/07, TORNADO TOUCHED DOWN, SARGENT, GA.

FRI., 01/05/07, NUMEROUS REPORTS OF WIND DAMAGE THROUGH THE MORNING FROM EASTERN AL THROUGH UPSTATE GA.

240 PM EST FRI JAN 05 2007 RIDGING IS FORECAST TO BUILD OVER THE SOUTHEAST IN THE WAKE OF A MIDDLE LEVEL CUT OFF LOW THAT IS EXPECTED TO LIFT NORTHEAST ON SATURDAY ...A COMPLICATED MERGER OF TWO SYSTEMS IN THE NORTHEAST ON SATURDAY... IN THE WARM SECTOR AHEAD OF THOSE CYCLONES...HIGH LOW LEVEL MOISTURE CONTENT AND CONVERGENCE ALONG THE FRONT SHOULD BE SUFFICIENT TO CONTINUE THE THREAT FOR RAIN WITH EMBEDDED THUNDERSTORMS EVEN AS UPPER LEVEL DYNAMICS WEAKEN WITH TIME.

213 AM EST SAT JAN 06 2007 AT THE SURFACE ... A FRONTAL WAVE OVER THE GREAT LAKES WILL PUSH INTO CANADA ON SATURDAY TAKING AN AREA OF RAIN OVER THE NORTHEASTERN U.S. INTO CANADA ALSO. ALONG THE SAME BOUNDARY ANOTHER WAVE WILL DEVELOP OVER THE WESTERN GULF COAST AND ADVANCE NORTHEASTWARD TO THE SOUTHERN APPALACHIANS BY SUNDAY EVENING. AN AREA OF RAIN AND SOME THUNDERSTORMS WILL ACCOMPANY THE WAVE FROM THE GULF COAST EXPANDING NORTHWARD TO THE LOWER GREAT LAKES/NORTHEAST ON SUNDAY.

comes back, sand washing over asphalt, lost, until the storm lifted, abruptly now out of rain, and bridging the Catawba, fog swaths forming on the rivers grey sheet, and on into the Piedmont, altostratus unevenly thickening. La Florida Spaniards named this place, marching inland in 1567, shouldering crossbows, harquebuses with their matchcords lit, asking, will you accept our faith? And many Indians replying, Yaa, according to a Spanish scribe, they received hatchets, mirrors, and at, Will you set aside corn for us? one town after another answered, Yaa. And the Spaniards, laying out an overland route for Mexican silver, their Indian vassals to line the way with corn depots, pushed up these rivers into the mountains until rumors of ambush, food shortages at their coastal base, drove them to withdraw, leaving small overseer garrisons near the Indian towns to a certain fate, the main force wading back through South Carolina swamps, deerskin sacks of corn held barely above black water. Dark presses in on headlights, a western rift shows a sponged daub of pink fading to slate, mists curl down the Yadkins high, deep sheen. V. 8:00 am, EST, Sat., Jan. 6, 2007, pastures and woods, Forsyth County, NC. The moon, just past full, descends under poplar branches. A southward flock of Canada geese banks over the woods, their line in honking disarray as they cloverleaf left, then cinch their spacing westward. At the fields edge, teepee stacked shadows of trees stake outward into mist, their lines converging up toward a brilliant gorge of light. Sun warms the green pastures back. In swales on downslopes: matted ribbons of grass, night stream beds for a grey tower plummeting. Crossing a log over a full, wet-weather creek, breaking spider lead lines, dispersing a cloud of midges in a sun shaft over the water that reforms to the rear. In the pasture a massive holly and nearby clumps of daffodil leaves projecting from the grass hint at an old home site. A haze line has emerged to the West, heralding another rain. Crows call from branch and ground, one pair rising, rowing up the air, others launching deeper into the trees, repeating four and five caws as they fly, echoing down a ravine.

4:43 PM EST, FRI., 01/05/07, PROPERTY DAMAGE REPORT WITH POSSIBLE TORNADO, GASTONIA, NC.

242 PM EST SAT JAN 06 2007 SOUTHERLY FLOW OFF THE GULF OF MEXICO WILL PUMP MOISTURE INTO THE SOUTHEAST. AN AXIS OF FRONTOGENESIS THAT DEVELOPS ALONG THE GULF COAST IS PROGGED TO MOVE INLAND OVER THE PERIOD. WITH STRONG DIFFLUENCE ALOFT AND READILY ACCESSIBLE MOISTURE... YET ANOTHER HEAVY RAIN EVENT ... WIDESPREAD AREA OF MODERATE AND OCCASIONALLY HEAVY PRECIPITATION EXTENDING FROM TEXAS TO MAINE. EMBEDDED CONVECTION IS FORECAST FOR THE PRECIPITATION SHIELD.