Hello All,
    Hope all is well.  Happy Cuartro De Mayo!  A bit between updates and once again a short one as I just got off an overnight shift.  Weatherwise the past few weeks have been active.  Big news this weekend though was the damage to the Dallas Cowboys practice facility in the Fort Worth area.  The NWS down there determined it was a microburst.  Basically that is dense air, cooled by evaporation of rain/hail below the cloud base, that has quickly descend and strikes the ground and spreads out.  The damage can often resemble a tornado.  They are wicked to aviation but to the general public too, as the Saturday event showed in Dallas.  More info can be seen here.
   A huge field project in meteorology is beginning this coming weekend and lasting into the first part of summer.  It is called VORTEX II, and it's focus is tornadoes and how they form.  This is a follow-up to a field research event done in the mid 90's.  It is a joint effort by several NWS groups, but also research and academia.  Basically, a network of mobile radars, mobile storm spotters, and even unmanned aircraft will poise themselves to intercept and follow tornadic-producing thunderstorms.  It is way more difficult than it sounds, especially in poor cell coverage areas and where the gridded road network doesn't exist.  Their domain is basically the central and southern plains, though they do come as far northeast as the 'Sota.  Sorry no 'Dota, or IL for that matter.
  Well got to wrap it up as I'm fading.  Shoutouts to Wuj and Holzner.  Oh of course Bobby too with his classic shoutout to Paul Pierce text and lfo text this weekend.  Very nice Mengler.

Well, well, well Guider...

From the 'Sota to the 'Dota......
MTF