Thunderstorm activity was mostly to the west of Tucson yesterday, as the air mass slowly dried over southeastern portion of state. Above plot of detected CG flashes (from Vaisala and Atmo) is for 24-hours ending at 11 pm MST last night. There was one storm area that moved off the Santa Ritas just a bit south of the airport. There were 22 sites in the ALERT network that measured rainfall during past 24-hours - most amounts very light - with only 7 sites having a tenth inch or more and only 3 having just over a quarter inch (these were along the path of the storm south of airport).
Blended PW analysis for 12 UTC (from CIRA above) shows that PW has fallen below an inch over the southeast corner of Arizona - much as forecast by the WRF model runs yesterday. The 12 UTC TWC sounding below is quite stable, with PW down to 0.94". Easterly winds below 700 mb will continue to bring dry air across our area and storms will mostly be to west and southwest of Tucson area.
The 500 mb chart at bottom is a forecast from the 00 UTC NAM model and is valid at 5:00 pm on Saturday afternoon. Pattern is not favorable for much in way of storm activity, since center of anticyclone is nearby and stronger winds around south and west portions of anticyclone are not very close to our area. However, tropical storm activity over the east Pacific is about to pick up again and may help bring mT air back to our region.
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