Friday, August 23, 2013

MCV?

As shown in the loops below, a beautiful little vortex (i.e., circulation system) has formed in the St. George area over the past few hours (note that the loops are not time synced).



The system has the look and feel of a mesoscale convective vortex (MCV), a small scale area of cyclonic (counter clockwise rotation in the Northern Hemisphere) rotation that sometimes forms with thunderstorm complexes.  MCVs can be long lived.  We'll see if this one hangs on as it moves northward through Utah.  

1 comment:

  1. What looked to be an MCV formed over central Colorado yesterday, dropping four inches of rain and a lot of hail, so I heard. There were substantial flash flooding and a lot of car and property damage. I'm here at the U now though. I hope we get some rain here, just not all at once if that's possible.

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