Marine Weather and Tide Forecast for Wood Lake, NE

SYNOPSIS
Issued at 316 AM CDT Tue May 13 2025

H5 analysis tonight continued to show a split flow regime across the CONUS. The broad ridge of high pressure had migrated east and was now centered over the northern Great Lakes into northern Ontario Canada. South of the ridge, a cutoff low was located over northern Mississippi and had finally migrated east of Louisiana over the past 24 hours. High pressure was anchored over the southern Bahamas and a ridge extended north to Bermuda.
Further west, a strong upper level low (~5550 meters) was present over western Oregon tonight and a strong trough of low pressure extended south to approximately 300 miles off the central coast of California. Downstream of this trough, several embedded shortwaves were present from western Nevada to Idaho and Montana. Weaker disturbances had led to some convective cloudiness over western Wyoming into eastern Montana overnight.
At the surface tonight, a Pacific cold front extended from northwestern North Dakota into eastern Idaho and central Nevada.
Low pressure was located over south central Canada wit a secondary low noted over southeastern Montana. A surface trough of low pressure extended south of this low into eastern Wyoming and eastern Colorado. Southeasterly winds were present overnight across western and north central Nebraska and were generally in the 10 to 15 MPH range. Skies were mainly clear and temperatures as of 3 AM CDT were in the lower 60s across all of western and north central Nebraska.

SHORT TERM /THROUGH WEDNESDAY NIGHT/
Issued at 316 AM CDT Tue May 13 2025

Over the next 12 to 36 hours, fire weather concerns today, followed by the threat for severe thunderstorms Wednesday into Wednesday night are the main forecast concerns. For today, abundant sun, southerly winds and a persistent low level thermal ridge, will lead to a very warm temperatures across the area.
Utilizing NAM12 H85 temps at 00z earlier this evening and comparing them to the NAM12 00 forecast for later today, yields nearly identical temperatures across the forecast area. With clear skies and continued southerly winds this afternoon, persistence appears to be a good forecast for this afternoon.
That being said, highs will be in the upper 80s with lower 90s over far northern Nebraska. With the upper level low off to the south, now over the Ohio and Tennessee Valley today, low level moisture has begun to lift northward into the area. By this afternoon, am expecting dew points in the middle to upper 40s across the area. This will give a 5 to 10 percent boost to min RH values this afternoon, resulting in min RH values of 20 to 30 percent across the area. As for winds today, Bufkit soundings are indicating gust potential in the 20 to 30 MPH range this afternoon which is around 5 MPH slower than yesterday's wind gusts. That being said, with the higher forecast min RH's and slightly lighter winds, we are forgoing any fire weather headlines for this afternoon. Will hit the elevated to possible near critical fire weather concerns in the FWF and HWO. Later this afternoon into the early evening hours, some of the CAMS initiated some isolated convection over the far northwestern forecast area in the 23z to 03z time frame. There is a nice area of 1000 to 1500 J/KG SB CAPE which surges north along the highway 61 corridor this afternoon. However, cap strength indicated in the CAMS is very strong trough early evening. That being said, will limit pops to slight chance, in case a rouge cell decides to pop up in the northeastern Panhandle. Overnight, a Pacific cold front will stall off to the west of the forecast area. Persistent southerly and southeasterly winds will continue to push boundary layer moisture into the area overnight. We may need to pay close attention to moisture trends today, as the NAM12 soln is indicating some stratus development possible in the east tonight. On Wednesday, the Pacific cold front will enter the panhandle and approach the highway 83 corridor midday. Tonight, the models have slowed the timing of the front and wouldn't be surprised if the SWODY2 has the severe threat further west than the current SWODY3. With respect to the severe threat: A nice area of 1500 to 2500 J/KG SB CAPE develops along and east of highway 83 Wednesday afternoon. Deep layer shear is sufficient (30-35 KTS) to facilitate severe storms. Also, there is little to no CIN at 21z Wednesday afternoon. As for severe mode, ATTM it appears the main threat is large hail and damaging winds, as low level helicities are meager. Behind the front Wednesday afternoon, the latest HRRR and 3KM NAM develop a MCC over NE Colorado. This feature and its associated cold pool track across the forecast area Wednesday evening. The threat with this feature would be damaging wind gusts and this shows up nicely with the 00z 3KM NAM 10m wind gust product. And is supported early on in the 00z HRRR surface wind gust forecast over northeastern Colorado around 00z Thursday which is advertising wind gusts north of 50 KTS.

LONG TERM /THURSDAY THROUGH MONDAY/
Issued at 316 AM CDT Tue May 13 2025


Long Term
Thursday through Monday...Temperatures behind the exiting cold front Wednesday night will be more seasonal on Thursday and Friday with highs in the upper 60s to lower 70s. As for precipitation chances, there are some decent differences between the deterministic GFS and EC solns tonight with respect to a H5 low over the northern plains late in the week. The latest EC soln is more aggressive, moving this low from the Dakotas into Minnesota some 12 to 18 hours quicker compared to the GFS soln. The latest NBM soln does have precipitation lingering across northern Nebraska into Friday morning. Given the model differences, will hold onto the NBM soln for now, but, this is a low confidence precipitation forecast Thursday into Friday morning. Another trough of low pressure will enter the west coast Friday night into Saturday. The next chance for precipitation will arrive late Saturday night as mid level warm advection increases ahead of the appg. trough. The threat for storms will increase Sunday night and again on Monday night. With the GFS soln indicating abundant low level moisture flow into the central plains, when the main trough does eject onto the plains Monday into Monday night, we could see some strong to severe storms across the area.

AVIATION /18Z TAFS THROUGH 18Z WEDNESDAY/
Issued at 1221 PM CDT Tue May 13 2025

Strong winds will be the main aviation concern through this evening.
Southeasterly wind gusts up to 25 to 30 knots will continue through early evening before relaxing slightly overnight. Increasing clouds will then build into the region with ceilings dropping down to 1000 feet by sunrise. At this time, no fog is anticipated, but expect very low stratus for a few hours before rising after sunrise.

LBF WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES
None.