July 23rd 2013 severe storms

July 23rd, 2013 Severe Thunderstorm Outbreak

The combination of unseasonably strong mid and upper level flow combined with extreme instability allowed supercell thunderstorms with very large hail and damaging winds to develop during the late afternoon hours over central Kansas.

Thunderstorms developed along a slow moving cold front and moved south-southeast during the evening hours. Shortly after the initial storms developed, very large hail of 3-4 inches in diameter was reported in and near Hutchinson, Kansas. As the area of thunderstorms continued to develop southward, damaging winds in excess of 80 mph were reported across portions of south central and southeast Kansas.

The storms caused widespread damage in Hutchinson and locations south and southeast across portions of Kingman county while other storms downed power poles in Cedar Vale and South Haven.

Map of Reports as of 3:50 am June 24th, 2013

Images from South Central Kansas

Broken glass from large hail in Hutchinson, KS. Picture courtesy of Matt Harding.

Picture of the Reno County supercell taken by Robb Lawson around 7 miles west of Wichita.

Picture of the Reno County supercell taken by Robb Lawson around 8 miles northwest of Wichita.

Picture taken by Bryce Kintigh south of Haven

Picture taken 9 miles s-se of Pretty Prairie by Fred Simon

Radar & Satellite

3D radar view of the supercell when it was just south of Hutchinson. This image shows the core of this storm extending up to 50,000 ft!

Satellite view of the supercell.

The following image is of cloud to ground lightning between 7 PM and midnight Central Daylight Time. The image plots all 30,479 strikes (at least according to the lightning sensors) which occurred in the five hour period. That total does not include lightning which did not strike the ground (i.e., cloud to cloud, in cloud or cloud to air).