2026--Day 6

Left Bismarck after a weather briefing, aiming for Minot to the north.  There's potential for interesting weather, so we wait.

During lunch in Minot, I was able to meet up with Fran, a college friend I've not seen since 1987.  

After lunch, we spent about 38 hours waiting in Minot for storms to develop.  We eventually decided it would be better to move southeast to be able to better see the developing convection to the west.  Turned out to be a good move.  We saw at least two shelf clouds, and while we were stopped for a photo op, we could feel the temperature drop from the cool outflow. 

Charts are always on the lookout for discrete storms, because they are easier to chase and have better potential to be really strong, for a host of reasons (i.e., better possibility of rotation and tornadoes).  Under certain circumstances, however, the storms can group together and form a line of thunderstorms, often with very strong straight-line winds.  That's what happened tonight as we sped toward Fargo. 

The little blue circle is our vehicle at the time.  We should be able to get into Fargo before we're overtaken by the squall line (quasi-linear convective system, or QLCS if you want to impress your friends).  Nevertheless, the winds ahead of the lines can make driving a high-profile vehicle, well, interesting for lack of a better adjective. 

Another look at this QLCS...the multiple bowing segments on this line form what's called a Line Echo Wave Pattern (LEWP).  Each one of the bow segments represents a portion of the line that is accelerating ahead of the rest of it, and is a favored area for very strong straight-line winds capable of producing significant damage. 

All im all a very good day (meteorologically and personally).  Long day will likely bleed into an early morning, as we'll have miles to go before we peep (at storms).  Today's tally was a robust but second-lowest 410 miles (2923 total), and tomorrow could be even longer.  Heaven help us.