CONVECTIVE FORECAST
VALID Mon 08 Aug 06:00 - Tue 09 Aug 06:00 2005 (UTC)
ISSUED: 08 Aug 06:38 (UTC)
FORECASTER: GROENEMEIJER

SYNOPSIS

Monday at 06 UTC... a large mid/upper-level low pressure area centered over southern Scandinavia dominates the European weather maps. The air-mass near the low is of cold, moist and near neutral. East of a frontal zone from Finland to the western black Sea... a warm air-mass is advected northward. A plume of very warm and dry air is found over the Iberian Peninsula.

DISCUSSION

...Spain......
The air-mass over much of Spain shows inverted-V profiles extending up to near 500 hPa. Yesterday, these profiles allowed for scattered storms across the southeast of the country, despite the fact that numerical models didn't develop any precipitation. Today, weak rising motions over the peninsula are expected to be associated with a higher influx of maritime moisture by the sea-breezes. Hence convective development today seems as least as likely as yesterday. Scattered high-based storms are expected to form during the early afternoon over the mountains of eastern Spain and possibly across the Ebro valley, too. Given that deep-layer shear of about 25 m/s is expected, storms may develop rotating updrafts. The main threats of the storms will be isolated strong downbursts, that may locally be quite intense. The storms will cease rather quickly after sunset.

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