TODAY'S CHASE IN NEW MEXICO/TEXAS | April 26, 2025

12:00 PM: Currently traveling south on Highway 70 out of Clovis, New Mexico headed for Tatum, New Mexico. Last night, several long-lived supercell thunderstorms grew upscale into an MCS (mesoscale convective complex - a cluster of thunderstorms) across the Texas Panhandle into western Oklahoma. These storms persisted into the early morning hours before shifting east and weakening, leaving an outflow boundary in their wake separating the untouched warm and humid air to the south, and the rain-cooled air the north.

Black arrows point out the morning outflow boundary, separating rain-cooled air to the north and hot, muggy air to the south.

The boundary separating these two air masses is our target for a renewed round of supercell thunderstorms this evening. As afternoon sunshine cooks the remnant boundary, it should modify and destabilize. The resulting environment could support a few supercell thunderstorms erupting in the vicinity of the remnant boundary and modified outflow regime during the late afternoon and evening hours. Ample wind shear and ambient vorticity from the modified outflow regime will support an initial risk for a tornado or two before the event likely shifts into photogenic supercell structure show mode during then later part of the evening.

Black circle highlights storm observation target zone, with outflow boundary visible through the center. The cooler, cloudy zone to the north of the boundary should begin to warm and destabilize through the afternoon.

Tricky setup where you've got to babysit the modification of what begins as a cold, cloudy, and generally unfavorable environment and hope things really do evolve as modeled by some of the high-resolution models depict - with one or more long-lived supercells in eastern New Mexico or far western Texas on Saturday afternoon and evening. A tornado or two, big hail, and some photogenic storm structure should be the ceiling on the day, with the floor being an environment that just doesn't fully recover and leads to storms that can never really establish themselves.

Headed for Tatum, NM for now, which keeps us in position to pick off any storms that form further east in Texas, while leaving all of eastern New Mexico within reach.

Check back for updates through the late evening!