textproduct: Kansas City/Pleasant Hill

KEY MESSAGES

- Scattered Storms Late Saturday Evening

- Severe Storms Forecast Late Sunday Evening into Early Monday

- Another Round of Strong to Severe Storms Forecast Monday

DISCUSSION

Issued at 340 AM CDT Sat Apr 25 2026

Most of Saturday morning and afternoon will feature a surface high pressure that will keep conditions quiet, with light east-southeast to eventually southeasterly flow. Temperatures will reach the upper 70s by the afternoon, with some locations perhaps hitting the 80 degree mark south of U.S. Highway 50. The middle and upper portions of the troposphere are featuring multiple perturbations that will provide multiple days of thunderstorm activity through the weekend and the start of the next work week.

There is a closed-low system up through 500mb centered over the Prairie Provinces of Canada and stronger jet streak across the Northern Plains. The aforementioned surface anticyclone has developed on the anticyclonic side of this jet streak. A tight H5 height gradient is also present across the desert southwest and portions of the southern Plains with several short-wave perturbations. This prompted dCVA over the Rockies promoting surface cyclogenesis that will force the surface anticyclone eastward, along with a cold frontal boundary that is currently positioned across Central Nebraska. The deepening of this surface low will continue through Saturday afternoon, resulting in surface pressure falls expanding across the eastern Plains into the lower Missouri River Valley. This is expected to pull more moisture into the forecast area through the evening. Convergence should increase after 00z along with extra mid-level lift from an H5 short-wave trough that will result in shower and storm activity, though more of it may be closer to the location of the cold front by the time it arrives in Central Kansas. CAMs continue to have a corridor of increased instability into far western Missouri late this evening through the overnight hours, with 00z HREF mean MUCAPE values between 1500 to 1750 J/kg. A few stronger storms could become possible as the LLJ strength increases overnight, but the overall better forcing will remain well west of the forecast area, which will limit the severe threat, keeping the greater threat over Central Kansas into Sunday morning. The SWODY1 outlook issued at 06z clips extreme western Missouri and extreme eastern Kansas with a level 1 marginal risk. Most of the CAMs dissipate any shower/storm activity east of Interstate 35 after 09z into Sunday morning. The frontal boundary is then set to stall across Central Kansas to east-central Nebraska through Sunday afternoon.

Sunday, strong mid-level vort maxima develops near the Four Corners region and quickly ejects across the Rockies and into the Plains, providing stronger dCVA, deepening the surface cyclone in the TX/OK Panhandle region, with a few localized pockets of extra lift into the eastern Plains. This will drastically increase theta-e transport, and transition lower-level flow south to southwesterly through much of Sunday, and may push the thermal boundary of the central Plains slightly northeastward through the day. Increased flow will also increase deep layer shear across the warm sector for much of the afternoon on Sunday. CAM solutions for Sunday afternoon continue to show inconsistency with afternoon convective activity, tied mainly to the timing of available forcing. The 06z HRRR has developed convection along an area of a localized H5 vort maxima that tracks from northeast Kansas into Northern Missouri between 19z- 22z Sunday afternoon. The presentation looks as if it may be elevated along a corridor of isentropic ascent, but a peak at a few model soundings ahead of this cluster of storms shows robust boundary layer mixing and steep low-leve lapse rates which could mean a few surface based storms would be possible. The main question mark with afternoon peak heating convection though for our forecast area will be available forcing, as the main thermal boundary will still be positioned likely over Central Kansas. If afternoon convection develops in this corridor as suggested by the 06z HRRR, wind and hail would be the primary threat. Later in the evening, the primary jet streak begins to move into High Plains, which will shift the deepening surface cyclone eastward and push the cold front eastward as well. Convergence will increase heading into the late afternoon and early hours across the central and eastern Plains. Across central Kansas, mixing should erode any CIN ahead of the approaching front and allow for initiation of discrete storms. Backed surface winds will allow for notable curvature in the low- level hodographs across central and eastern Kansas, and long hodographs from 3km and upward will provide sufficient growth for an initial supercell storm mode. Now for our forecast area, while the CAPE and shear parameters may be there, the main initiating boundary will not be close enough, which would greatly limit the potential for a supercell storm mode by the time the forcing is present in our far western counties. Some guidance has suggested a few discrete storms attempting to initiate in eastern Kansas and western Missouri, but recent trends suggest this is more prevalent over central Kansas. A more likely scenario will be upscale growth heading late into Sunday evening, with strong MCS or a few bowing segments to move through. This all depend on how far east deep convection initiation occurs Sunday Night, thus uncertainty in the exact timing for our area is still fairly high. With stronger MCS or congealed cluster with strong cold pool will present a damaging wind threat, though larger hail could be spotted in a few of the storms. While background environment could be supportive of tornadic development, the likely storm mode for eastern Kansas into Central Missouri may greatly limit this, with any threat for this being tied a cold pool balancing and strong 0-3km bulk shear allowing for meso vortex development. The level 3 enhanced risk for Sunday highlights the wind threat associated with any upscale growth, and the conditional threat for supercells if that boundary pushes further eastward than currently progged before triggering CI.

This creates messy picture heading into Monday, but severe weather will still remain possible into Monday as the deep surface cyclone moves through, along with a combination of the cold front and dry line feature moving eastward. Deep layer flow will still be present providing plenty of shear over a theta-e rich boundary layer, with surface dewpoints progged in the mid to upper 60s across most of Missouri. Remnant outflow boundaries and areas of differential heating will make for a potentially complex mesoscale environment heading into Monday afternoon. Depending on the degree of clearing that occurs from lingering morning convection, new discrete development could once again produce a few discrete supercells. An MCV may also not be out of the question, which adds further complexity. 06z guidance overnight for Monday though is highlighting a greater risk that is east of our forecast area closer to the Mississippi River Valley and eastward. This area will also have more time to destabilize throughout the afternoon. However, most of area still remains in a level 2 slight risk per the SWODY3 outlook. Uncertainty in specific details remains high for Monday activity, but the background environment will be largely supportive of severe storm development.

The extended forecast does feature additional POPs with a few more mid-level disturbances that are expected move across the central CONUS through the remainder of the work week. Uncertain at this point if any of these setup will present a severe risk.

AVIATION /12Z TAFS THROUGH 12Z SUNDAY/

Issued at 632 AM CDT Sat Apr 25 2026

High pressure will keep conditions VFR through the afternoon with southeasterly winds around 5 to 10 kts. Increasing cloud cover is likely later in the afternoon. Scattered showers and thunderstorms are possible in eastern Kansas and western Missouri late this evening. For now have placed them into a PROB30 group for STJ and the KC metro terminals.

EAX WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES

MO...None. KS...None.