XCSkies CAPE

[Spam]

Question for any weather guru's out there:

I have had a wonderful season so far this year. I've had many 4-5
hour flights cross country. I'm trying to figure out the XCSkies
weather features. The CAPE has shown 0-300 almost everytime I've gone
soaring so far this year. It's never above 0-300 but yet I still can
have great cross country flights.

Does the CAPE (Convective Available Potential Energy) matter when
reading the weather forecast?

[Mike the Strike]

> Does the CAPE (Convective Available Potential Energy) matter when
> reading the weather forecast?

Yes.

[Bernie[_4_]]

http://www.drjack.info/BLIP/INFO/parameter_details.html#CAPE

CAPE
Convective Available Potential Energy is a measure of the
atmospheric stability affecting deep convective cloud formation above
the BL. Higher values indicates greater potential for strong
thunderstorm development and larger updraft velocities. Thunderstorm
strengths associated with CAPE values (as published by Wright-
Patterson AFB) are: 0=none, 300-1000=weak, 1000-2500=moderate,
2500-5300=strong [note that these values are relative to the very
large thunderstorms which occur in the Mid-West!]. This parameter
only indicates the potential for thunderstorm formation - for
thunderstorms to actually form also requires some triggering mechanism
which produces upward motion, such as flow over a ridge or
convergence. This parameter is obtained directly from model output
and not from a BLIPMAP computation.

[Spam]

........*This parameter only indicates the potential for thunderstorm
formation ............

Sweet! Just what I was looking for. Thanks for sharing that
information. That makes sense now that I look back. I've only had
one flight this year with thunderstorm activity in my area of flight.
Coincidently, that was the only day this year, that I have gone
soaring with a CAPE around 700...thus causing me to land out due to a
thunderstorm over the gliderport that would not let up.

[Mike the Strike]

On Jul 6, 8:24*pm, Spam > wrote:
> .......*This parameter only indicates the potential for thunderstorm
> formation ............
>
> Sweet! *Just what I was looking for. *Thanks for sharing that
> information. *That makes sense now that I look back. *I've only had
> one flight this year with thunderstorm activity in my area of flight.
> Coincidently, that was the only day this year, that I have gone
> soaring with a CAPE around 700...thus causing me to land out due to a
> thunderstorm over the gliderport that would not let up.

I also suggest that you check out all the models. We recently had a
contest day at Parowan where RUC was predicting 700 CAPE and NAM 10.
NAM was a lot closer to actual conditions. Be suspicious if models
are very different - there may be lots of uncertainty. Incidentally,
CAPE was 3500 in Scottsdale the other day when we had storms.

Mike