Weather Tidbits: Elevated Thunderstorms

This edition of Weather Tidbits will be discussing elevated thunderstorms. Elevated thunderstorms are storms that develop within a pocket of warm, moist air aloft a layer of cooler and more stable air at the surface. This is the result of a temperature inversion profile. The storms can also develop in a region of unstable air from the surface up, survive the trip to the capped environment given the airmass aloft is unstable. With elevated storms, severe weather, especially with damaging wind gusts and tornadoes, is very low. Hail is the most likely severe weather possibility you may see. So, while elevated storms tend to not be severe, they can be very noisy. The surface temperature inversion enhances the sound of thunder because the sound waves bounce within the inversion, causing these thunderclaps to be louder than otherwise.