This page shows the forecast of convective parameters, mainly for the central-southern part of Chile, calculated from outputs of the Global Forecast System (GFS) model with a horizontal resolution of 0.25º degrees. These forecasts can be used as a tool to help monitor the establishment of favorable conditions for the occurrence of severe storms or tornadoes/waterspouts in Chile. On this page, users can find maps with the horizontal distribution of some convective parameters, skew-T diagrams for a group of cities in central-southern Chile, as well as time series of some convective parameters for these cities. The products on this page are updated once a day. The page is available in both Spanish and English, allowing the user to access the information on this site in any of these languages. It is important to note that the products on this page should not be taken as an official forecast, but only as a guide for monitoring favorable conditions for the occurrence of severe storms.
Bulk wind shear between the surface and 1 km AGL. Units: [m/s].
Height of freezing level (0°C), as a first available level counting from the surface. Units [m] AGL.
Mixed-layer CAPE: Convective Available Potential Energy, derived from the mixed-layer parcel. Units: [J/kg].
Storm-relative helicity between the surface and 500 m AGL for left-moving supercell vector. Units: [m2/s2].
Significant Tornado Parameter based on the formula from Coffer et al. (2019), doi: https://doi.org/10.1175/WAF-D-19-0115.1. This version uses left-moving supercell vector for SRH calculation and is dedicated to the Southern Hemisphere. The parameter is dimensionless.
