VORTEX2 is the code name for a large scientific field project to measure stormscale environments around tornadic storms. The project has been out chasing storms since about the 10th of May, but has had very little organized severe weather to work with. In fact, the dearth of severe weather for this time of year is rather unprecidented. The featured image displays the daily number of SPC issued watches for May since 1997 (oldest date of digital records). Areas of white indicate no watches issued and you can see the drought of 2009 is largest area on this plot. Greg Carbin of SPC wrote an interesting blog post on how rare this quiet period of May has been. Based on forecast models, business for the VORTEX2 project appears to be picking up with a more organized severe weather expected.

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