Why it is hard to pinpoint thunderstorms

Mentioning a risk of thunderstorms in a forecast often comes with a mixture of feelings. Some of us love them, while others of us are more thankful when they miss our location.

When thunderstorms are mentioned, most of us look to see if they will occur near us. Instead, finding a thunderstorm warning area with no pinpointed location as the area where the thunderstorm will occur.

This is because pinpointing the location of a thunderstorm is actually rather difficult. The best way to explain why is the case is by using an analogy of a saucepan boiling some water.

When boiling water, you know that bubbles will eventually appear when the conditions are right, you just don’t know where they will appear.

This is similar to the prediction of thunderstorms. We can see an area of unstable conditions developing enough to aid the development of a thunderstorm. We just cannot pinpoint where the correct conditions will be to pinpoint the exact location of the thunderstorm itself.

Nevertheless, once a thunderstorm has been established, we are able to use current weather observation data to update our forecasts to both keep track of the thunderstorm and to predict where it will move.