4. Forecast Applications

Convection » Microbursts: Wet vs. Dry Wet Microbursts

Sounding conducive for wet microburst

Here we see a typical wet microburst sounding. You can open the Interactive Skew-T with this sounding.

Wet microburst soundings are characterized by moist, nearly saturated conditions at low levels and drier conditions aloft. These soundings often appear similar to the capital "Y" severe weather soundings, but generally have higher precipitable water values. The dry air aloft gets entrained into convective downdrafts and enhances evaporative cooling, which increases negative buoyancy and strengthens the downdrafts. These microbursts occur most frequently over the southeastern United States and are often accompanied by heavy precipitation.