1. 1

   Temperature and dewpoint lines

   The red line is temperature and the green line is dewpoint. Where they're close, the air is moist.

2. 2

   Find the cap and the LCL

   Look for warm layers aloft (the cap) and where a rising parcel saturates (cloud base).

3. 3

   Shade the CAPE

   The area between the parcel path and the temperature line is CAPE.

4. 4

   Check winter profiles

   Any part of the temperature line above 0°C aloft is a warm nose that can produce sleet or freezing rain.

Terms in this lesson

Skew-TSoundingLCLCapWarm Nose

Maps used

Model Soundings (Skew-T)CAPE (Surface-Based / Most-Unstable)

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