April 5, 2010
I
chased the dryline in Central Kansas today. The cap was too
strong to be overcome and nothing significant was observed.
I stayed in Wichita overnight for the next days chase.
April 6, 2010
I
left Wichita this morning, and headed South where agitated
cumulus began to bubble. I traveled to Blackwell Oklahoma
and then West on Highway 11 to Medford. I watched towering
cumulus hit the cap, then die out numerous times. After about
20 minutes, the cumulus skyrocketed and formed pileus and
blasted right through the cap. This happened multiple times,
but the towers were unable to survive and quickly went back
below the cap layer. We observed these storms for a couple of
hours and followed them NE on US 81. Eventually I decided to
call it a day and head back home realizing that storms would
not be able to sustain themselves. During the trip back South
I observed strong storms form just North of Oklahoma City. One
formed a very small hook, and within this region I observed a
wall cloud with rain wrapping around it. The entire storm was
rotating and had a beautiful spiral feature. After about 5
minutes the wall cloud dissipated and the storm grew into a
line segment. As I continued South I observed very brief pea
size hail. We continued the trip home and bumped into David
Drummond and some others on a scenic lookout in the Arbuckle
mountains. Nothing else significant was observed today.
May 10, 2010
Today I
chased with Meteorologist Bob Goosmann as well as friends
Jeremy Wilson and Jay Urish. Today had a very high probability
of large, violent and long track tornadoes. The
Storm
Prediction
Center
put a categorical High Risk centered right over
Tulsa
, which spelled bad news for lots of Oklahomans. We started
the day sitting in
Guthrie
,
Oklahoma
pouring over forecast models. It appeared the dryline was a
little further West than planned today, which was good for us
since it put us in more chase-friendly topography. The warm
front was racing North making dewpoints in Central and
Southern Oklahoma
skyrocket. We decided to go West on Oklahoma Road 33 out of
Guthrie towards Kingfisher. While traveling West we observe
storms rapidly form to our West and Northwest. We flew North
on 81 through
Dover
and into
Hennessey
,
Oklahoma
. While traveling North on 81 we observed funnels drop
multiple times. These funnels almost looked like little
fingers, and were very high based. We
continued to race this storm by moving East on 51, stair
stepping our way along. We went North on I35 then East on 412
into Perry where we observed quarter size hail. The storm we
were on was moving into non-chaseable terrain and several
rivers made repositioning difficult. With the storm speed we
were unable to keep up. We continued to move East on 412 and
watch the storm to our North where we observed a tube funnel
extend half way to the ground and then disappear quickly.
Again, this was very high based. We decided to drop back south
and catch up with the storms further south pushing off the
dryline. We took 177 to Perkins, then east on 33. We went back
South on 18, where we happened to pass a deployed sticknet
probe shortly after the VORTEX2 crew had placed it (Not the
place you want to be after they drop the probe and try to get
away from it as fast as they can.) We continued South all the
way to Shawnee on I40 then followed 3 distinct supercells with
tornado warnings trekking along I40. Along I40 we observed
multiple wall clouds and a funnel near the town of
Wilson
. We continued to watch a rotating storm to our North while
traveling East. The wall cloud on this storm was almost
hugging the ground by this point. When we arrived in Henryetta
the storms had almost lost their supercellular characteristics
so we went South on the Indian Nation Turnpike. While on the
turnpike a line of storms with embedded tornado warnings
passed to our South. We pulled over and let the area of
rotation pass in front of us while we watched the rain and
wind shift directions. This was the end of our chase day. No
tornadoes today and 50-80 mile-per-hour storms led to a
frustrating day. It was nice to be back out chasing, maybe
better luck next time.
Left: Rain Free Base, Right: Storm Chase Vehicle and
Rain Shaft
Left: Anvil forming, Right: Bob Goosmann
Left: Bob Goosmann, Right: Wall cloud
May 19, 2010
Today I
chased with Meteorologist Bob Goosmann. We started the day
late, leaving the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex around 1230PM.
We originally targeted Clinton Oklahoma, but with the dryline
forecasted a little further East. We broke off 287 and went
North on 81 through Duncan and Chickasha. We ended up in
Guthrie Oklahoma with storms already active. We sat just South
of Guthrie on I35 watching a tornado warned thunderstorm to
our West moving East at 35MPH. The tornado was heavily
rain-wrapped, but we could see the storm rotating and the
striations. We could see the rotating wall cloud emerge from
the rain and disappear back into the curtain. We went
south out of Guthrie as the hook region passed through the
town. The sirens in town were sounding, but the tornado had
already lifted. We measured nickel size hail, torrential rain
and noticed strong winds. These winds were probably associated
with the RFD. Lots of nice structure today, but no tornado.
Nothing else significant was observed.
Left: Rotating Storm in Guthrie, OK, Right: Setting up
TV camera
Left and Right: Approaching Shelf Cloud
May 20, 2010
Today the
chase was local, and it panned out well. I left home around
1245 and headed for the southern Dallas County line. I went
south on loop 12 to spur 408. I passed through small hail and
saw what appeared to be a very high-based and ragged wall
cloud. I stopped at the split of Spur 408 and Interstate 20
and watched a tornado quickly develop. This tornado started
off with a large rope / curved stovepipe look before weakening
dramatically. I observed this tornado from approximately 15
miles. I quickly began to turn in reports to the Dallas County
RACES net as well as make reports back to the TV station. The
tornado remained a moderate rope for the majority of its life
and lasted approximately 10 minutes while passing through the
town of Midlothian. The tornado lifted and dropped 3 times. As
it slowly moved to the East, the tornado weakened and roped
out before the storm base became wrapped in rain. The tornado
remained in open fields and did no damage to structures.
Successful and short day.
Left and Right: Midlothian, Texas tornado
Left: Tornado in Midlothian Texas
May 23, 2010
Today I
chased with Jessica Trober and Dave Fick. Our target
today was Northwest Kansas. We went west out of Salina on 70
and passed through Hays, and into Colby. Around 1Z storms
began to rapidly become Severe. We turned around and went back
East to Oakley and then South on US83 towards Scott
City. Here we observed a very large rotating wall cloud to our
West. The wall cloud was scraping the ground, and could very
well have had a brief spin up underneath. Approximately 5
minutes later we observed a tornado near Russell Springs. This
lifted and touched back down 5 times. We went North on 83 and
back west on 70 to get closer to the tornado. By the time we
got back to Interstate 70 the tornado had lifted. We went west
to Goodland where a new Tornado Warning was issued. Here we
observed another small tornado with rapid lower level
rotation. The storm crossed 70 and continued to the
North. We followed it North out of Goodland and
chased a HP supercell with an embedded large tornado. We went
East on 36 to Bird City and North on 27 to Wheeler. We
followed this storm that contained a large and dangerous
tornado for 30 miles. The storm began to lose its
supercellular characteristics so we called the chase
off. We stayed in McCook, Nebraska overnight to stage
for tomorrows chase.
Left and Right: Jessica and I watching storm
Initiation.
Left and right: Wilson shows us where to go.
Left: Jessica and I, Right: Dodge City, KS Tornado
 Left
and Right: Sherman County, Kansas Tornado.
Left and Right: Sherman County, KS Tornado.
May 24, 2010
Today
Jessica, Dave and I chased Nebraska and South Dakota. Today,
once again, had early storm initiation. We traveled North on
83 through North Platte. We notice storms beginning to fire on
radar to our West in the Nebraska panhandle. We flew West on
80 then Northeast on 385 towards Scottsbluff and up into
Alliance. We quickly jumped onto a tornado warned storm as it
passed just North of Alliance. We observed very low hanging
clouds and a possible rotating wall cloud on the forward flank
of the storm. Shortly after storm passage we measured 53 MPH
winds and nickel size hail. We also observed a brief rotating
funnel at this location. We continued to follow the storms
North into Chadron and into South Dakota. We went East on 18
to stay ahead of the now bowing line segment. We eventually
went South on 391 back into Nebraska and ended the chase since
all the storms were linear by now. We went into Wyoming and
stayed in Cheyenne overnight to stage for tomorrows Southeast
Colorado chase. Nothing else significant was observed.
Left: Jessica Trober, Right: David Fick
Left: David Fick after frontal Passage, Right: Jessica
and I at a "rest stop"
Left and Right: Sunset Glamor.
Left: Funnel Cloud in South Dakota.
May 25, 2010
Today
Dave, Jessica and myself targeted Southeast Colorado. We left
Cheyenne, WY around 9AM and headed for Pueblo Colorado. When
we arrived in Pueblo we stopped at the local Weather Forecast
Office to discuss with the meteorologists there. Shortly after we left Pueblo storms began to fire in
far Western Kansas. We shot east on US 50 through La Junta,
and on to Lamar. Storms quickly went tornado warned to our
North. The structure was very impressive, but the storm tops
were incredibly low. We watched the storms from about 15 miles
away, and observed a large tornado for about 5 minutes
before it became obscured by rain. We went North out of
Granada on US 385 through Sheridan Lake and Northeast onto
Cheyenne Wells where another storm had just gone tornadic. While on
385 we passed the Vortex 2 armada gathering data and doing
transects on the current storm. We also passed what I believe
was the Smart-R DOW. While on 385 just north of Sheridan Lake we observed 2
small rope tornadoes. We continued North to race around the
storm for better position. We went East on 40 through Oakley
and onto 70. To our immediate south was a very large tornadic
storm with a large VIL return and massive hook echo on radar. We continued East and
were able to wrap our way around the NE
quadrant of the storm. Here for about 7 minutes we observe
another large tornado from about 10-15 miles away. I
immediately sent in my observations to DDC on the NWSChat
software and within a minute a tornado warning was issued
containing a large and violent tornado. What a great feeling
knowing we were able to help the public and increase lead
time! We
continued South on 283 to get on the Southeast side of the
storm. We had a perfect view of the storm base and observed a
large bell lowering obscured heavily by rain. The tornado had
lifted and the storm quickly formed a
massive shelf cloud. The storm remained tornado warned. We continued South and let the rotation
and hail core pass to our North. While sitting in the southern
end of the core we measured 52 MPH sustained winds and pea
size hail. We had lost daylight and the
storm wasn't as impressive as earlier so we called the chase
off and headed towards Dodge City for the night. 8 tornadoes
in 3 days ended a successful week of chasing for the 3 of us.
Left: Dave Fick and Pikes Peak, Right: Jessica and I at
Pikes Peak.
Left: Jessica Driving, Right: VORTEX 2 Mobile Mesonet
Left: VORTEX 2 Mobile Mesonet Right: Storm Structure
near Grove, Kansas.
Left and Right: Structure near Grove, Kansas.
Left and Right: Tribune Kansas Tornado
Left and Right: Large tornado near Grove, Kansas.
Left and Right: Wedge Tornado near Cheyenne Wells,
Kansas.
Left and Right: Grove Kansas Radar. We are the white
circle. Cutting it close!
May
26, 2010
Down
Day.... Passed through Greensburg, Kansas and Wakita,
Oklahoma...
Left and Right: Twister Museum.
Left: Twister Museum, Right: Wakita, Oklahoma water
tower.
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