Yes, this brings back some memories. I had been chasing for some years but was still green. I ran into a guy before Gene -over just east of Beggs. Hard to remember exactly my route now. I took a lot of video that was really cool. I believe I first set up on hwy 75 perhaps north of Preston and se of Beggs. I got on a tripod and directly north was a very, very dark core. The storm was tornado warned, but vehicles were just driving straight into the core without slowing down. I found that remarkable at the time. I turned my camcorder to the ne towards the rainfree base of the storm coming from Beggs I believe. There was a distinct wallcloud lowering. I jumped in the vehicle and drove perhaps a mile or so west and then north some directly in front of the wallcloud, but it was perhaps attempting to pass a bit to my north. I got out, watched, and videotaped the storm some more. Another chaser got out of his vehicle. I seem to recall he had a larger American type sedan, perhaps a burgandy, or possibly it was black. I think the guy was alone, but not sure. He was talking to me by himself. Anyway, he said he chases these things all the time, and had been out for awhile himself. I think he said he was from Arkansas, but could have been Missouri, etc. I remember he said to be careful of the storm as it was really getting it's act together. As I watched the lowered, rotating wall cloud's base was behind a hill. In actuality it could have been a tornado at the time. Reviewing video I never can tell for sure, but it sure looks like a possibility. It was a very dark - black and fairly large truncated cone shape. After awhile the guy thought we could reposition so I followed him north across some railroad tracks, etc. Somewhere along the way following him we got hit by sudden, intense wind. I stopped the vehicle and ducked down in it for awhile as the trees went crazy, leaves and debris were blowing, and branches broke and fell around and nearby. I now know of course that was the RFD. There were some branches down on the road, and I managed to go around them. We repositioned and managed to set up just south of a VERY large inverted bowl, rotating, inflow region / wallcloud. I'm not sure I've seen anything like it since, but it was probably 2.5 to 5 miles in diameter and as it rotated small tornadic vortices would spin and touch down along the outside similar to a rotating carousel. This was fascinating to watch. After this is when it moved east and formed a tornado I believe north of Preston - and I believe I followed as I crossed east across hwy 75. I got separated from the other chaser in all the confusion. Never did find out who that was. Not sure he introduced himself. It is in this region east of hwy 75 I met Gene. We watched that tornado (a white elephant trunk) for awhile then did some maneuvering I believe southeast and along the way there was another tornado just south of our east bound road. There we got caught in heavy precipitation from merging storms as it began getting too dark to chase. Along the way back along the hwy headed south I ran into all sorts of people under overpasses that were scared to death. I remember on lady and her family were trying to get back to Fort Smith, but didn't know if it was safe to proceed. I updated them on the storms positions and they were happy for the relief.
Anyway, to this day, I still wonder who that chaser was I met se of Beggs. Let me know if any of you recall being at that location and talking with me. I was in a black BMW 535is sedan. Yes, that was a seriously cool chase, with some wicked storm activity. The lightning that evening / night was very intense as well.
