04/18/09 REPORTS: KS/OK

[Adam Lucio]

Finished full account yesterday. Pics and video.

www.aerostorms.com under the chase logs section.

I wish I could get these up sooner but the I have to spend the whole day after the event driving home.

 

[Tim Segraves]

I finally got my account written as well. Sorry it wasn't up sooner but hopefully it'll be an entertaining read for some.

http://www.wxshots.com/2009/04/22/cimarron-ks-chase-4182009/

 

[Brandon Goforth]

I was on the Alva, OK storm from the beginning and observed a few wall clouds with rapid rotation at times...the first wall cloud is the one that interests me the most as that thing was very low and with good motion. My question, was anyone else near this thing early on? I didn't see anyone for quite some time, but surely there were other people around this thing. Take a look at this picture of the first wall cloud with a funnel there in the middle. This was taken looking west from highway 14, while it was just ESE of Fairvalley (SE of Freedom, OK)...very suspicious as you can see, and while there was a very *small* ridge there on the horizon, I had virtually an unobstructed view of this thing. This was taken literally right when the storm first went tornado warned, if not a minute or two before.

Wall cloud #2 passing over highway 14...moderate to strong rotation was observed as this passed over the highway. Right after this was taken I blasted up to highway 64 to head east toward Alva and came across hail that was probably 2-3 inches deep, and completely covering the road.

Here's one from just east of Alva, looking back toward town...this thing became an HP beast at this point.

Overall, this was a very fun chase, one of my better chases of the year (so far) even though it did not produce a tornado...at least "officially", although I'm not entirely convinced of it, especially early on.