04/19/05 TALK: Central Plains/Southern Plains

[Tom Dulong]

Two supercells in Elbert Co Colorado...

The one just southwest of Deer Trail should pass right over the town
in 30-40 minutes...storm still has vault.

New storm just southeast of Kiowa showing hook and 80-100 kts gate-to-gate shear. It looks to follow same path as Deer Trail storm.

 

[Jeff Snyder]

Though not as exciting (despite being more dangerous), there is a very impressive set of storms over Garden county with continuous redevelopment right on the front in central Nebraska now that is dumping copious amounts of rain in the same area... Throw the LNX radar into loop, and it's pretty cool. Radar is estimating >7inches in this area, though the presence of large hail probably makes this a little optimistic. Nonetheless, I'm quite surprised that there isn't a flash flood warning out for the area...

 

[Ryan McGinnis]

I pity the poor soul trying to chase that lovely looking Cherry County storm. The road networks north of Lake Mcconaughy are mind bogglingly sparse. N/W roads with E/W turnouts every... oh... 50 miles or so. :? Add to that "tennis ball sized hail" and you have the makings of a scary chase!

 

[Verne Carlson]

Just got home after chasing with Tony out to Elizabeth, CO where we ran into a nice mini-meso barber pole that dropped quarter size hail breifly. Tony had to go to work at 5, so he went back to Denver and I meandered around to the north and then back to a cell over Agate, CO that seemed to be a lone right mover. Got under to find that it was rotating but had a very high base and no chance of dropping anything. Got some quarter size hail again and then headed back home. Not a bad little chase of just 300 miles in my own backyard.

 

[Mike Hollingshead]

Got to the Sterling CO cell right as it died. Went back north to where I had come from(around Oskosh NE) and saw a very nice supercell north of Lewellen. The roads it took to get to it were rather interesting to say the least. I knew they'd suck, but c'mon. They were ok at first then they got REAL small where my mustang barely fit on the 'road'. What you do when another car comes i have no idea. AND at the crests of these hills there were tumbleweed DRIFTS. As in taller than my car drifts of tumbleweeds leaving even less room to get through. I had to drive over and between them as they brushed up against both doors. No one uses these roads. I finally found a bit better one as the storm also got better. Pretty soon this outflow'ish storm turned into a very nice supercell as the sun came through and lit up the gold fields. Back behind the rfd cut there was this wall of interest on the ground with rapid motions in it. What it was I don't know, but it was in the right spot to be a tornado and the storm was at its peak visually. FF'ing video and it was likely just rapidly rotating rain curtains with a sharp right/east side and precip blocking the left/west(looking north at it). I was depressed after around 500 miles of driving to see the Sterling storm shirvel as I arrived. Kept at it and took some crazy roads and it paid off I think. On the way back west letting it pass me and back tracking was treated to an amazing display of mammatus. My decent gravel looked to get hairy on the gps again right where I'd have to punch into it and east again and opted to not try that in precip with what I had just seen earlier. Saw way too many chasers out for a weekday in mid-april in bfe NE. WIFI really rocks....hence why I am typing this(in super 8 in Ogallala).

Paid $2.40 for gas and chased in CO today...both firsts. Will post pics to the reports thread whenever the chases end. I'd post there now and add later if it wasn't for the silly one post rule where no one will know the second time you post. Oh, yesterday in sc NE chased that tail end charlie inflow beast. Lovely winds over 40mph screaming into the hailer. It was a nice storm to observer. It later broke my windsheild as I punched it to head home.

Good luck to all on Wed. It is looking pretty good to me right now(jinx).