05/22/04 REPORTS: NE, KS, IA

[Michael Maxwell]

Here are some radar images taken near the time of the large tornado pictured above. This is Gempak plotting NIDS radar data using the part of GEMPAK called Nmap2. If the image make people mad or they look bad they can be deleted. I'm not an artist so the images just had to be converted from postscript format into jpg.That makes them look pretty bad and too big.
All times are 00:19z or 7:19pm central time.

Base Reflectivity 0.5 degrees:


Radial Velocity 0.5 degrees



Storm Relative Mean Velocity 0.5 degrees

 

[David Schuttler]

At least I'm not alone then.I might just have to get a laptop afterall ....

I stayed till 11:30 after a storm was done in Beatrice. Funnels but no touches that I could till. Going to bed before I look at tapes.

Anyone heard from David Drummond. I saw a van like his on hwy 5 headed to hwy 15 sporting a few plastic windows now.

 

[Chris Hayes]

Is it just me, or is TWC and CNN out of touch with the outbreak in NE/IA last night. TWC says several homes were destroyed in Hallam and a few people were injured in the entire outbreak, and CNN says there were no reported injuries. What is the true story of what has happened???

 

[Jerry funfsinn]

Incredible chase day and night. Viewed what must have been the Beaver City tornado from a distance as I approached from the west.Then watched that disipate and thought the outlow was overtaking the updraft when I intercepted the Alma NE tornado before getting rain wrapped. Then was chased trying to dodge baseball hail. Manage to deflect the hail and let the storm pass at an old farm building that has seen many a storm (hoped it would survive another). Was mindful of the rain soaked roads but had no choice but to navigate them to safely get out of the storm path. Some white knuckle driving for a while.Got to see the incredible updraft to this cell as I tried to get back in position. Thanks goes to Fabian Guerra and his crew for there help on this day.
Have pictures posted on my website:
http://creativejetstream.com
Currently heading back home for the action in Illinois today.

 

[J.B. Dixon]

FYI: Governor Mike Johanns is holding a press conference this morning at 9:00 am CST. He declared a lot of counties a disaster area early on last night. We'll know a lot more about injuries after that. But anyone who saw that rain/dust-wrapped monster knows that it was a potential killer.
I'll be heading back down to the Firth area to help with the clean-up this morning. I'll post some pictures as soon as I can.

 

[J.B. Dixon]

Governor Mike Johanns confirms one fatality in Hallam, NE.

 

[Mike Hollingshead]

[Broken External Image]:http://www.extremeinstability.com/stormpics/04-5-22-23.jpg

Account is up for the storm near Columbus to Blair.

http://www.extremeinstability.com/04-5-22.htm

Wayne....those pics are awesome!!! Dang.

Mike

 

[George Flickinger]

A TV met in KC said that a storm chaser, David Drummond, drove into a tornado last night!

 

[Angie Norris]

All I can say is what an insane evening it was.
Got to Beatrice about 5:30 and positioned on Hwy 136 just southwest of town. Watched as one storm exploded basically out of nowhere, went severe and then tornadic (doppler indicated, but in a few minutes, both spotters and law enforcement saw a funnel). Repositioned on 15 just north of Fairbury and watched as the cell cycled, put down a brief rain-wrapped tornado and a second funnel.
By this time, it sounded like the entire atmosphere over southeast NE was exploding, as NWR was constantly announcing new tornado warnings. Discretion was the better part of valor as far as I was concerned, so I pretty much stayed where I was instead of trying to track down tornadoes in an area which was totally unfamiliar, trying to drive and read maps simutaneously (ahhh, the joys of solo chasing :shock: :roll: :wink: ).
Since I don't night chase, about 8pm I decided to try to head out of the area, so I headed west on 136 toward 81, got caught in some quarter to golfball hail (ok, kinda core puched, but it was right in the way :wink: ), then watched as an absolute monster of an HP sup formed off to my north. I think this one may be the storm which produced the Hallem tornado...inflow into the beast was at least 50 mph from the south...looked like watching time laspe. Don't know if it was the Hallem storm, but the timing would have been about right.
Heading back down 81 into Kansas, the lightning was almost constant.

A big thank you to George Tincher for an incredible nowcasting job...George you are awesome!!!
Thoughts and prayers are with the people of NE and IA, especially in Hallam.
Mel, glad you and David are alright...dang, that was bit close :shock: !!

Angie

 

[Joey Ketcham]

Shane, don't feel bad... I didn't bag a tornado either.. saw a number of rotations though... like you it's something I'm having a hard time dealing with.. how could there be such an outbreak but yet I don't even get a tornado?

I go to the storm that produced the tornado near Alma but by the time I got there it was rain wrapped, I pretty much followed that storm and once it got dark I called off the chase - I never chase at night.

I got to use my new WX Worx system and some things I noted:

1). You can't use it while driving, it won't get a radio signal - which I assumed it would since it would act like a normal XM Radio or something... but I could only get a signal when pulled over.

2). I couldn't use both my WX Worx and my Delorme GPS at the same time, I could use one or the other - but not both. Then once I was done with one, it was damn near impossible to get the other working. I'd disconnect my WX Worx, plug my GPS up and get it going and it'd say "Acquiring" but never went... I'd reboot the laptop and it'd do the same thing.. after disconnect the USB 5 times it'dfinally come up..

I'm just gonna have to get the GPS for the WX WORX system...

anyways, here's some pics I took in the area between Alma and Hastings.

http://www.jkdigitalphotography.com/storm.html

 

[Jason Montano]

After 2 days, 1500 miles, 3 tornados, 2 speeding tickets, a dead battery, a jump start, a lot of gas, and even more cash I am home. I left Norman on Friday around 1000 and humped it up to SE IA just in time for sunset. Chalked missing those tornados up to a travel day. Headed E to Omaha to spend the night and set up for Saturday.

Headed out of Omaha around 1130 after looking at latest FCST. My initial target being Fairbury, NE. I arrived there, found a WiFi hookup and waited. Watched the storms to the west and then to the north but held fast to the OFB. Around 1800 I finally decided to head W seeing a tower building to my SW.

Headed W on 136 and then S on 81 intersected the towers, still building, S of Hebron. Followed these as they converged and began to anvil and rotate. Saw an outline of a Wall Cloud and headed N to Hebron on 81. The Wall Cloud was rotating rapidly and dropped a tornado to the N of Hebron. I was all over it until a cop shut me down, he had hwy 81 closed, forcing me to navigate some farm roads. The tornado was hard to make out at this point b/c of a ton of dust blowing around. I ran parallel to the storm heading E. Finally navigated myself to hwy 4 and saw a second funnel touch down to the my NW, this quickly disipated, only to reveal another torndao form to my E.

This tornado touched down and quickly became a large wedge. Unfortunately I was driving and trying to take photos at the same time so they are of low quality. Followed this until I finally lost sight of it. I played catch up for a while but to no avail. It was probably 2100 when I drove through Wilbur and was stopped on hwy 41 b/c of live power lines covering the road. Giving up on the chase I turned around back to Wilbur and assisted their EOC w/ communicating emegencies (put the old ham to good use!!)

What a day, well worth the cost, even if my photos are crappy I dont care b/c it was a heck of a day. I am having problems uploading my photos to the web, will post them when I can.

 

[Justin McCauliffe]

I live in Manhattan, Kansas so this was a nice, close chase. I left Manhattan around 2:15 in the afternoon and arrived in Beatrice, NE around 3:50. Stopped in at the library there to check on some data. The ladies at the desk there were really nice and had no problem whatsoever with me using their computers. By the way, there was a group of chasers there riding in one or two tan SUVs with lightbars, was anyone at the library there around 4:00 or so?

I left Beatrice around 4:30 and headed west towards 41/15. This is where I made the mistake that pretty much killed the day for. I noticed the towers going up north of 80, at the time I thought they were a lot closer than this, obviously they weren't. To make a long story short, by the time I got to one of these cells, it looked to me like it wasn't doing so well. I stayed with it for awhile, than headed south again, calling off the chase. Now that I think about it, that storm may not have weakened like I thought it had. I think more than likely it had just become incredibly rain wrapped, and being inexperienced like I am it appeared to be weakening. I left it around 6:30, I believe it was in the Fremont area when I left it. That only strengthens my belief that it was in fact still going pretty good as there were warnings posted in Dodge County around this time I think.

The drive home was very interesting as I tried to get home on 77. Well, because of my lack of experience and lack of any data on what was in front of me I decided to just play it safe and head west on 80 to clear the storm near Lincoln. Of course, when I did get west of it, I was greeted with the line of storms that was behind it. This line would have been the one stretching into Kansas. So, an arrival time in Manhattan of 11 became a final arrival time of 2am. :roll:

A little off topic maybe, but: Some things I learned from this chase:

1. Don't be intimidated by veteran chasers (silly I know, but you guys are a little intimidating to me )

2. Try and get some nowcasting, it was ridiculous for me to try chasing without it and without trying to stop to get some data or something. I know I don't know any of you, but if the chance arises again for me to chase, would whoever is nowcasting (if any) be willing to help me out?

Oh one other thing, on my way up to those cells I very nearly got in an accident with either dumb drivers or chasers who weren't thinking correctly. Myself and a car behind the group on the left side had to think pretty quickly. They were stopping to look at the storm and nearly caused a 5 car accident at speeds over 60 mph! :evil:

 

[Shane Adams]

Originally posted by jketcham
Shane, don't feel bad... I didn't bag a tornado either.. saw a number of rotations though... like you it's something I'm having a hard time dealing with.. how could there be such an outbreak but yet I don't even get a tornado?

Well, it certainly stings, but I'll get over it. All I had to do was stay put one hour longer than I did, but with several cells already producing tornadoes quite a distance away from us, I looked at it this way: "I can can sit here and do nothing, or I can try and get to those storms." I figured I was screwed either way (if I stayed, no storm would form near me...if I left, the storms I was chasing would die and a new one would form where I'd been)

It's just an example of how luck is a major factor in chasing. If I'd stayed a while longer, we'd have been all over it. One decision usually dictates the entire day, and because of this, I knew early on (though I didn't mention this to anyone with me) that we were screwed.

You have good times and bad times in chasing, that's just the way it works. Yesterday's dealt with. All I'm concerned with now is Iowa on Monday. By Monday night I seriously doubt we'll be thinking about Saturday :wink:

 

[Kevin Scharfenberg]

We saw at least four substantial tornadoes, two of which were quite large, and several other brief spin-ups, on the Hebron/Daykin/De Witt monster supercell.

We arrived in Hebron from the south by 3:30, and were aware of the tornadoes being reported to our west near Beaver City/Alma. However, upon pulling up a surface map and satellite image, we saw that the nice dryline bulge we were expecting had developed to our southwest near Hill City. We also noticed that moisture was pooling locally with a lot of cumulus clouds in the Hebron area. Our winds in Hebron were ESE, but had been out of the SSE just to the south of Hebron in Belleville, KS. We surmised the moisture convergence and low level jet were intersecting the dryline bulge just to our southwest, and made a very difficult call to not blast west toward the existing storms but instead to stay put in the Hebron area.

By about 5:30, a clump of turkey towers developed to our southwest, near Lovewell Lake, KS. By 6:00, a tower finally broke the cap just north of Hardy, NE. It was high-based at first, but slowly became a large, circular base as the storm passed over Deshler and became severe at 6:30. We drove through the 2003 tornado damage path in Deshler, then went east on a dirt road just south of the center of the updraft base. Suddenly, just after we noticed an RFD clear slot and associated downward motion develop, a patch of scud developed a few hundred feet below the updraft base and raced upward. The process repeated several times over the next 60 seconds, and suddenly we had a huge, rapidly rotating wall cloud ocassionally scraping the ground and kicking up a lot of dust.

We saw a few spin-ups, then a large tornado formed northwest of Hebron, but was unfortunately obscured by dust much of the time. The tornado moved E then ENE then NNE near US 81 north of Hebron. Finally the dirt cleared and we got to see the rope stage of the tornado NE of Belvidere. At one point I glanced to the northeast from there and just saw the non-descript, high base of the forward lip of the wall cloud. Only 30 seconds later I looked again to the northeast, and the process was repeating again! A tornado formed within 60 seconds as the wall cloud again built down, rapidly rotating. This tornado developed not far north of hwy 4 and 53 west of Daykin, and moved ENE as it became another large, dusty tornado.

This tornado became obscured between Daykin and Western, but the huge wall cloud had lowered even closer to the ground, was rapidly rotating, and we saw several spin-ups along the outer edge. Also, there were numerous high-based funnel clouds, both cyclonic and anticyclonic, to the south of the wall cloud in the RFD lip.

In the midst of the rapid rotation, a ghostly white column tornado developed in the center of the huge mass and sat nearly stationary southwest of Swanton. As that happened, one of the spin ups along the south lip spun up and became a full-fledged tornado wrapping around the SE and E sides of the wall cloud, for two simultaneous tornadoes.

We saw a few more spin-ups as we tried to stay with the storm as it moved into De Witt, but it became a lot messier visually and it was getting dark, so we called it a day. At dusk, as we went south, we saw another supercell develop in the twilight distance to the W, had a beautiful field of mammatus covering much of the sky, and had nearly continuous intra-Cb tower lightning and anvil zits for a fantastic ending to the day.

Another incredible chase in what is shaping up to be one of the best years of my career.

Edit to add: We had to lock up our brakes twice for @$$hole chasers who stopped in the middle of the lane of traffic. In both cases there was plenty of room to pull over and out of the way on the shoulder.

 

[Dan Robinson]

A frustrating wall cloud/funnel chase Saturday on what should have been a no-brainer tornado day. We targeted Hastings, NE and adjusted west to Minden. We made the mistake of jumping on tail end charlie of the existing complex near the KS/NE border instead of patiently waiting around the Hastings/Beatrice corridor. Caught the cell at Alma where we saw a well-defined rain-free base and rapidly rotating wall cloud to the west of Alma. It fizzled in short order and the storm quickly became outflow dominant. We tried moving east to catch the new meso and get into warm southerly winds again, but had trouble keeping up on the road network with surprise dirt roads that started as pavement. Thankfully we didn't get stuck.

Near Republican City, we saw several white, laminar funnels quickly form and dissipate. One made it 1/3 of the way to the ground before dissipating, and we stopped to film it in the town of Franklin as the tornado sirens were activated.

The flanking line was an amazing sight to our east as we tried to get back ahead. We eventually made it in front of the storm again near Blue Hill, but by this time it was all outflow and nothing looked promising. We saw the new cells developing south in Kansas and tried to make it south, but by then it was dark. Across the border in KS, met up with Dave Crowley, Justin Teague, Matt Stroup and their group who had just witnessed the large tornado under the eastern supercell. We headed east to escape the approaching cores of the new tornado-warned cells to our west and southwest. Stopped to shoot lightning-illuminated structure shots for a while, them headed to Topeka/Manhattan area for the night.

Had the worst time ever finding a hotel room in Manhattan and Topeka due to graduations taking place everywhere. Finally found a small hotel in YATES CENTER Kansas at 3:00AM that wasn't booked!!! Needless to say, no high speed internet to be had there. Lodging in Tulsa now in preparation for a chase tomorrow in MO/IA. Wishing I was in IL now but way too far to drive after 6 consecutive days of all-day drives and 4-5 hour sleeps. Taking today off......going again tomorrow.