10/18/07 REPORTS: MS / AL / TN / KY / IL / IN / MI / WI

[Carla Bisby]

My chase was similar to John Farley’s. I was also on the cell near Vandalia but I was on Hwy 51 near Shobonier. I had perfect visibility as the area was flat and I found a break in the tree line so I could see the entire storm from the shelf cloud in the front, green core in the middle, and WC on the end. I watched from Hwy 51 and then followed the storm east on 70 and never saw any tornado. There were a few attempts at funneling but it never pulled that off. It did have a persistent WC and I followed it until dark. There are 2 tornado reports on SPC from this storm but the Central IL NWS said: “There were no tornadoes associated with this activity, likely due to a lack of directional wind shear locallyâ€￾.

 

[Dan Robinson]

Completed chase log with photos, screen captures and video clips here:

http://stormhighway.com/oct182007.shtml

 

[John Farley]

I have now posted my chase report, with lots of photos and a couple radar loops, here:

http://www.johnefarley.com/chase101807.htm

 

[Skip Talbot]

Full log, pictures, and maps:
http://www.skip.cc/chase/071018

 

[Danny Neal]

Full report and pictures at www.bwer-chaser.blogspot.com

 

[Chad Cowan]

I finally have everything up; I downloaded the GR2AE trial (awesome program) and have spent many hours playing around with it. I chased with Matthew Fischer and Adam Lucio who posted our story above. In short, we chased the long track, cyclic supercell from Lafayette into ne IN and witnessed numerous wall clouds and funnels. The best way to view my pictures would be in order on my website, as I have chronolgically ordered the 3d radar images within my pictures. The first picture in that album is a composite I made of the 10/17 & 10/18 storm reports; it's amazing what percentage of the country was affected by this event.

Shortly after initiation sw of Lafayette, IN, the storm produced a left split which strengthened and went svr warned while the main storm struggled. As if someone flipped that metaphorical switch, the storm undewent incredibly rapid intensification from THIS @ 2040z to THIS @ 2046z. Shortly thereafter, this appeared:

At the time, I believed the appendage was virga, but now believe it to be a shapely, ragged funnel. Contrast enhanced. In the pictures taken shortly after that, the rain to the left clears and you can see a well defined meso.

The supercell cycled as the sun went down and rotation tightened as a well defined wall cloud appeared between lightning flashes:

You can see the wall clound and possible funnel just to the left of the barn:

We later witnessed the lowering that Kurt Hulst posted above as it was illuminated by city lights.

This is what 90+ kt mid-level winds do to developing towers.

LFC=KFC

I will post my account of the Nappanee tornado shortly

 

[Terrence Cook]

Chasing IL/IN border

Around 2pm I headed into East central IL with Jared Farrer and played the waiting game just south of Champaign/Urbana. Around 5:30 the first towers began to go up South West of Danville, IL and began racing off to the NE.

This is the cluster that went on to produce the EF-3 tornado in northern IN, of course... it went over my house as a shower, go figure:


(Click to Enlarge)

It was right at initiation that we realized we were driving on a flat tire and so began the quickest tire change in the world on Oct 18th... this 10 minutes is all that it took to be behind the storm for the next hour as we drove towards Lafayette, IN in a desperate attempt to gain ground. We quickly realized the hopelessness of the situation and called the chase off as we didn't feel like night chasing with a spare tire.

Fast forward 2-3 hours...

After sunset I joined Doyle McIntosh who had just returned from Ball State U. and headed south for what turned out to be the shortest successful chase of my career (didn't even leave the county). No tornado, but a moonlit supercell with a nice wall cloud was all it took for me to declare this 20 Mile chase a fantastic success!


(Click to Enlarge)

The above storm is the same one that John Farley chased from the Effingham area and eventually became the tail-end storm and went on to be tornado warned again as it neared Lafayette, IN. We intercepted this storm between Danville and Lafayette.

Of course we only had approx. 5 minutes to enjoy the sights and observe the
storm before it continued on it's way off to the North at LUDICROUS SPEED!!!

Picture of the day:

(Click to Enlarge)

What a fun October day!

 

[Kurt Hulst]

Report Completed

I have finished my report for October 18, 2007.

I have included a video clip of the day and some pictures. With a brief write up.

You can see it through this link http://midwestchasers.com
Click on the image Oct. 18 report

Enjoy