2011-07-04 Reports: MN/ND/SD

[Andy Jackson]

I ended up making the trek up to North Dakota. I'm not sure what drove me to chase this event given the low level helicity/shear was not very high. A nice cumulus field developed by the time I got to the Fargo area but H7 temps were still pretty high. Luckily, convection was developing north of Grand Forks so I drove north. I intercepted the line of thunderstorms near Crookston, MN and watched the tail end storm start to get it's act together. The storm actually started rotating pretty good with a nice wall cloud and warm RFD. I ended up behind the storm so I debated a core punch but turned around after I started getting into some big hail. I did get back into Fargo as the tornado warned part of the line passed over part of the city. Afterwards, as the storm was south of Fargo the local fireworks displays kicked in this was actually pretty cool. I will post some photos a little later, but all in all this was a pretty good chase. The one thing that I keep thinking about is if there were higher 0-1km helicity values I think there would have been some significant tornadoes today.

 

[Andy Jackson]

Here's some photos:

near Crookston on highway 2, it was weird because there was traffic from all of the holiday lake goers making their hasty retreat ahead of the storm. This has to be the most stressful day for WFO's knowing that their will be more people in rural areas away from substantial shelter.

Here's the NWS report of the tornadoes that occurred:
Tornadoes
Honestly, I think I videoed the northern EF-0 but by that time it was wrapped pretty good.
I did see an area of interest as I was on the 29 south but I was in pretty high precip by the time I got to Fargo.