2012-04-13 Reports: OK/TX/KS

[Dan Robinson]

Well, I suppose it's my turn to get chewed out by the chase community. I was seconds away from being hit by a tornado that suddenly appeared out of the rain and maxed out on Highway 54 south of Cooperton, Oklahoma. I escaped in reverse, nearly colliding with a car doing a k-turn that also was not visible in the screaming rain-filled inflow jet until I was upon him**. To my credit, this was all not intentional. The storm's visual appearance suggested outflow dominance, with no low-level inflow. The storm did not have a radar-apparent circulation prior, and had none for the previous 20 minutes. The tornado was west of where one would have expected. I had called off the chase and was heading north toward OKC to get a hotel. I waited for the VIL spike to cross the highway and proceeded north, and bam. Earlier, I saw at least 2-3 other tornadoes inside the notch of the HP just east of Blair.

**EDIT: It turns out the guy I almost hit wasn't doing a k-turn, he was southbound and suddenly turned 90 degrees across the road right after he passed me, directly in my path, to view the tornado. That's why I didn't see him. I don't think he realized I was backing up. I didn't know what happened until I was able to look at the video from my rear-facing camera. The entire incident from my 2 dashcams (front/back) and camcorder is here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E0UAoFnfSj8

Some more screen grabs:
http://stormhighway.com/blog2012/april1312a.shtml

 

[Austin Marti]

Jordan Hartley and myself just did a backyard chase SE of Wichita (Winfield, KS area).

Every storm we hopped on died out fairly quick it seemed like.

I've only edited one shot so far. I really need to get my sleep before tomorrow (Saturday).

 

[Skip Talbot]

Had a blast today with Brad Goddard and Jennifer Brindley Ubl, but it wasn't an easy chase! High precipitation storms and challenging terrain made views of tornadoes difficult. We drove through Cooperton, OK twice before it got hit, but ducked south to avoid the core just before the tornado. Here's a brief tornado we squeaked out of the same storm after dark west of Apache, OK.

 

[Sean Ramsey]

Started out from work and headed to the first cell near Amber, decided I didn't want to chase into Norman and deal with traffic in the metro area so I dropped off it and went further south towards the second cell near Cement. Not 10 minutes after I dropped off the first cell it produced the tornado that hit Norman. The second cell wasn't near as organized so I moved southwest and met a large photogenic storm near Cooperton. Great chase!

 

[Marcus Diaz]

I'll keep my summary a text only until I can get home and process pics and vids.

Started a tad late today but that may have been my saving grace. I ducked south of Sayre and went after the supercell coming out of Blair (the first supercell). Saw some rotation, some nice structure, but nothing that wowed me. That is, until I got past Warren, OK and saw a suspicious lowering. The storm was well off into terrible road networks, so not sure if anyone else saw it. Anywho...I dove back and south of Blair for the next beast of a supercell. The inflow on the north side of the storm was crazy. I pulled over just south of Blair and watched the wall cloud spin like crazy to my southeast...but I was consumed by heavy rain. I decided to go north and back east on HWY 19. This put me in the core. And this core was probably the worst core I've ever driven into. The wind was screaming from the northwest at a good 70-90 mph. Debris was litering the road. Pieces of roofs were hitting my car, aluminium and tin sheds were flying through town, large matured trees were being snapped. Not to mention the absolute blinding rain. If there was a tornado over Blair, its safe to say I was driving in it.

I drove east out of the nasty core and west of Warren I caught sight of a small stovepipe tornado to my south, less than a mile off the highway. It was moving from east to west as if it was carosseling around, because it dove south back into the rain. I creeped back to the east and saw an area with very rapid rising motion. I couldn't tell if a tornado was sitting next to said area, but there very well could've been. The core had consumed me again so I made a break back east up HWY 19. I eventually just made my way back through Snyder to refuel and then break to the storm coming out of Hollis. I got to Duke and drove north into the bear's cage. I got sight of the wall cloud. By this time I was losing light, but kept on the storm. It didn't do much except for the wall cloud. I followed it east through Altus where it was losing its visual umph. I dabbled with storms all evening that looked impressive on radar, but not so much visually. I'm sitting in Weatherford right now getting ready for Saturday.

 

[Jeremy Jones]

Started the day off watching the Norman storm to my SE, decided to play the Cells in far SW Oklahoma. Had a fairly easy chase and documented a
suspected tornado near the Copperton/Roosevelt area. Here's an 11mm wide angle of it...

and here's a timelapse at the same position as the wide angle still...Watch video >

Definitely a chase I'll remember for a long time!

 

[Jeff Duda]

Definitely one of the scarier days of my life.

Left Norman in the early afternoon with the intent on getting on storms that would form later on near the TX-OK border. Drove under the storm that would go on to produce the Norman tornado as it was between Chickasha and Minco. The storm was clearly outflow dominant and had a ragged, shallow shelf cloud. I thought the chance of it becoming better organized was pretty low, so I let it go and waited in Apache for more storms coming in from the southwest. My wife left her phone at home but called me from a coworker's phone at about 3:30 saying she got let out of work early (she works in downtown OKC). I told her about the storm and that if she took an easterly route south into Norman and if she did it quickly and immediately that she could beat the storm on her way out of OKC, but otherwise to stay put. Of course, just after I hang up the damn thing pulls a serious right hand turn and spins up a tornado right into Norman. For about 30 minutes I had no idea on the whereabouts of my wife or my apartment on the north side of town. Finally heard back from her shortly after 4. Turns out she had stayed put near I-240 in SE OKC. Our apartment was also not damaged.

As for the rest of my chase...
Everything moving past Apache looked like crap and was outflow dominant. Thus decided to get on the new development to the west near Altus and Hobart. Watched the northernmost storm for awhile from a pavillion-like pull off just north of Babbs on US 183. What a wonderful sheltered viewing place! Not sure how many other chasers know about that, but it was pretty cool to be able to sit there and watch the storm come our way. THat storm also appeared outflow dominant, and after watching it for a solid 20 minutes, decided to bail on it in favor of the storm to its immediate southwest. That storm appeared to have a very meaty shelf cloud as we passed through Roosevelt and headed west on Hwy 19. Got as far southwest as the turn from south to west a few miles east of Blair before the very wet RFD cut us off. Observed a rapidly tightening circulation within the inflow notch, but had to bail back northeast to avoid the hail core before we could confirm anything happened. Storm appeared to become disorganized for awhile after that. Headed down to Snyder, then towards Lawton, taking the scenic route around the Wichita Mountains Wildlife Refuge. Eventually settled a few miles northwest of Meers on Hwy 115 and observed some suspicious features in the inflow notch, but could not confirm anything at all. Called it off due to darkness and desperation to get back to Norman as all four of us lived there and some were not yet sure of the fate of their homes.

 

[Hank Schyma]

I was there... The tornado made a U-turn then grew to that giant which headed SE making a complete circle... I almost died... twice!

 

[John Peters]

Photographed and filmed the large wedge/stovepipe tornado SW of Salina KS between 530 and 630 PM CDT. I will post videos/pics later tonight/tomorrow.

 

[Marcus Diaz]

Might catch some flak for this, but...here's video from Blair, OK. I was unaware of the situation unfolding behind me. Apperantly a tornado had formed just on the SE side of town. As I was driving north through town, the winds were very strong from the northwest. From what I'm gathering I was on the outer fringes of this tornado. Damage was observed all over town as I drove through. After punching the core going east I finally got visual on the tornado. You can see it in the video before I even acknowledge it vocally. It was pretty intense, definitely just a touch out of my comfort zone.

Watch video >

 

[Jenn Brindley]

Though we only ended up scoring the one brief night tornado (see Skip's post above,) - it was a very photogenic day for us otherwise. Chased with Skip Talbot and Brad Goddard.

~Jenn

Full blog post & all images here: http://www.thefaceofastorm.com/2012/04/april-13th-2012-kansas.html

 

[Dan Robinson]

Here is a video clip from the Cooperton, OK tornado encounter, from 3 camera angles:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E0UAoFnfSj8

 

[Doug Drace]

Absolutely the most intense insane chase I have personally ever been a part of in 17 years of chasing! Like many others that have posted, we do not ever INTENTIONALLY get this close to Big Tornadoes, it was more just a situation of dealing with a monster HP Beast! The pics and video speak for themselves about the massive Tornado. The only thing I would like to add is, I have no idea, when dealing with an HP Tornadic Supercell....why does anyone want to drive onto a mud filled road just to get close???? I say this, cause someone...dont know who it was (had California Tags), felt the need to do so, only to appearantly realized they had made a huge mistake, which lead them to back up in a panic and block us (we were stopped on the end of the paved drive before it turned to a mushy mud slopped pit just on the south end of the S curve on HWY 54), almost hitting us a few times! Each time we tried to turn around to get the hell out of there, they would back into our front end a little more, wedging us further into a bottleneck, which forced another chaser off into a ditch trying to get out of there...and almost got some people killed! Dont really care at this point who it was, but chasers need to start using their heads more...not just for themselves...but for everyone else out there on the roads before someone ends up getting killed because of wreckless driving!!!

Chase Partners were Jeremy Milligan, who did a bang up job of standing on the gas pedal to get south of the tornado before it ran us over and Jason Girard...great job guys!!!

First Wallcloud of the Day on HWY 54, 10 mi S of Cooperton, OK

Wedge Tornado at the intersection of HWY 54/19 S of Cooperton, OK

Video Link: http://www.youtube.com/user/FirstIntercept1972?feature=mhum

 

[Ben Toms]

This was one of the more confusing , terrifying, and ultimately successful chase days of my young chasing career. I started the day out in Lawrence, Kansas so had to bolt down to southwest Oklahoma and unfortunately didn't make it in time for the early initiation. I ended up missing the Norman tornado, but was ultimately in a better position to intercept the redevelopment in far SW Oklahoma. The scariest moment of my life happened when I pulled off the road to take pictures and proceeded to slide all the way into the ditch. With reports of a large wedge tornado coming in and the storm about 20 minutes away, I was honestly terrified for my life, but fortunately a farmer who was running from the tornado himself stopped by and pulled me out. About 15 minutes after this, the large Cooperton wedge planted nearly right on top of where my car was ditched.

I followed the storm through the Wichita Mountains to get some photo ops on structure since I knew catching any tornadoes was nil since the storm was so wrapped up, so here is my favorite shot from this day:

 

[Ben Holcomb]

Had a great chase in Oklahoma, seeing tornadoes near Saddle Mountain and Carnegie and narrowly escaping danger and losing an apartment in the Norman, OK Tornado.

Here is my video of the Saddle Mountain, OK Tornado

Watch video >

I've written my full chase account at http://www.benholcomb.com/Chase-Accounts/20120413

 

[Seth Edge]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qd8v...DvjVQa1PpcFMguRMNUVvTaa1kOfF0K83ncJSoaZ78VX8= rope tornado SW OK

 

[bvassmer]

I was at the NWC in Norman when the storm started to look interesting. I headed up to the observation deck to check it out. Here is a wide view of the storm. Overall, it looked very outflow dominant to me, but was kicking out some nice lightning.



As the storm approached Norman, the NWS issued the Tornado Warning, and when the sirens sounded and they made us go to shelter in the basement. Here is last photo I took was at 3:56pm (my EXIF shows 4:06PM, but I found my time on my camera to be 10 minutes fast when I got home and started comparing photos with my wife). This photo is looking WNW from the obs deck at the National Weather Center. I just missed the beginning of the tornado.



My wife was at Sarkeys Tower on the 7th floor at this time, and stayed in her office a little longer. She took this pic at 4:03PM looking WSW from the west side of the building. You can see the Physical Science Center on the left side of this photo. At this time, the tornado was about halfway between Lindsey/36th and Lindsey and I35. Sorry for the poor quality of this photo, the flash fired and reflected in the window and she had to go to the tornado shelter before she could take another photo. I heavily contrast enhanced the photo. Her camera's time was also off, I found when we got home, by about 20 minutes.



Overall an easy chase, as we traveled 0 miles. Wish I could have seen it from the obs deck (dont know if it was obscured by rain from the NWC).

 

[Dan Robinson]

I finished my chase account/imagery for the 13th:

http://stormhighway.com/april132012.shtml

 

[Joe Pudlik]

Ended up with a nice chase this day. We were on the Norman cell, but dropped off of it just before it produced. Eventually we ended up with the great looking supercell in the Wichita Mountains, and observed a brief tornado just south of Carnegie, OK.

Full chase log here: http://www.turbulentstorm.com/1/post/2012/04/april-13th-2012-cs-oklahoma.html

 

[Hank Schyma]

I Got Hit :/
Bagged the Cooperton tornadoes... one bagged me. The First a small rain-wrapped briefy near the Tom Steed Reservoir. The second tornado (my 40th) ran my arse over... and the third, the giant wedge, almost wrote my obituary. Ive been chasing supercells since 2000... This was the stupidest thing I've ever done. Normally i'm cool in close proximity to tornadoes, however... i lost it... Big time! What went wrong was this: The roads ended in the Wichita Mountains just as the storm got interesting. None of the chasers wanted to leave just yet as it would take 30-45 minutes to intercept it on the other side... we stayed, we gambled, and our co-pilot Murphy put his laws in full effect. The tornadoes made a complete circle a mile or so in diameter crossing highway 54 three times. hence the mayhem. I'm not terribly proud of this video... especially the language, however feel obligated to post it. In the last 12 years I've watched more and more chasers get more and more brave... and sad to say the trend is influencing me. Just prior to the tornado striking my vehicle it leveled a silo. Had it strengthened instead of weakening, I'd probably be the first chaser to die chasing. After it intercepted me the circulation materialized into a giant wedge... Had it formed 1/4 mile West, I'd be dead. Here's the video... call me an asshole... i deserve it.
I'm also attaching a map of the tornadoes path created by my friend Evan Hatch who also almost got waxed.

Watch video >

 

[Skip Talbot]

I was finally able to salvage my video from this chase and render it out as a timelapse. Video starts up by Quartz Mountain State Park and ends in the Wichita Mountains (lots of mountains in Oklahoma), with a peak at the HP structure and RFD core that produced the Cooperton, OK tornado from just south of town.

Watch video >

 

[Joshua Nall]

Well, I’m glad the tornado doing circles!? on the seek and destroy mission missed me
Never got inside on anything when it was wrapping up. First time seeing storms over a “mountain” range though.