2014-04-02 REPORTS: KS

[Jeff Duda]

Pretty much with the crowd on this chase. Was glad to see the quasi-stationary/warm front continue to drift north through the late afternoon because I figured that would place the forcing under continually less capping. Unfortunately the warm sector remained capped, and the only storms that could go up immediately drifted into the cold sector. Nevertheless there was sufficient MUCAPE and excellent shear to get several high-based/elevated supercells across KS.

Initially drove towards Enid, but continued north to the KS-OK border on 81 by about 6:15. After nothing but turkey towers and orphan anvils littered the sky, I figured it was going to be a flat out cap bust. Then the radar updates and there's a growing storm 35 miles to our west. Drove west on KS-44, with the storm coming into focus by the time we reached Anthony. Pretty cool supercell structure for about 15 minutes there before it barfed its guts out, sending tons of dry outflow air and raising dust plumes all around us. A particularly big one passed by us a few miles to the south. A gustnado developed in the field across the road, then the tumbleweeds attacked us. Followed it up to Harper and then east, giving up on the way to Wellington as darkness set in.

image 1

After dropping the storm to the south for several miles, we looked back and caught the last glimpses of twilight lighting up the back/top of the storm. Unfortunately there wasn't enough lightning for my camera to pick up the storm without an exposure time that was too long.
image 2

 

[Sean Ramsey]

I debated for a bit in the beginning of the day because I really thought there might be something to the SW of OKC pop but ultimately decided to play northern OK and started out on the first messy cell and quickly went west of Anthony, KS to catch the second, more robust cell that developed to the southwest. I waited west of town about 15 miles or so for the storm to move up to me and got some nice shots, and ultimately moved east to stay ahead of the dirt that was being kicked up by the outflow, including this kind of humorous video when I was taking photos and the black dirt came upon me.

Watch video >

 

[Joshua Nall]

Since I was already in TX from the day before (spent the night in Wichita Falls).... I really considered just staying in TX. I figured I had a greater than 50% chance of storms in the same general area this day and then a good chance of storms again on the 3rd. And looking back that is what I should have done. Instead I kept watching mainly the HRRR and noticed it showed less and less activity along the dryline and finally around 3pm I decided to go for the storms that would form along the KS/OK border. Got up there in time to see the cell South of Wichita really take off right at dark. It was a wee little storm and I was sure it was about to die, but as I was coming up 35 I saw a massive plume go up that backsheared and just a bit later I noticed several inflow bands had developed as the warm sector air started flowing in. Anyway it started cranking there for a while and I stayed with it for a little over an hour. I wish now I had stopped on 35 and shot the spidery feeder bands and the backsheared anvil with lightning. It was something to see but I was in such a mad dash to beat it and go East on a certian highway, I never let up, so no pics. But that is always the way it is, looking back you almost always wish you had done somethng a little differently. What I really wish I had done is stayed in TX and busted and then i would have been ready for the parade of storms North of Dallas the following day and I could have stuck with that wacky looking supercell across NE TX on the way home.

 

[Joe Pudlik]

Ended up on the photogentic elevated supercell that moved from near Sand Creek, OK to Harper, KS...and eventually south of ICT. Picked up some hail to nickel size as well.

http://www.turbulentstorm.com/1/post/2014/04/april-2nd-2014-n-c-oklahomas-c-kansas-chase.html

 

[Skip Talbot]

Brindley and I intercepted the striated supercell near Attica, KS, having been torn between targets in north central OK and southeast KS earlier in the day. Brindley got some amazing photographs of the supercell structure and I captured some low level rotation on video in the base as this cinnabon spiral moved directly overhead. The sunset convection and skies that followed were beautiful, including a twilight elevated supercell over Wellington, KS. The forecast busted for tornadoes, but this was by no means a chase bust. The storm structure made our day and the twisting spiral that went overhead was awe inspiring.

Full write-up, pictures, video, and annotated map: http://www.skip.cc/chase/140402/

Watch video >

 

[Dave C]

Sat at a park in Alva, OK waiting for initiation, fully expecting the cap was going to destroy severe potential. I had actually tried to cancel this trip two days prior after seeing models diverge and the forecast so unpredictable but my chase partner felt committed, so we persevered out from Colorado. It was actually useful to me to be under such a strong cap, to see it smash storm development, as generally I can only afford to chase better setups than this - so I don't make it to the field to see this kind of 'bust' scenario very often with my eyes. Good learning experience.

Even with the short chase and slim pickings, storm chasing is always worth it. Saw some beautiful structure on a cell near Caldwell, KS, and like many chases, saw about five different versions of the same sunset as we drove around the cell.

 

[Eric Edgar]

My initial target was the weak wave / triple point near Arkansas City. Visible satellite of this feature, with 3 lines of cumulus converging at a single point, was quite interesting. Wish I had screen capped it. I had been struggling all day with that vs. the dryline-quasistationary front triple point that was being forecasted west of Enid. Made my decision and left Tulsa around 2:30. As I got to Bartlesville I noticed visible satellite showing TCu around Enid and figured I had made the wrong decision, but stuck to my guns anyway. I suppose I'm glad I did, although I'm certainly jealous of all the great photogenic big sky pics I'm seeing from that area.

Anyway, I sat on a tall hill outside of Sedan for an hour or so. Saw the first cell go up W of Medford, OK but noted that it immediately crossed north of the front. At that point I figured the only chance of a warm sector cell would be something coming off of a N-S oriented boundary. My choices were the southern limb of the aforementioned mesoscale wave (Arkansas City to Blackwell) or a second, farther eastward wave that had developed from Yates Center to Sedan. Convergence looked to be stronger on this latter feature, and so I drifted toward Fredonia (although I was concerned about the usefulness of the warm sector in this area). A few cells fired and headed pretty quickly NE. I got on the southernmost cell, which eventually became dominant, developed radar/visual supercell characteristics, turned a bit to the right, and slowed down. This occurred around Buffalo.

The storm was never particularly visually impressive but did have a relatively persistent wall cloud, which briefly developed rotation as it was near Iola. I thought things were going to get interesting, but the rotation was fairly brief. Pic of this feature below. Broke off as darkness fell somewhere N of LaHarpe (RadarScope screen cap below). Saw a few guys out and about, but nothing like I was expecting. I guess most folks decided to play the synoptic triple point, and photogenicity certainly was higher for that play. But it sure was nice to be under a supercell for the first time since May 31, 2013.

 

[James Siler]

My initial target was Enid. So I left my house in OKC at about 1pm and made my way up highway 81. Getting to Enid I pulled over to watch some towers struggling to go up but then crap out a few minutes later. After playing with a new mount for a bit I decided to head on north till I ended up on highway 11 just out side the highway 11/11a intersection outside Wakita. I chatted with Marcus Diaz a bit through text and phone calls about what was going on. Marcus was also now casting for me which I appreciate very much. While waiting outside Wakita, I noticed the towers going up seem to look a bit harder and crisper than before but like a lot of chasers they would cross the warm front and go to crap. After about 45 minutes of standing around watching tumbleweeds I head west towards Ingersol. I went north on highway 58/11/8. As I crossed the bridge of the Medicine Lodge River, I crossed the warm front and noticed big drop in temps and in humidity. I stopped at some kind of pumping station and figured I was about to call it quits but then the warm front caught me. Temperature went back up and so did the humidity and south winds. I hung around the pumping station a bit longer, switching back and forth between Radarscope and my Geocaching app. I decided to call it a day and a bust to go after some geocache's north of me on county road E0050 RD at the tiny Riverside Cemetery. While walking towards the geocache something to my north caught my eye. I stood staring at this feature asking my self, is that a rain shaft or a landspout. I stood there for a bit watching and was thinking I was noticing some rotation with it but not sure if it was wishful thinking. It also appeared to be moving slight from left to right. I continued watching it when it finally clicked in my head that I need to take a pic of this. Having my cell in hand I launched the camera app and snapped a pic. I didn't think I would have time to run back to my truck and get my real camera which was a good call cause it fell apart shortly there after. I sent the pic to Marcus and he said it looked to be but figure only one way to be sure. I emailed the NWS in Norman.


They replied back advising me that to the two meteorologist who reviewed it believe it to be a landspout but just on the Kansas side of the state line. The following if from the email I received: "Hello,

As far as we (one other forecaster and I) can tell, the most likely description of the center feature of your photo is "landspout." After looking at UCAR's radar archive for that time, it appears to be in the right place for a landspout to form. The most probable location is far southeastern Barber County, Kansas. The rain area appears to be the right half of the photo, to the right of the apparent landspout.


Hope this helps. I have forwarded your message to the Dodge City NWS office since this storm was apparently in their forecast area.


Thanks for sharing the photo.


Cheryl Sharpe, meteorologist and assistant to the Webmaster"

The photo is not the greatest pic I am sorry to say but based on what they said this was an unexpected surprise that I am happy with. It was my first landspout. After leaving the cemetery I was heading back south and started observing a very persistent and violent dust devil. I haven't seen a dust devil rotate like this, which made me think, maybe another landspout was fixing to get going but I couldn't get this one captured cause by the time I pulled over and found where it had went it was out of range to get it. All in all this was nice day to just get out of my house.



I forgot how to properly add photo's to a post. I am sorry I will try to correct this later when I have more time.