2014-06-30 REPORTS: IA IL MO WI MI

[chrisbray]

What a disappointing day (again). My friend and I drove all the way to near Sigourney, IA, arriving as the line was about to move through, about 2:30 pm. I was hoping for something discrete ahead of the line, or maybe for tail end Charlie to produce. Not once through the whole day did we see anything other than outflow, outflow, outflow. We followed the line all the way back to Bourbonnais, ILL and called it a chase before dark. I did attempt to intercept the second sever line at 10pm but did not really have time to setup before it hit, and the winds were super intense in the section of the line that hit Kankakee county, so I scrambled home, exhausted at that point.

Curious what others think about this day. Based on the forecast models leading up to it, and I guess the SPC agreed with me, I thought there would be real tornado potential.

 

[Dan Robinson]

Target for this day was the outflow boundary baking in the sun in southeast Iowa. I arrived by mid-afternoon, but it was clear very early on that the tornado potential was hosed by the large MCS blasting supercell-decimating outflow south and east. I bailed on the tornado play and headed east to Chicago for yet another attempt in an 8-year-long goal of mine to capture upward lightning in the city. I ended up fulfilling that goal with a lightning bonanza over downtown, with numerous strikes to the three tallest buildings, twice with all three at once. Video and a couple of images are at the blog post below:

 

[Austin Jones]

My second Day in a Row chasing the St. Joe Mo area, A line of rotating storms formed on the cold front and approached us from the NW we chased tail end Charlie , , none of the rotations really became dominant , with new rotations consistently forming to the SW west of the previous rotation, we hopped from rotation to rotation , seeing some really good motion and a bulb funnel near Plattsburgh Mo. But the tornado waited until after dark. Here are some Pictures:

 

[Jeff Hawkins]

Target for this day was the outflow boundary baking in the sun in southeast Iowa. I arrived by mid-afternoon, but it was clear very early on that the tornado potential was hosed by the large MCS blasting supercell-decimating outflow south and east. I bailed on the tornado play and headed east to Chicago for yet another attempt in an 8-year-long goal of mine to capture upward lightning in the city. I ended up fulfilling that goal with a lightning bonanza over downtown, with numerous strikes to the three tallest buildings, twice with all three at once. Video and a couple of images are at the blog post below:

I chased the tail-end Charlie storm which had a menacing inflow south of Indianola IA around 1:30pm that didn't produce, and it was bolting east so I chased it a bit but dropped it when I realized I wouldn't be able to catch up. So instead I had the fun of following the line from behind from Des Moines all the way back to Chicago and watching the lightning-fest ahead of me the whole way. Lots of 'crawlers' and CG strikes. Then with the 2nd line that came through around 10pm and I'm at home and have my GR2 running, and hear the tornado sirens go off. I look at the screen and say "what the???" because where I'm at there's zero rotation on radar anywhere, but a radar-indicated tor-warning about 5 miles south. So just to be safe safe I go in the bathroom a few minutes and let the storm pass. All is well. Then today at work a co-worker who lives north of the Willis (Sears) tower shows me the shots she took from her condo of the lightning striking it. She was thrilled to get them (just using a smartphone)! I told her to send them to me and I'd post them here for her but then I saw your pic...which trumps all of them. A very nice grab to be sure!

 

[Todd Rector]

I live in Altoona, 10 miles NE of Des Moines. Home with a sick daughter, I was heartbroken I couldn't chase on Monday until I saw what a huge MCS mess the system became. I set up for some daytime lightning shots when the squall went through, but there was so much rain leading leading the way there was nothing to shoot except my deck furniture blowing around.

Your lightning shots are impressive - Good for you!

 

[James Simonds]

I watched the first line on radar cross Lake Michigan and lift northward/dissipate over central Michigan. I decided to stay up for the second line, which rolled through shortly after 2:30 am local time. Though it had weakened slightly by the time it reached me, there was ceaseless CG and torrential rainfall. About 5 miles north of my location a couple power lines came down.

I recorded a good 18 minutes of footage when the worst of it came through. At three different occasions there was a bright, blue flash in the distance; what I would guess was a transformer. Boy, what a light show!

 

[TJKLECKNER]

I ran from Ames IA to Knoxville, IA to catch anything on the southern most end of the huge MCS. I think it was a waste of time because I spent most of the time trying to outrun what felt like a hurricane moving at 60 Mph. By the time the storm hit Indianola IA, the worst of the wind and hail was gone just before hitting Knoxville. We checked out the Indy track and drove over to Lake Red Rock. I took some dam pictures and one ok looking roll cloud. Not bad for $10 in gas.