2021-03-23 REPORTS: IL

[Skip Talbot]

Early season cold core setup in eastern MO/western IL. Targeted Macon, MO for midafternoon low topped cells in hopes of documenting photogenic convection and maybe a funnel cloud. Chased lackluster cells east toward Mississippi before retargeting warned cell tracking through Louisiana, MO into Illinois. Observed brief weak tornado west of Rockport, IL at close range before storm fell apart at dusk.

Tornado warned storm sw of Rockport, IL/north of Louisiana, MO at 7:15 pm:



Developing tornado sw of Rockport, IL at 7:19 pm:


Faint dusty debris cloud visible beneath cone funnel at 7:19 pm:


Photogenic funnel and parent cyclone structure with debris cloud at 7:20 pm sw of Rockport, IL:


Faint dust tube is visible beneath funnel along with misty white ground circulation in nearby field at 7:21 pm:


Snaky rope-out of half condensed funnel cloud at 7:22 pm w of Rockport, IL:


Video:

 

[Ethan Schisler]

This was more of a spotting experience for me versus an actual chase. Although I did document what I believe to be a QLCS spin-up tornado NW of the town of Blandinsville, IL around 7:47-7:50 in the evening. Clear RFD cut in the notch of the line and dust being lofted before it disappeared back into the precip heading NNW (like most all the circulations were this day), note just to the left center of the image as it progresses from left to right. I forwarded the images along to NWS DVN and they are looking into it. It's a fairly rural area, so I'm told will likely get an EF-U rating in the final Storm Data publication. There had been another tornado just to my NW near Fort Madison about 20 minutes earlier which got an EF-0 rating as well as another to my southeast later that night in Mason County. Circulations on these high shear/low CAPE setups can spin up just like that and then they are done, very hard to warn on! I hadn't noticed this in real time as there was little to no lightning activity with this storm, but there was some decent rotation on KDVN radar at the time and when I pulled up the shadows in photoshop, I noticed the dust plume and structure better the next day.

I had initially planned on heading south toward the area Skip was in, but I opted to stay home as I was pessimistic due to the persistent cloud cover all day and weak instability (even 0-3km CAPE was borderline for what I'd consider decent up until around 00z when things markedly improved). I also noticed a dew point/temperature increase in the hour prior to these storms arriving, leading me to believe I was close to or right along the warm frontal boundary in West Central IL. Interesting little jaunt 15 minutes from my apartment.

Here are my series of images I shot which were grainy at ISO 12,800 due to lack of lightning and no tripod.