4/24/07 REPORTS: TX / OK / KS / CO

[Jason A.C. Brock]

I chased from the Wichita Falls area to Bowie Texas area. There was some great motion alog the gustfronts of these storms and they were actually very photogenic but as far as photogenic tornado potential it jsut wasnt happening. Too many storms. I headed back to Wichita Falls hoping something would pop along the dryline but I wasnt holding out much hope with all the storms to the SE eating up the good moisture and instability. I hate high risk days and even high end moderate days. Ill take a low end moderate or a high end slight risk anyday with nice isolated cells and easier targets to narrow down. I did see tons of hail along the Red River that actually made the river bed look white with some rather dense hail fog. Unfortunetely this severly damaged what was to be a bumper wheat crap with this area actually having above normal rain in spring for the first time in years. I wish now I had taken some video but doing so I would have had to pull over on the bridge and didnt think that would be too safe. I still am not sure why some people get so close to these things. They usually get so close you cant even make out any structure in the photos and video. Then again some chase more for experiencing the storm up close. I chase to get good photos of structure and just something nice to look at.
Jeremy Wilson and his chase partner roughed it out and did catch the Tarrant County Tornado warned storm near dark. They think they may have witnessed a brief touchdown but again it was one of those DFW Metro brief spinups type deals or so it sounds.
I will post pics and video later this week. We actually may ned a couple days off after this weekends marathons.


Im done folks.

OFF-TOPIC RANT REMOVED BY ADMINISTRATOR.

 

[Mikey Gribble]

I can't upload video and grab stills off of my video camera until tomorrow when I get home. I am at my girlfriend's house right now. Lindsey has pictures of some of the tornadoes (with times off her camera) so I will post the pics of the ones she has and show the other one with a video tomorrow.

#1
I have this one on video. It took place 5-10 minutes before 7PM.

#2 - touched down at 7:08


#3 - touched down at 7:13


#4 - touched down at 7:17

It went on to be this rope after touching down several times (all counted as one Pritchard)


#5 - touched down at 7:32


I have video of one more that took place somewhere between 7 and 7:10. I will post video of that one too tomorrow when I get home.
Now, if you ask me that is 6 tornadoes, but if you ask Pritchard it is one tornado that went up and down for 45 minutes. That or Pritchard was just too far away to know what was going on.

EDITED BY ADMINISTRATOR TO REMOVE DERAIL

 

[Ray Walker]

I chased around the Chickasha area in Oklahoma today for KSBI tv out of Oklahoma city. A nice high based supercell formed inbetween Altus and Lawton around 11am and I thought ok ITS GO TIME!!!!!!!!! and then wouldnt ya know it a squal line formed. Thats it lol.

And by the way Skip your argument as to wether there were multiple tornadoes or just one is well warented. I have seen many times a small funnel has a dust wirl under it and then it hits trees, a wheat feild or some object and then it hits the dust again, Meaning one tornado was on the ground the whole time.

 

[Tim Vasquez]

TARGET AREA RULES

(3) Prohibited content. Users may NOT post the following:

* Non-weather content, including complaints about others posts. Use the "Report this post" feature at the top of a post to complain about improper content.


This is for CHASE REPORTS. If there are any further discussions in this thread about non-weather issues, infractions will be issued. This may result in an automatic 48-hour suspension. The moderators have also been instructed to take a zero-tolerance policy on any flames or flamebaiting in the Target Area forums. If you attack the person rather than the point, there will be consequences.

 

[Doug Mitchell]

Started the day in El Reno, OK and drifted north on US81 along the backside of the midday squall line. Made the decision in Wellington, KS to go north to McPherson and hope for the best along the dryline. Sat in McPherson as the dryline bubbled and flew west as the first warning went up along the line. Made the mistake of chatting up some other locals/chasers for too long as the storm turned to linear garbage while the southern storm intensified. We dropped back south and 5 minutes later the tornado warning was issued. During this, we encountered *awful* drivers including one pickup truck going 5-10mph down the road and another COMPLETELY stopped in the middle of the lane (on a paved highway!!). Eventually stopped about 3 miles NE of the updraft where we witnessed 2 "tornadoes" apparently although they looked more like gustnadoes than anything. Both lasted maybe 15 seconds at best. We dropped further south to 2.5 miles NNE of Nickerson and let the rotation pass about 1/2 mile to our west, and got some awesome footage looking up at a giant "cinnamon roll" in the sky. The RFD started to kick in and I thought for a while we could have a decent sized tube drop but as a massive armada of chasers (must have been about 100 cars that passed us in about 7-8 minutes going north), the storm gusted and died. During this time, I encountered more horrific driving seeing many roads blocked and sudden stops and turns and other erratic driving. All in all, a pretty good day albeit nail-biting at the onset.

Someone will have to explain to me how a storm in 60-80knt 500 flow manages to only drift NE at 10mph, was it really that low topped?

 

[Dan Robinson]

Started the day in Pratt, moved north to Russell and waited. Storms finally fired in the cumulus field along the dryline, and we hopped down the line all the way to 20 miles N of Sterling to keep up with each tail end storm. Southwest of Ellsworth, everything looked terrible on radar and in person. A loose USB cable stopped my WxWorx data stream, which would require a reboot. I didn't bother. After a chat with Jeff and Kathryn Piotrowski, Dave Hoadley, and Craig Maire at a small chaser convergence, I gave up on the day and decided to start heading east for Wednesday. A vivid rainbow and spectacularly cavernous and contrasty whale's mouth got our attention for the next 20 minutes. Basically the mental exhaustion of a long and unproductive day influenced our decision making, and cost us the tornado(es).

When we finally came to our senses and made it to the Sterling storm, it was long since done. Got some great shots today, but not of tornadoes. Congrats to those who scored in Sterling.

A nice item of note was crossing the boundary north of I-70 with arms out the window, and feeling the air go from ~79F to ~55F instantly. Comfortable T-shirt air to chilly jacket air in less than an inch. We crossed this several times in the car, and then stopped, got outside, and let it pass by us. Just like May 11, 2004 in Aberdeen, SD, but not quite as much of a temp difference. Still very cool.

Ended the day at Montana Mike's in McPherson for a steak dinner with the StormNet crew (Steve Marshall, Craig Maire, Jack Kertzie). We didn't get our celebratory steaks yesterday, so we made up for it today. It was also nice to meet/chase on and off with Jeff and Kathryn Piotrowski, Brian Stertz and Rich and Ryan Thies yesterday and today.

We're heading back tomorrow, possibly paying a little attention to the SE KS area setup on the way. All in all a very successful and enjoyable 'mini' chase expedition from the eastern USA!

 

[Mike Mezeul II]

Chased in North Central Texas today. Not much really going on here, checked out the tornado warned storm in stephens county but was honestly not impressed. Returned back home to severe flooding going on in the area. Multiple cars, including a UNT Bus and a Fox 4 News Van stuck in the high waters. Video can be found here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=srASiepi-00

 

[Michael O'Keeffe]

Here are some pictures my dad, John O'Keeffe, took of the tornadoes from yesterday. Still unsure with the number of tornadoes we saw but quite a few.

The first tornado of the day looking WSW.

Two circculations at once!!

The best tornado of the day to our NW!

A VERY strong wall cloud to our north that produced multiple spin ups and a few tornadoes as well.

 

[Kiel Ortega]

Darren Clabo, Mike Imgarten, Tiffany Meyer and I headed down to Marlow, OK to try and hail sample The storm had a light green tint but I think all the nice hail (i.e., bigger than what we got!) fell to the west of town We did however get several (whatever the hell that emphasis is for...keeping with the theme of some of the earlier posts ) hail stones up to nickle-size probably as we drove along. We did get a lot of rain which nearly blinded us at around 30 mph. Storm was outflow dominant as we approached from the north which made for some cool scenes in and just north of Marlow.

 

[Jim Bishop]

Chased the same storm in Kansas as most others. The best part was when the tornadic circulation touched down right in front of us next to the road. The tornado would only be considered an F0 i'm sure, but I have video of cars driving through it. The look on the guys' face in the sedan was priceless. I guess I saw three seperate tornadoes from this storm, but multiple touch downs and funnels. Amazing structure. Spent the night in Wichita. Headed back to Houston today.

I was passed quite rudely and dangerously by a few chasers, one of them was a chasing tour van. They simply had no consideration for their own safety or others on the road. I was pretty upset by that.

 

[Jordan Hartley]

My wife and I went out with Mike Gribble, Ryan Shirk and Lindsey Butor. By far one of the most exciting times ive had. Mike did a great job of putting us in position for each tornado. Intercepted 6-7 very weak tornadoes but they were fun none the less. I got some great video of the tornado intercept crew as they punched through the debris cloud of one of the tornadoes about 300 yrds away as we passed just to the south of the debris cloud under the MOTHERSHIP I couldnt believe how many chasers converged on that storm. It was like being in Dallas during rush hour outside of Nickerson, Ks yesterday which would have been really bad had the thing been a little stronger as it crossed the road that led into Nickerson where everyone was lined up. Jim Bishop's picture above is what im talking about. Hope everyone had fun!

 

[Mike Hollingshead]

Well now I don't feel so bad about busting too far east yesterday...it makes counting easier! No controversies in what I saw. It's a good thing I waited as long as I could out west near Hays, then broke the law going east to make sure I was ahead of whatever could form east of Salina/ICT(I waited out west long enough I just about did not get ahead of the crap around Salina..."phew"). I thought I was making all the right decisions at the right times. I just never thought there'd be enough of a window behind that first line, obviously there was. By the time that stuff went, I was north of Topeka. Even at that, I wasn't that enticed to make the drive all the way back sw. I would have arrived just in time to see it die. Glad that didn't happen. I'm now officially overly good at screwing the hell up. It doesn't even sting anymore, it really doesn't. Even the tornado I got in March was after screwing up, imo. Much more of this and people will call busting, "you Hollingshead", sort of like "Munson" in the movie Kingpin.

Stick a fork in me, I'm done. I wish.

Congrats to all the smarter chasers out there. I used to just think I was stupid. Now it's official.

 

[Brian Stertz]

Bustola too

Busted bigtime yesterday in C.Kansas...but after that wild night Monday...the sting of the bust was not as severe as it would have been otherwise. Ate dinner in Salina while all the TOR action went on an hour south of us. Steak dinner was nice though and very needed. Enjoyed meeting up on the chase with Dan and Matt Robinson...and of course my chase buddies Jeff & Kathryn Piotrowski and Terry Schenk. Now it's back to normal life...chase mode is over for me for a week or so...unless something shows up that I cannot resist !!

 

[afischer]

Got off work at 7am and left KC at 8am, targeting Hutchinson. The 12Z data showed the dryline play looked rather crappy, as the 1km flow was forecast to wane significantly through the day. I really didn't want to chase the warm front, but if everything could come together it would be a better play so risked it. Elevated convection kept firing just north of the front at the nose of the dry slot, reinforcing the boundary and making it "not nice" for tornado prospects via north winds and cold temps. (Also of note, Like Dan R, we wandered up to find the front near Waldo KS and in an eyeblink winds went from SE to N and the temp dropped 20 degrees while we stood outside.) Chased early storm cells near Sylvan Grove, but they were struggling and quickly crossed the front. Initiation occurred on the dryline as forecast, and we quickly followed the string of pearls south to tail-end charlie near, where else, Hutchinson... as we expected that this sucker could probably pull off some magic despite the marginal low-level shear. Observed the same gorgeous storm as everyone else, along with four tornadoes. The third was gorgeous and passed immediately to our south, persisting for several minutes. It began as a tall cylinder extending aloft... though it never fully condensed to the ground, like the others. We were in the RFD area, and it was not particulalrly warm. Pics and an account to come!

 

[Verne Carlson]

Also got on the Rice County storm along with everyone else. Got in nice and close, at one point the circulation passed right behind us. Here are some pics.

Tornado passes overhead.

Tornado moves to our east with weak circulation on the ground.

Strong RFD winds blast a farmhouse.