4/26/08 REPORTS: TX

[Jason Boggs]

I almost didn't chase today. As it turned out, it was the best of the year so far. I was really hesitant to go out with the meager moisture return, but I said the heck with it...what do I have to lose. I left Amarillo around noon or so. I wanted to at least get to Lubbock and go from there. I looked at surface obs and noticed the best moisture was to the SE around the Snyder area. The Td was only 50 in Snyder which was actually some of the best moisture around. I went south to Tahoka and decided to fiddle around in Post. I noticed the cells forming to the north around Ralls and Crosbyton. They didn't look very good on radar, at least at that time. I fiddled around for another hour or so and noticed the cells were really getting their act together and strengthening fast. Actually the cells to the north now had T-storm warnings on them. I went north and noticed the anvil really getting crisp and well defined. I also noticed a nice cell near Wilson at the time the cell to the north got it's act together. This cell near Wilson had some pretty nice structure. After I took a few photos of this cell, attention went back to the north cell. I went through the core and got only nickel size hail at best. I made it to Spur and went south out of town to catch the cells to the west. I met up with David Drummond and Steve Miller (TX) south of Jayton. We got a few miles south of Jayton and noticed a nice high based meso forming SW of Clairemont. We pulled over and took a few photos and got south. At dark, David and Steve took lightning photos and we parted ways near Roby. Here are a few photos of today's chase:

Storm with crisp anvil near Ralls

Nice storm structure near Wilson

David Drummond and Steve Miller (TX) enjoying the show ( storm located SW of Clairemont)

 

[Mike Umscheid]

San Angelo, TX high-based supercell & lightning

I intercepted and photographed the San Angelo high-based supercell. As I was en route to the San Angelo area from Big Springs, I ran into Bill Reid as the storm was in its incipient stage. The storm underwent a classic split after initiation to the south of Sterling City. Eventually, the right split finally took over, and I followed the storm southeast on approach to San Angelo. I decided to take Ranch 2288 south, to bypass the city. This was a good choice as it offered me a wonderful view of the storm without the nuisance of dealing with the city. I connected the Lightning Trigger to my Nikon D200 after it became apparent that photogenic CG lightning was occurring at a reasonable interval around the updraft. It worked like a champ. The success rate with the Lightning Trigger is about 20-40% or so, I am finding, when shooting at a 1/10 to 1/30 shutter speed, depending on the on the return strokes after initial flash that triggers the device. There was so much lightning with this storm -- high-quality, brilliant lightning. I cannot recall a storm of recent memory that I had so much fun photographing with respect to lightning. The supercell really became outflow dominant as it came into San Angelo. Overall supercell structure was pretty good, but the CG lightning was what made this storm a real treat to the photographer. East of San Angelo, I was leap-frogging Bill Reid and Paul Sirvatka's COD team, staying ahead of the storm on Hwy 87 to Eden. I was able to capture a fantastic image looking west down Hwy 87 of a spectacular CG with COD's chase vans in the distance on a hill.

I went south on Hwy 83 about 10 or 12 miles to photograph a little more...which was when I lost internet connection. There's a data hole in this area. The SCIT track had the storm crossing Hwy 83 about 7 miles south of Eden, so I waited patiently until the core of the storm crossed in front of me to the north. I went back north to Eden after about 20 minutes to find a wintry scene of hail covering Hwy 83 several inches deep over a couple mile stretch. From the last radar image I saw before data loss, there was another small supercell taking bead on the Ballinger area in time. I was planning to head to Abilene anyway, so I was hoping for a little more lightning. I was pretty greedy at this point -- having an awesome good time! I stopped a couple times around the Paint Rock area for more incredible lightning. It was a staccato-fest! Bill Reid said it best after I saw him the final time when we were west of Eden: "It was like taking candy from a baby". What an incredibly fun chase. Below are a few crudely processed images that I did on my laptop. I have a couple more on my blog:

High-based supercell updraft & CG lightning northwest of San Angelo:

Spectacular CG just north of my location, between Wall and Vancourt on Hwy 87 (1/2s exposure, LightningTrigger used):

CG lightning north of Paint Rock along Hwy 83:

Mike U

 

[Bill Tabor]

Not a lot to report yesterday, but pseudo chased so here are the details.

I was too late yesterday for my target area, and I actually had nailed it completely apparently. I had picked SJT/BWD/ABI 2 to 3 days before and yesterday morn had refined it to SJT/BBD. The primary tornadic storm yesterday moved from SJT/BBD to Mason. I see that there are no reports of torns on it in the SPC storm log, but it was over a lot of open very rural country (somewhat difficult terrain) at night. Anyway, I wasn't real confident in the area and couldn't decide if I wanted to just go out to my area, or back to Austin, or hunt turkeys again with my Dad, so I ended up hanging around a bit too long north of Abilene chatting with my Mom. That was ok...no big deal really, but it would have been nice to see more of it during the day. I did get some rainbow and sun dog looking pictures from the storm.

Actually I could have probably punched the core south of ABI and taken my chances but I had done that some lately and decided against it. I wanted some breathing room for a change. It was just too late to make a direct approach. Plus the road network sucked. The storm motion and roads where not in alignment for a good intercept. Later once dark and near Doole on Ranch 765 I was going to head straight toward the area of rotation on the frontside and see what I could see. I got about 6 miles west on the road, and had zero cell signal on my phone or aircard. I couldn't call out. It was so dark my dashcam would no longer pick up images except maybe for lightning flashes. I had no connectivity to stream video - which I had wanted to do that day. No Spotternetwork. Also the cell to the southeast was merging with the one near SJT and I was in between the two. I've been there before and with it merging over me I figured there was a chance of it dropping torns nearby in the dark, plus I would have likely been in the heavier rain / hail core with the area of rotation still to my sw. I also thought about the possibility of a car breakdown or similar and chasing alone with this happening nearby and figured it probably wasn't a smart move and turned around. I believe it was after that it began getting tornado warnings for much of the night as it continued in it's hard right turn. I never did see a lot of the structure of the storm, but it did have some good lightning. I still would have gone to the inflow area if I could have gotten south of it with a road going up to it, but there never was one.

Never did shoot any pics or video, but in hindsight perhaps I should have set up somewhere with the tripod for some lightning photography. I'll keep that in mind for next time.

 

[Steve Miller TX]

Fun chase yesterday around Post and Jayton with David Drummond and Jason Boggs. Sorry I messed up your photo above Jason! ;-) I also got to enjoy some really cool dust devils too earlier...including some multi-vortex ones. Not a bad round of storms for upper 40Td.

 

[Andrew Ryan]

Scott Peake, Greg Blumberg, Evan, and I headed down from Norman to Aspermont where we waited for the cells to initiate. We first got on a cell west of Hamlin. At first it looked good but quickly fell apart. We opted to go north to a supercell heading southeast towards Jayton. As we approached the storm, it developed very nice striations on its base. That was the highlight of the chase. After that we took some lightning pics and headed back to Norman.

Full chase log available at Here.

 

[Laura Hedien]

We were out on this also. Any thoughts? We've been going round and round about this being a landspout or not. It seemed to be on the boundary with a rain shaft/precip core to the rear of the ?? spout ??
I didn't grab a radar image at this exact time but we think it was one of the left spliters it had been throwing off. This was the second left split.
Time was ~0012Z. Precip core is leaning NW.
Thanks,
L