Mike Hollingshead
Wasted 500 miles in Iowa after about 400 in and around Missouri the day before. That and a quarter billion hours watching models update for the two days ahead of time. Wow am I a freaking slow learner. The only thing that got me chasing on the 6th was, "What else is there to do today." I really wanted to sit out a few "decent" days so I could at least know I could, when I didn't expect them to pay off(read fast motions...grunge....which were both certainties). Aaarrgghh.
Never seems like a big deal to just go chase, until the chase is over and your 3 hours from home...on the days you knew better. Then it is like, damn it, I should have came up with anything else to do this day. The day itself isn't even that annoying, it's what these do to later days for me. I end up wanting to hedge my bets harder later on, after tossing away money and miles early on. Anymore I seriously just want to blow off a day I think looks great, just so I know that I can do it.
Anyway, couldn't have done the day much better(great at that on the days that don't matter). Waited on I80 near Malcom but didn't go north of the front, since that cold air was so damn close and things were heading for it so soon. Dropped south at first signs of stuff trying to go on Missouri border south of Des Moines. I then just made sure to stay ahead of things till they got better. This was a race now zig zagging back northeast. I shot north of Brooklyn just as that storm got organized(crossing the front), got a big hook and then tornado warning. Looked like a decent supecell to the west. Some mesonet and a few other chasers parked on a muddy road there and watched and it seemed this was all that was around then. Rather than stopping on that road I went a bit more north till I was just about in the path(my car fears anything wet that isn't paved is why I did not stop there). Lost sight for a second in core, so stopped and the view came back. I was like, hell yeah, timed this all perfect on this fast moving day. But no, it wasn't to be. Portion to the northeast bows out and the thing just turns to a pile of goo. Then it was like, well that was fun. I tried to stay with it for a while but it looked like a lost cause, speed-wise as well as just the storm was toast looking.
Lovely looking flooding all around there near Chelsea I think it was. Thought, yeah, lets get back to a more major highway soon, as the fields looked so damn full.
I wanted to get cored by big hail and couldn't even get that out of the storm up in there. The line was pathetic after that on I80, hardly any lightning. The mosquitoes were amazingly bad for early April, yikes. Must remember bug spray next chase. They were bad in nw MO the day before too.
I was surprised just how many semis were blown off I80 west of there and over how big of a distance(couple miles or so?). Saw one in the median but most of them were well off the north side. I wish I would have been there in that when that went down. Then the day might have been worth the chase. As it stands, I have 3 chases I should have known better on and 0 chases worth anything. And again, they don't bother me much as far as doing them. The totality just always has a way of making one think they can't afford better days later on(even if I chase those too anyway lol.....but yeah a day like June 5, 2009, which I didn't chase, in some ways doesn't happen because of these early stupid days...though that day itself had issues to cause some hesitation).
Very ready for a plains, slow moving, storm day. I will take a good lightning storm! What I most want to do, severely badly, is to just not chase some of these things. The ones that are "close enough" but you don't think will pay off in many ways, other than maybe a lucky fast moving tornado, which really seems unlikely on them as it is. Annoyed I was at the point I was ready to actually skip yesterday, but the ONLY thing that made me go was, "What else am I going to do today." I thought, it won't be annoying, it's too close to home anyway. LOL but come evening an hour east of Des Moines after racing around for nothing, I was like...damn it!
Those lead surface lows both days, veering things before another one forms/deepens later on to the west in KS, should have been big enough flags to sit out both days. Bad when the low level response looks like it's getting good 6 hours after darkness. And hell that's just one issue. Course the day you don't ignore some of the issues and hope for the best, something "crazy" happens.
Never seems like a big deal to just go chase, until the chase is over and your 3 hours from home...on the days you knew better. Then it is like, damn it, I should have came up with anything else to do this day. The day itself isn't even that annoying, it's what these do to later days for me. I end up wanting to hedge my bets harder later on, after tossing away money and miles early on. Anymore I seriously just want to blow off a day I think looks great, just so I know that I can do it.
Anyway, couldn't have done the day much better(great at that on the days that don't matter). Waited on I80 near Malcom but didn't go north of the front, since that cold air was so damn close and things were heading for it so soon. Dropped south at first signs of stuff trying to go on Missouri border south of Des Moines. I then just made sure to stay ahead of things till they got better. This was a race now zig zagging back northeast. I shot north of Brooklyn just as that storm got organized(crossing the front), got a big hook and then tornado warning. Looked like a decent supecell to the west. Some mesonet and a few other chasers parked on a muddy road there and watched and it seemed this was all that was around then. Rather than stopping on that road I went a bit more north till I was just about in the path(my car fears anything wet that isn't paved is why I did not stop there). Lost sight for a second in core, so stopped and the view came back. I was like, hell yeah, timed this all perfect on this fast moving day. But no, it wasn't to be. Portion to the northeast bows out and the thing just turns to a pile of goo. Then it was like, well that was fun. I tried to stay with it for a while but it looked like a lost cause, speed-wise as well as just the storm was toast looking.
Lovely looking flooding all around there near Chelsea I think it was. Thought, yeah, lets get back to a more major highway soon, as the fields looked so damn full.
I wanted to get cored by big hail and couldn't even get that out of the storm up in there. The line was pathetic after that on I80, hardly any lightning. The mosquitoes were amazingly bad for early April, yikes. Must remember bug spray next chase. They were bad in nw MO the day before too.
I was surprised just how many semis were blown off I80 west of there and over how big of a distance(couple miles or so?). Saw one in the median but most of them were well off the north side. I wish I would have been there in that when that went down. Then the day might have been worth the chase. As it stands, I have 3 chases I should have known better on and 0 chases worth anything. And again, they don't bother me much as far as doing them. The totality just always has a way of making one think they can't afford better days later on(even if I chase those too anyway lol.....but yeah a day like June 5, 2009, which I didn't chase, in some ways doesn't happen because of these early stupid days...though that day itself had issues to cause some hesitation).
Very ready for a plains, slow moving, storm day. I will take a good lightning storm! What I most want to do, severely badly, is to just not chase some of these things. The ones that are "close enough" but you don't think will pay off in many ways, other than maybe a lucky fast moving tornado, which really seems unlikely on them as it is. Annoyed I was at the point I was ready to actually skip yesterday, but the ONLY thing that made me go was, "What else am I going to do today." I thought, it won't be annoying, it's too close to home anyway. LOL but come evening an hour east of Des Moines after racing around for nothing, I was like...damn it!
Those lead surface lows both days, veering things before another one forms/deepens later on to the west in KS, should have been big enough flags to sit out both days. Bad when the low level response looks like it's getting good 6 hours after darkness. And hell that's just one issue. Course the day you don't ignore some of the issues and hope for the best, something "crazy" happens.
