5/2/07 REPORTS: TX

[Shane Adams]

Another "backyard" type chase in and around the DFW metroplex today. I knew the show would be further southwest earlier on, but I decided to work and worry about things later in the day as they neared DFW. I left Irving around 3:15pm, and found myself near Crassen as a cell developed ahead of the line (at least that's what it looked like, I was visual today). It looked really interesting for about 2 minutes, with a nice pronounced wallcloud, with southeast feeder bands and nice rising motion on the northern flank.....but it was on the wrong side of the core......line bow. So rather quikcly, it gusted out and I decided to head southeast on 171 towards Godley to punch the core and get on the inflow side of the cell.....which by now was turning into a line. West of Godley, I saw a loweirng in the base of the storm that seemed to be the last one in line....I shot video in bits as I negotiated the town, trees, and hills. It briefly lowered into a fat funnel-shaped lowering, but I couldn't discern any rotation, as I was too far away. I kept shooting it until I cleared town to the southeast, and of course by then it was disappearing in rain. Reports started coming in near Burlson of possible funnels, and one guy said he had a confirmed funnel halfway down, while I moved east on 67 out of Cleburne. I could see what looked like possible inflow bands at mid levels, maybe as low as 5K, but the lowering underneath it looked ragged and I couldn't see rotation....though I was well south. A few minutes later, I heard a third-hand report via the scanner of a reported tornado in Godley, but it sounded like a bogus report. I thought of the lowering I'd seen, and was planning on doing a review of video to see if time stamps matched the report.....but there is no report listed, so I assume it was bogus. I may look at the video anyway just for grins, but I didn't see ANYTHING rotating all day. Lots of cloud motions on a gustfront, but nothing spinning....at least everywhere I was that I was close enough to see movement. Jumped on US287 and near Mansfield, pulled over and let the line overtake me, with winds around 50-60mph, with a few gusts to maybe 70mph. Turned back north in Waxahachie, then west on 20, north on loop 12, and 114 home. Saw a tractor trailer overturned on Spur 408, and from the way it was lying, it looked as if he'd stopped and was blown over by winds. This was another extremely difficult chase, going pure visual, working with paper maps, manually switching between RACES nets and NWS radio via scanner, shooting video, driving a stick, and negotiating rush hour traffic in heavy rain/wind. Not to mention crap storms....again. DFW should hire me to protect them, everytime I'm somewhere else it's a tornado....when I'm here, it's rain.

Man, I miss the days of clear blue skies, nuclear bomb sups, and you can see it from 100 miles away.

 

[Tim Marshall]

The Marshall's headed to Ballinger, TX today and were chased back east by the bow echo. We finally let it catch us at I-35. Encountered wind gusts well in excess of 50 mph. Saw roof shingles fly off a house. Two 18-wheelers were overturned on I-35W. Saw billboard damage too. Electric power is out throughout Johnson and Tarrant counties. Heard that 300,000 are without power alone in the Metroplex. TM

 

[Andrew McDonald]

Hi all,

Today had the potential to go crazy and it did. But not for us. We made a decision during the early afternoon to head S from Kerrville to Uvalde. At the time, we figured the OFB and the dryline would intersect pretty close to Del Rio. CAPE was also much higher further S and the cap was somewhat stronger so we figured storms would remain discrete for longer. All of this happened…a massive storm blew up about 40mi over the border into Mexico. We saw this on radar from Uvalde and we figured that with the 40knt mid level jet from the west and relatively weak low level flow over in Mexico, that this storm would move in a generally eastward direction and cross over into Texas somewhere around Eagle Pass (which was hit by a tornado only just over a week ago). But…the storm took a HARD right turn and moved SSE with a massive hook echo showing up on radar. The storm basically paralleled the Texas/Mexico border for hours with the storm sitting about 25-30mi over into Mexico. We tried to go S to intercept it if it was eventually to cross the border but we rain into dirt roads so we basically had to give up on this storm. What made things worse was that many of the places we had driven through earlier today were subsequently hit by some very nice supercells (Kerrville, Uvalde). I’m guessing that the OFB stalled across the southern Hill Country and supercells just developed along this as the airmass destabilized late in the afternoon (it was still 8/8 and drizzling at 4pm in Uvalde). We eventually got some minor redemption finally getting onto the tornado-warned storm near Frio about half an hour after sunset. We managed to get into a decent position which allowed us to look into the notch of this HP supercell which was relatively frequently lit up by lightning – we didn’t see anything. We also met another chaser who had also gone for the Mexican stuff (making us feel not quite so bad). We were treated to a pretty nice lightning display (which is still going as I type this as we are driving N along I-35 – its 11:35pm).

In hindsight, our forecast was pretty spot on. The most isolated storm/s developed further S (ie away from the MCS) and were probably the most impressive in terms of radar echoes. The “target” cell developed just ahead of the dryline/OFB intersection and remained discrete for its entire life pretty much (its still going!). The HUGE problem was that it was in Mexico and we weren’t (not a visa/passport issue – but again the rental car issue). I’m still quite surprised at how hard this storm turned to the right – I would’ve thought this would be more likely on a day like yesterday with weaker mid-level flow. Overall a fairly frustrating day but if the only reason for a semi-bust is an international border, then things can’t be too bad .

We are making tomorrow a driving day. We are going to boot N along I-35 as far as we can as Friday onwards looks very nice. A strong cap looks to be in place S of about I-70 so we’ll try and head for say Wichita, KS tomorrow (about 550mi) with the thought of wanting to be in the vicinity of Hayes, KS by cap breaking time on Friday.

Andrew & Chris

 

[Olivier Staiger]

what happens in Mexico stays in Mexico

Gene Moore and I started first towards Fort Stockton, abandonned the coldfront, headed back south, then tried to get the nice Mexican cell but it kept staying in Mexico, we were ready to get as far south as needed, met Mark McGowan: then we went on SE, aiming for Laredo, but the road 1021 suddenly was closed, so had to give up. Caught some lightning later west of San Antonio.

images here
http://klipsi.blog.tdg.ch/general/what-happens-in-mexico-stays-in-mexico.html

images

 

[Sam Barricklow]

Funnel over Dallas on May 2nd

I intercepted a small supercell imbedded in a line of storms associated with the long lived bow echo system that moved through Dallas on May 2nd. Photos of a mesocyclone going through the process of occlusion are posted on a web page. See URL below.

http://www.k5kj.net/20070502.htm

This mesocyclone moved northeast from the White Rock Lake area and crossed LBJ freeway just west of Garland Road. After the mesocyclone passed just northwest of Sam's Wholesale Club on Northwest Highway, a strong gust front rushed eastward behind it (as would be expected due to the circulation associated with the mesocyclone). Heavy rain reduced visibility to less than 50 yards. The high winds blew grocery carts across the parking lot. The carts bounced off of cars like balls in a pin ball machine.

It appears likely that a tornadic circulation was on the ground at least intermittently. I have not had time to search for damage that might be attributed to a tornado. The search may be difficult due to the widespread tree and other damage produced by 50+ mph straight line winds that blew through the area immediately behind the mesocyclone. However, power was off around White Rock Lake, along the path of this mesocyclone.

The contrast was enhanced by dodging and burning in Photoshop. Visual contrast was less. What you see is what was there. Nothing was added.

 

[Paul Austin]

Frustrating day. Initial target: south of Texon along I10. Unsure of our staging, at the advice of a local woman we decided to hang around Junction and have lunch at the Sunrise Cafe. So our departure time was a little later than normal. As it turns out, one promising cell popped up southwest of Sonora. We took US277 south and parked a couple miles south of the State55 intersection. The low stratus deck, which refused to burn off all morning made any discernible structure nearly impossible to see. As the cell's southern flank approached, we decided to track it along State55 toward Rock Springs, then intercept once again along US377 back toward Junction. Bad road choice - VERY prone to flash flooding. After a few extremely shallow crossings, we were halted by a fast-flowing river that I was certainly not willing to risk. We turned around, took State41 to US83 back toward I10 and stopped along the way for some sunset mammatus pics.





http://family.webshots.com/photo/2794015230100066693wuVNML