5/22/06 REPORTS: CO

[Mark Farnik]

Well it's been a long and enjoyable chase day so after I relaxed for a while I thought I would post on how today's chase unfolded. I headed out from my house at 12:20 and got to Brush, CO by 1 p.m. I met up with Tony Laubauch and Verne/Michael Carlson in the parking lot of the Microtel Inn, sitting in the hot sun mooching off the free wifi and waiting... and waiting... and waiting for initiation. In the meanwhile a half dozen or so other chasers arrived and we had quite a little chaser gathering in the motel parking lot. Finally things began to initiate about 4 p.m. and we split up. Tony and Verne/Michael went east after an atomic bomb supercell near Wray, while myself, Sean Mirage and his chase partner (spacing his name right now... if you're reading this, forgive me!) hauled south on Highway 71 to try and intercept a tornado warned cell in northern Elbert County. Well, that fell apart and the grunge-tacular storm cluster racing northwards from El Paso County (where it spawned a tornado just west of Ellicot that caused some damage) forced us to turn around halfway to Limon and go back to Last Chance, where we turned east on Highway 36 and began searching for gas stations. After one town (Linden) where the gas station was closed and one (Anton) that had no gas station, our gas gauges were riding on the 'E' when we rolled into the small town of Cope and thank God found a little Sinclair station in which the older gentleman owner courteously filled my tank! We topped off with some snacks from the convienience store and headed east out of Cope on 36, then hung a left onto Highway 59 and raced northwards in hopes of catching an isolated cell in far northern Yuma county which was moving very slowly northwards. But it didn't look good enough for me to drive the extra distance so I turned off at Highway 34 in Yuma and began heading west. For the next THIRTY miles i was buffeted by 60 mph + outflow winds from the HP superline that was rapidly closing in from the south/southwest. I barely avoided the cores by a whisker and arrived home at 8:40 p.m., an 8 hour and 20 minute, 250 + mile chase complete. It was my first solo chase and even though I didn't see anything overly spectacular it was still lots of fun and I really look forward to chasing more in the weeks to come!

 

[Andrew Stoller]

Nothing really to report. I was about a mile north of Wray all afternoon and watched a tower try and try but rained itself out. Another tower went up and had barely any rain with about 3 lightning strikes. I sat and waited about 3 hours, by 6, I saw the linear mess heading up from the southwest and decided to head home. When I called my Pop and he told me about the tornado near Ellicot I about wanted to cry :lol: I think the upper level wave moving over CO just didn't get northeast in time.

 

[Stan Rose]

Nothing really to report. I was about a mile north of Wray all afternoon and watched a tower try and try but rained itself out. Another tower went up and had barely any rain with about 3 lightning strikes. I sat and waited about 3 hours, by 6, I saw the linear mess heading up from the southwest and decided to head home. When I called my Pop and he told me about the tornado near Ellicot I about wanted to cry :lol: I think the upper level wave moving over CO just didn't get northeast in time.
[/b]

Dont cry too hard--i doubt you wouldve seen much. Having worked the event id say it was either a quick non-meso spinup, gustnado or possibly straight line winds. It was a strong mesocyclone but the 40 degree dewpoint depressions and lack of low level rotation are suspicious. A survey will be conducted today.
Yesterday played out pretty much as i suspected, nothing great but no throw-away either. Unfortunately it left me too tired to consider a long drive to NE today, so im virtually chasing this one! Hope the end of the month pans out.

 

[Dean Gill]

Dont cry too hard--i doubt you wouldve seen much. Having worked the event id say it was either a quick non-meso spinup, gustnado or possibly straight line winds. It was a strong mesocyclone but the 40 degree dewpoint depressions and lack of low level rotation are suspicious. A survey will be conducted today.
Yesterday played out pretty much as i suspected, nothing great but no throw-away either. Unfortunately it left me too tired to consider a long drive to NE today, so im virtually chasing this one! Hope the end of the month pans out.
[/b]

Hi, I'm a swiss (french speaking) storm chaser and spent 3 weeks chasing in the Plains...
I know it's a bit late but we saw something quite interesting south of Interstate 70. The thing was 15 miles south of Flagler/ 30 miles southeast of Limon. The storm formed just after sunset and was moving north.

I also made a short video of this event. Of course, our live comments are in french but I think it's quite easy to understand what we're talking about...
http://www.deanostorm.ch/USA2006/Limon Hysteria.wmv

Enjoy!