• While Stormtrack has discontinued its hosting of SpotterNetwork support on the forums, keep in mind that support for SpotterNetwork issues is available by emailing [email protected].

6/17/2010 REPORTS: ND/MN/IA

Tornado in vicinity of Grand Forks, ND.

2a.jpg
 
Got going after work, didn't even take the day off! Got on Highway 12 at 3:30, met up with Ian Luhm near Darwin, saw a brief funnel and went with the storm up towards 94. Saw John Wetter, and headed towards the cell to the south as I had a feeling that the cell to the south of the one we were on was cutting out our current cell. Turns out to be a good move, as we exited off 94, saw the wall cloud, and as we waited got around VORTEX2 Vehicles (On their own dime now? Stickers are still on Vehicles) and DOW trucks. Brief Tor about 2 miles south of 94 on MN 25. Followed storm towards 169 and ended chase by 7PM

Pictures ----> http://www.thewxpage.com/061710chase.html

big061710chase5.JPG


big061710chase6.JPG



Video (For HD) 1080p HD .WMV File (Right Click Picture Thumbnail and Click "Save Target As..." or "Save Link As...") ----> http://www.thewxpage.com/stormchasingvideo2010.html
 
Decided to take a quick trip to North Dakota for the afternoon, and very happy with the results. Also caught the tornado near Grand Forks, and got some nice video on the side, which I'll post later.

IMG_0098.jpg


Almost got stuck in the mud trying to get out of the I-29 construction bottleneck, but it was well worth taking the chance, or I would have missed this tornado. It was a slender but awesome tube, and went through about 3 occlusion cycles.

My sympathies to all the families in MN who lost loved ones. Kind of makes a good chase day bitter sweet.

John Hudson
VE4 JTH
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Just a teaser of a few of the 10 tornadoes Skip Talbot and I intercepted from Kiester to Conger to Albert Lea to Clarks Grove to Hollandale, Minnesota. FULL report and video to come soon...

Pics:

100617kiester1.jpg


SW of Conger, MN

100617kiester3.jpg


SW of Conger, MN

100617kiester4.jpg


SW of Conger, MN

100617torinconger1.jpg


In Conger, MN

100617conger2.jpg


2 E of Conger, MN

100617conger.jpg


2 E of Conger, MN

100617albertlea2.jpg


4 W of Albert Lea, MN

MANY MANY MANY more photos and videos to be posted on my site in the coming days.... hell I still have such a high from this storm I may stay up all night doing it. Loving 2010! 32 and counting!
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Was out with Brandon Sullivan & Jesse Risley. They got me out of my current slump & we ended up with an amazing chase day. Now I need to convince our interns that they aren't the cause of my bad luck! :)

1.JPG

2.JPG

3.JPG

4.JPG

5.JPG
 
Just when I thought the year couldn't get any better. I hope you guys don't mind a few more tornado pictures, but this is the first time I've been able to post a report since we didn't have internet on the road, and we just got our power back in Chicago this morning from yesterday's raging squall.

Danny Neal and I inadvertently took the "Shane Adams' Challenge" when we went most of the chase without data due to a lack of cell coverage and technical issues with our data cards and phones. We initially headed to Luverne, MN but raced back east when storms started going up east of us. Fearing we fell behind the action, we were able to make it down to Tail-End-Charlie near Kiester, MN. We saw a nice base and a lowering that pointed out more like a shelf cloud than a nice inflow feature or funnel, before the base became wrapped in rain. We thought that would be the show until a small cell to the south popped up and merged the original storm. We caught a slender cone through some rain a few miles to our south, and were quite happy with that tornado intercept and actually thought the storm would be "one and done." The rest of the chase left us gyrating with our mouths gaping.

First tornado near Kiester, MN:
100617vid01.jpg


What looked like a wall cloud condensed into more of a wedge like tornado:
100617vid02.jpg


The tornado from the above shot dissipated (left), and a brilliant white cone forms on the new meso (right):
100617vid03.jpg


The cone retreats but redevelops a couple minutes later as a brilliant stovepipe under dazzling structure:
100617vid04.jpg


Another tornado with what looked like a negative tilt:
100617vid05.jpg


A satellite tornado whips around the east flank of the stocky tube:
100617vid06.jpg


High contrast cone:
100617vid07.jpg


The cone starts to widen into more of a wedge as it approaches Albert Lea:
100617vid08.jpg


After driving through Albert Lea, we caught the storm north of town for one last tornado near dusk:
100617vid09.jpg


Timelapse footage from the robotic camera dome coming soon!
 
This day was my best chase ever!! My chase partner Matt and I almost missed everything in southern Minnesota too. We were running late, stuff fired a little further east than we thought, and my grlevel3 radar data was almost 30 minutes old at one point! Did anyone else have this problem? We made it about to Blue Earth, MN when the northern part of the sup's started crossing I-90 with a huge hail core and reported tornado, so we didn't want to cross into it with old data!
043.JPG


we turned back around and thought about going down and around the southern end of the storms, but they kept redeveloping so we ended up back in blue earth and made our way as far east on the interstate as we could again, before finding another exit to decide what we wanted to do. while sitting there we could see south quite a ways and started to see the back base of the storms. suddenly a lowering started forming off in the distance and we raced south to catch up! this was the first tornado of the day south and west of Bricelyn, Minnesota:
070.JPG


we watched the storm put down two quick tornadoes, and at one point have two funnels at one time. then suddenly it just blew up into a huge wall cloud that formed the Kiester, MN area tornado. this was where we saw the first damage in town with some tree damage, etc. tornado near kiester:
134.JPG


we followed it on to conger, mn:
143.JPG


after this i don't remember where all the pics were taken too!!
160.JPG

166.JPG

169.JPG


last pic of the night, wish it was in better focus!!
172.JPG


we actually were going to head home after losing the storm on highway 46 south of armstrong, bc of downed power lines. we hadn't been looking at or had time to look at the radar for quite a while with all the action. so kindof surprisingly, not more than 5 miles down the road we hit a cell that had near golfball sized hail, and then developed a rotating wall cloud. we followed this back into albert lea, mn, where on the eastern edge of town, we crossed a bridge where all of the sudden cars were stopped. at the bottom of the bridge on the other side were two cops stopping traffic. they didn't want ppl going east bc of the new large tornado that was on the ground somewhere northeast of albert lea. this was the tornado that went by hillendale, mn. so instead they stopped traffic, ON A BRIDGE!! we knew at this point the storms were through, but still the cops were actually worried enough that they were coming up to cars and suggesting we now get out of our cars and walk to the bottom of the bridge and get under the bridge. we talked to the cop and suggested they at least let us go another 100 feet to the next intersection where they could let ppl get off the bridge and turn around to the west. after about 15 mins of this we got going again, but now it was getting pretty dark so we had to let the storms go. what a day!!
i forgot to mention in my original post that these were my first "official" tornadoes!! i've been chasing for about 3 years and do about 8 or so chases a year, usually fairly local(within 4-5 hrs drive max). last year i was at kirksville, but only saw the tornado wrapped in rain for about 30 secs before i had to bust out of kirksville. then i saw it from a long ways away after it had passed. so this was my dream shot, exactly what i had imagined in my head what it would be like to see a tornado!! also my buddy that came with, has just started going chasing with me and this was our 3rd chase. these were also the first tornadoes he's ever seen!!
 
Last edited by a moderator:
I chased the southern Minnesota and northern Iowa supercell with Brandon Sullivan and Aaron Shaffer. We initially targeted Spencer, Iowa, but then blasted east on Hwy 9 to intercept a cell that had went SVR warned near Swea City. Shortly after we intercepted the cell, it produced a beautiful funnel just south of Swea City.

As the cell moved to the ENE, it started producing tornadoes as it inched closer to the Minnesota state line. We followed the cell as it continued hosting quite an incredible show, calling the chase near Albert Lea as the tornado became more obscured by rain and darkness was approaching.

I've attached a few screen grabs from my video, which I am currently editing and will have uploaded to Youtube soon.
 

Attachments

  • wedge2.jpg
    wedge2.jpg
    34.9 KB · Views: 1,321
  • Kiester MN2.jpg
    Kiester MN2.jpg
    26.9 KB · Views: 1,411
  • Kiester MN3.jpg
    Kiester MN3.jpg
    32.5 KB · Views: 1,329
  • Kiester MN4.jpg
    Kiester MN4.jpg
    26.5 KB · Views: 1,325
Back
Top