6/2/2005 REPORTS KS/CO

[Jeff Wear]

Another cap bust to report....this time in SW KS. Was on our way to NW KS/E CO when we saw storm briefly go up near Hugoton. Storm rapidly shrunk and dissipated once we and about 800 others got on it. After that decided to call it a day and are spending the night in Garden City.

 

[Dave Chapman]

Here are a couple of shots from the Limon storm:

 

[Joe Zemek]

With chase partner Ted, hit Goodland around 2 pm (see TALK thread). Decided to go west a bit to find more sun and position for earlier CO storms, thinking if they petered out then W Kansas would still be playable.

Ha.

Met up with Al Moller, Matt & Stacy (?) from TX, and ... sorry! Illinois Guy. We bitched about the forecast challenge in the Burlington library for a bit until the SPC issued a new MD which pointed toward NE CO, where the first storm was already up. Went W then N on 59 (mistake) as we found our first cell a pretty HP but were out of position for the better cell to its SW (thanx in part to bad road data: paved, my ass!).

Blasted S on Gravel Highway 63 back to I70 and went W to catch the oh-so-pretty classic sup with nice inflow and gorgeous laminar vault (see Dave's pix above). Got to see a Front Flank Downdraft being sucked into the inflow ahead of the inflow tail (like Mike said, not beavery but inflowy). Skipped E ahead of this storm a couple times on I70, finding seemingly more chasers with every stop. Met STer Tim Johnson, who generously helped us with live radar data (we helped with CO DeLorme; even trade? Nah). Lost Al, Matt & Stacy somewhere on HWY 59 heading S to try and see the storm behind ours (reported TOR on that one S of Limon).


So, it's almost 11, we're in Lamar, outflow winds are kicking up & pizza has arrived to go with the Newcastles. All in all a great day despite a lack of tornadoes. Good luck to everyone tomorrow, especially you southern busters.

 

[Mikey Gribble]

Well that wasn't fun. I set up shop North of Sublette in SW Kansas. There was pretty good chaser convergence on the side of the road there including the tornado attack vehicle (F-350/tank or whatever you want to call it) and Wurman's group with the DOW's. I wanted to cry when the storm that went up along the border began to collapse. Hopefully I will have better luck tomorrow and Saturday.

 

[Amos Magliocco]

This was a tough forecast. Eric Nguyen, Dave Fick, and I woke in Garden City and headed for Sheridan Lake, CO, hoping for storms to fire on the higher ground and move into better theta-e air as the midlevel flow improved. But in the back of our minds we knew that not having a real focus for initiation could be a problem, and the cap was worrisome. Our cu field began to dissipate and the first Denver-area supercell fired. When storms began near Limon, we raced north and caught the Limon cell as it was entering the city. We heard reports of a tornado earlier and softball hail on the highway. As the storm came into view, we knew we were on something special.

This supercell was absolutely stunning. It outclassed the GRI mothership from the 10th and I would have never guessed seeing two storms of that calibur within four weeks time. A deeply striated and vigorously rotating storm, it was so incredible that one member of our group jumped back on Interstate 70 in order to race AWAY from it to get that Chris Kridler-style distance shot a la May 29, 2001.

Dave has video of a white cone tornado which I didn't see since we all seperated at several points during the chase. He is attempting to document where and when, but this is clearly a small tornado Dave captured while looking into the elusive notch.

We ate dinner in Kit Carson and emerged to find a small LP spitting CGs and spinning underneath a deeply starry sky. We hurried away from the city lights to shoot nighttime long-exposures of this amazing little barber pole updraft. Had it been daylight, this storm might have outdone the Limon storm from earlier. What incredible Colorado structure. I'm anxious to sift my images and post a few to the blog, but it's time for bed.

With both Eric and MikeH on this storm, get ready for some breathtaking images of Colorado at its best.

 

[Shane Adams]

Same as Michael, except we were on the west side of 83. It was a longshot on the cap, but we almost had it near Liberal. Back home for a few hours' rest then up and at 'em again for the clusterf*ck setup tomorrow. I love those 5-state outlooks. I can't wait till sometime in the future, when we can afford a laptop, mapping software, and a wifi card. It will be so nice being able to afford motels and actually staying out instead of having to drive back every single chase. Especially when we're still chasing 500 miles from home every time. I won't miss the "homing pigeon" style of chasing.

Congrats on everyone who nailed the Colorado stuff, can't wait to see the pics of the large destructive tornado we heard about on a quick glimpse of TWC during a gas stop.

The highlight of the day was Chad busting his a** while running underneath my pass (the football came in handy today). Mickey, I wished you'd have ben there man. I laughed so hard, but with you there, we'd have laughed all the way back home. FYI, I waited until I realized Chad wasn't gonna cry before I started laughing. Man it was funny. Ok I'm rambling and the effects of the No Fears are wearing off. Bed time and a fresh start/new hope tomorrow morning. Isn't that a Star Wars episode?

EDIT: Despite today being a capbust, it was a significant chase in that I just realized today's outing put me over 100,000 career chase miles.

 

[Marcus Opitz]

First of all I want to thank Mike Johnston for nowcasting for me. Second, I will join the ranks with those that busted today.... Saw some good towers go up with nice shear indicated by the cloud structure. But the cape would not budge. At least I got to re-aquaint myself with the beatuiful chase country of SW KS....

 

[Tony Laubach]

I was able to squander mid-afternoon coverage on campus, so I was able to get out. However, since I couldn't get out of my evening work, I ended up reduced to a couple hours of local spotting out near DIA early in the day before the main action went off. The severe-warned storm I pranced around led me from Lakewood up I-76 into Hudson where I dropped south towards DIA on a county road. I jogged east on a hairy dirt road to connect with another paved road heading south where I jumped back on I-70 and headed west into town.

My reports; penny-sized hail, crazy rains, and a few CGs. A Flash Flood warning was issued for the storm as it backbuilt for a while over the southern parts of DIA. It did lead to some minor flooding of Pena Blvd, but the warning was soon canceled when the rain ended over the area and water levels dropped.

Later in the evening after my work shift, we had a 90 second blast of heavy rains and pea-sized hail which literally came from nowhere.

A frusterating day as I was hearing the warnings and talking to various chasers in the field. I watched the towers from Littleton and cursed the real world for making me have to work. Glad to hear others scored well in my absense as I felt like a grounded child watching his friends play in the backyard while he sat in his room watching through the window.

 

[Verne Carlson]

Tom Dulong, Alan Covelli and myself headed out east to Goodland, KS all the while keeping an eye back to the storms we left in Denver. We finally had enough with the cap and blasted back west to intercept the cell moving east from Limon, CO. This storm had amazing structure and was great to chase as all we had to do was move east on I-70 and let it come to us.

Wall cloud near Cedar Point, CO

Amazing stacked plates structure near Genoa, CO

Huge inflow beaver-tail near Flaggler, CO

 

[Mike Hollingshead]

Wrapping up nw of Limon.

Probably south of Flaggler somewhere. I was east of Hugo on bob's stupid roads. Pissed me off that it turned east after having been moving straight se......after I was se of Limon.

Looking sw east of Seibert at an utter beast of an HP. It looked really un-organized at Seibert but quickly re-organized.

More pics/info and a video here: http://www.extremeinstability.com/05-6-2.htm

 

[Amos Magliocco]

June 2, 2005 near Limon, Colorado Pics from extracted JPGs. Will post better imagery to my site when this long season ever ends.

REPORT FOR JUNE 2, 2005 LIMON, CO AREA SUPERCELLS

This was a tough forecast. Eric Nguyen, Dave Fick, and I woke in Garden City and headed for Sheridan Lake, CO, hoping for storms to fire on the higher ground and move into better theta-e air as the midlevel flow improved. But in the back of our minds we knew that not having a real focus for initiation could be a problem, and the cap was worrisome. Our cu field began to dissipate and the first Denver-area supercell fired. When storms began near Limon, we raced north and caught the Limon cell as it was entering the city. We heard reports of a tornado earlier and softball hail on the highway. As the storm came into view, we knew we were on something special.

This supercell was absolutely stunning. It outclassed the GRI mothership from the 10th and I would have never guessed seeing two storms of that caliber within four weeks time. A deeply striated and vigorously rotating storm, it was so incredible that one member of our group jumped back on Interstate 70 in order to race AWAY from it to get that Chris Kridler-style distance shot a la May 29, 2001.

Dave has video of a white cone tornado which I didn't see since we all separated at several points during the chase. He is attempting to document where and when, but this is clearly a small tornado Dave captured while looking into the elusive notch.

We ate dinner in Kit Carson and emerged to find a small LP spitting CGs and spinning underneath a deeply starry sky. We hurried away from the city lights to shoot nighttime long-exposures of this amazing little barber pole updraft. Had it been daylight, this storm might have outdone the Limon storm from earlier. What incredible Colorado structure.

 

[Nic Wilson]

FULL REPORT AND PICS: http://weather.ou.edu/~nwilson/chase8.html

I enjoyed my first chase ever in Colorado last Thursday. I managed to sneak out of NCAR around noon and headed east to Limon for a data check. I raced north to meet up with the HP beast of a supercell north of Last Chance, CO around 22:30, but due to some untimely construction (see report) I missed the tornado report by 4 minutes or so. I was then pleasantly surprised later in the chase with the Limon/Flagler/Seibert supercell, when I was just anticipating jumping back on I-70 back to Boulder. Ended the evening with a mean looking tornado warned supercell after sunset that was pitch black, hailing and had nearly severe criteria inflow winds near Punkin Center, CO. It was a fun chase and I will definitely be better prepared next time for the poor road network and unthinkable road construction practices followed in Colorado!

The HP beast ~ 4 minutes before it dropped a tornado

Nice structure on the Lincoln Co. supercell as it approaches Seibert, CO

New updraft evident to the south that spawned my last tor warned storm of the day

More pics available at the link above!

 

[Joe Zemek]

Report posted above; selected pix located here:

http://www.care2.com/c2c/photos/view.html/..._Colorado_Show/