6/2 REPORTS: Southern Plains

[Scott Roberts]

Opening reports thread for OC/KS/OK/TX and adjacent areas.

 

[Jenifer Henslee]

I stood outside my place in Norman as the gust front came through just after 3pm. It was calm right beforehand (birds chirping and all!). I could see the roll clouds (horizontally spinning, quite spectacular!) and then the wind picked up and started gusting pretty high (I checked out the mesonet readings and it recorded a 60mph gust! A lot of other mesonet sites also reported high gusts like that)

The temperature dropped rapidly and within 5 min it went from 85-
~68°. Chilly with a 20mph wind!

The rain started about 10 min later. At the Norman mesonet site the sideways rain caused the dewpoint sensor to get wet which in turn caused erroneous data! (As in dewpoints <10°!) It rained pretty heavily here, and then it began to hail! Mostly pea size, but there was some up to quarter sized. There was over an inch of rain recorded. (greatly needed, May has been one of, if not the driest on record!)

After about an hour everything had moved through here and was headed south. I could also see a whole "field" of mammatus clouds, that was really cool!

This is the first time I've really stood and waited to be in a gust front. Quite interesting!

 

[Jeff Wear]

Had 1.00 inch diameter hail here in Norman near the corner of Hwy 9 and SE 12th at 3:50pm CDT. Here are some pics.....

http://www.theperksofchasing.com/accounts/...2/pix040602.htm

 

[Aaron Kennedy]

Had hail up to dimes at McGee and Lindsey in Norman. Fiance got banged with golfballs at Robinson and Porter. That's the last time I say "oh it's just a lil wind and rain" ; )


Aaron

 

[Jason Montano]

Went down to Witchita Falls and then West to Childress, watched the Towers build along the boundary. I was hoping for a slight chance of a tornado when the dryline storms interacted with the boundary, but it didnt happen. I sat just North of Childress and watched the massive line of svr tstorms push east. Saw the best CG show I have ever seen, I was just waiting for my Ham ant. to get struck. Encountered some quarter size hail and good wind gusts, but that is about it. Boy I sure do love to chase in NW TX and the Southern TX panhandle.

 

[Bill Hamilton]

We had golfball + size hail and high winds in the Duncan, OK. area with the false report of a tornado from someone at the Stephens Co. Sheriffs department which made the town of Velma, OK. sound their tornado sirens. Later found to be a small condensation lowering and scud clouds.

 

[Jay McCoy]

Interesting night in the tx panhandle. My partners Kanani and Bill and myself got caught in a hail core just NW of Happyaround 5:25pm. wasnt expecting anything real big just some nickels and quarters when baseballs started raining down. I didnt lose any glass but my lightbar was destroyed along with a alot more dents (as if i didnt have enough already). both red and blue domes have holes in them so I have already ordered new ones. We then set up south of happy near the main area of rotation when the sirens went off in Happy but nothing formed.We then drove south and were about 10 miles NNE of Tulia when we had a small spinup in the field beside us that lasted about 30 seconds. wasnt sure if it was a tornado yet since i havent reviewed the video and I didnt see a funnel but a tornado warning had been issued for that area NE of tulia about 5-10 minutes before that and it was directly under the wallcloud. Will turn over some video to LBB NWS for them to decide. Storms became a blob of wind and rain after that so went back to amarillo just in time to be called out on wx watch for more storms coming in. measured winds of 63mph on the NW side of town with reports of power lines and trees down all over the city. Truck will be down for a day or 2 for repairs.

 

[B Ozanne]

Anybody know the status of the Childress observation station? TWC was reporting it was knocked offline last night. I'm looking at the NWS obs and the last one is from 6pm on the 2nd.

 

[John Cameron]

yep, looks like the Childress and Vernon sites got taken out by lasts night's winds.

 

[Angie Norris]

I left Norman yesterday morning about 11:30 with a target of Childress TX. A friend who is a newbie also went along on her first chase.
We got to Clarendon about 3:30pm and watched two areas of convection, the cells which were near Hereford and a newer cell which was going up north of Pampa. I decided to go after the Pampa cell since it was more isolated, so we headed back north on SR70 into Pampa.
We watched the Pampa cell try to put down a small lowering, and headed east on US 60 to try to stay ahead of it, but the storm made a bit of a right turn (pretty much right over the top of us), and the core was punching back a bit...heavy rain and small hail (dime/penny sized, maybe a little quarter sized stuff). Took a wrong turn (well rather missed the south option on FM 1474) and stayed on Hwy 60 into Miami, then turned south on FM 748 into Laketon. Fianlly got out of most of the precip and made it back into McLean.
The light show coming back down I-40 was absolutely incredible...haven't seen that many CGs in a long time!! Got back into Norman about 10:30pm.
Big thanks to Shane and Jo for nowcasting yesterday!!!

Angie