8/13-14/04 REPORTS: Charley

[Bill Hark]

This thread is for first hand chase accounts of Hurricane Charley.

 

[Mike Johnson]

Just wondering why there are no chaser reports in yet
regarding Charley.

Were any chasers stationed near ground zero or did
everyone group in the Tampa area?

I heard some roads were blocked or closed just prior to
the projected path change. Did anyone have a problem with
closed roads or law enforcement?

Mike

 

[Olivier Staiger]

I heard from my buddy Mike Theiss, he's fine. but his websites are down because server in Orlando, and power down in Orlando. He says he was inside 3-mile wide eye, with 160mph windgusts. car is totalled. Jim Leonard also said to be fine.
as email does not work we correspond with sms text messages which seem to arrive half a day late.

Klipsi
Geneva Switzerland
http://eclipse.span.ch

 

[Olivier Staiger]

Mike Theiss was in Charlotte Harbor

new update from Mike Theiss, he was in Charlotte Harbor. NOAA says windgusts were up to 174mph. wow.

his sites
www.ultimatechase.com , www.cyclone-tours.com , www.mthurricane.com still not accessible due to hosting server problem.

looking forward to reports , pix and videos soon.

Jim Leonard's http://www.cyclonejim.com is working, but no update yet.

 

[Jeff Gammons]

Hello Everyone,

We are home and getting caught up on some sleep after 4 days of chasing first tropical storm Bonnie and then monster Hurricane Charley. Here is a short update and more will follow soon.

We intercepted Charley in downtown Punta Gorda, FL at the county court house just off of SR41. Our lowest pressure reading was 943MB during the eyewall passaged that lasted all of 3 minutes due to the very small eye.

Once we moved into Punta Gorda we all kinda split up and spread out around the town a few blocks from each other. Jim Edds and Mark went on foot about a block over from our location. Chris Collura, Jason Foster, Doug Kiesling, and myself were around the county court house area during much of the peak.

The winds are the strongest I have ever seen and its really hard to explain what we witnessed for over 2 1/2 hours at ground zero. Starting tomorrow I will be uploading some intense video from the chase during the eye.

Here is a little sample of Charley in the Northeast eyewall in Punta Gorda, FL taken by Jim Edds one block over from us.

Windows Media Player:
http://www.extremestorms.com/Charlie%20Cor...nta%20Gorda.wmv

More to come shortly.

Jeff Gammons
http://www.weathervine.com

 

[Jeff Gammons]

Here is another video clip in Windows format. This is the view during the worst of the backside of the eye. Doug Kiesling left his dash cam running as our winds came around once on the western side.

Very impressive sustained winds in this video and note how the hood of the SUV is ready to come off. Doug was in front of us facing west-southwest at the time of this video.

Video: http://www.lightningboy.net/2004_Hurricane...ey_Eye_Wall.wmv

Still rendering my video and more to come.

Jeff Gammons
http://www.weathervine.com

 

[Mike Hollingshead]

Our lowest pressure reading was 143MB during the eyewall passaged that lasted all of 3 minutes due to the very small eye.

That's some pretty low pressure...lol. Congrats on the catch and sweet first vid. DL'ing second clip now.

 

[Doug_Kiesling]

Reports?

Originally posted by Mike Johnson
Just wondering why there are no chaser reports in yet
regarding Charley.

Were any chasers stationed near ground zero or did
everyone group in the Tampa area?

I heard some roads were blocked or closed just prior to
the projected path change. Did anyone have a problem with
closed roads or law enforcement?

Mike

Mike and everyone, www.lightningboy.com has been updated all weekend with the latest photos and video. I have a ton of video on line in Windows Media Format.


We got some INSANE video from ground zero at Punta Gorda. The BNVN and Weathervine crews (Jeff, Chris, and Jason) in one location where
we found a protective bubble from the storm but were still able to be out in the storm to experience the full force of the strongest part of the eye
wall. Jim Edds and Mark Rackley were a couple of blocks away from us as well and we all just got the video of a life time. Where we were
parked, winds were mesured at 60+ next to where we were but just out side of where we were, I can only say the winds at the peak of the eye
wall were "Light Speed"! Just think of a white out in the middle of winter where you can not see more then 10 feet. The Jeep started bouncing
like it had some 3 wheel tilt and the hood was ready to rip off.

I have several videos as well as photographs up on http://www.lightningboy.com of this whole event including one guy looting gas that Jim and
I caught on film and video. Jeff is currently working on updating http://www.weathervine.com and Jim Edds got some hella insane video that he
posted to http://www.extremestorms.com

As a Lightning and Tornado Chaser being able to come down and chase my first Hurricane and getting into the worst of a Cat 4, all I can say is
chasing a Hurricane is a lot easier then finding a tornado but surviving a hurricane is a hell of a lot harder then surviving a tornado. All of the 2004
tornadoes and damage do not even begin to compare to what we saw here this weekend.


Doug
Back to Deep Lurk Mode

 

[rdale]

"NOAA says windgusts were up to 174mph"

I've not seen that - where was the exact location and what was the source? I went to Tampa Bay's webpage and you'd have NO idea a major hurricane just hit as there's nothing on their home about it!

 

[Larry J. Kosch]

Look in Weather and Chasing

I found the source of the wind speed info you heard about. Look in Weather and Chasing forum and find the Hurricane Charley: Aftermath: Major damage and loss of life. thread. This was posted by Evan Bookbinder.

Both Wes and Doug ended up practically across the street from each other...one at the hospital and one at the court house in Punta Gorda.

This may be true as I've now heard that the hospital's anemometer clocked a 173 mph gust before blowing away. Furthermore, it's interesting to note that Punta Gorda's last observation had a 109 mph wind gust with a SLP of 997.4mb.

Hopes that helps.

 

[rdale]

Again - "I've heard" from someone else... Not that I'm don't believe Evan or that the report is inaccurate - I'm just asking for verifiable reports.

 

[Nick Smith]

This is the only instance that I could find where the report indicated a measured wind gust:

A hospital here recorded a wind gust of 173 miles (276 kilometers) an hour before its wind meter was torn down.

Link:
http://www.terradaily.com/2004/04081504321...8.qifsqs7p.html

 

[Aaron Kennedy]

NBC-2 Mentioned the 173mph gust at the hospital on air from hospital officals.

Aaron

 

[rdale]

Thanks for trying - if you do have something semi-official post it here.

- Rob

 

[Ken Johnson]

hurricane hunters and Charley

I got the opportunity to fly with the hurricane hunter's last Thursday. Let me tell you, IT was a LONG day. We left Keesler around 12:30pm and returned at 12:30 am. 12 hours in the air. We intercepted Charley, south of Cuba. ( THis is only the second year Cuba allows us to fly recon missions over their country!) When we flew through it, it was no worse than any other turbulence you would experience in a regular aircraft on an ordinary summer day. after 5 long hours of exploring the storm, we left and took a break over the Gulf. The pilot told me the storm had strenghtened into a CAT 3 while we were out there. Everybody aboard the plain had let the guard down, because so, far it wasn't too bad! Boy, were we wrong! When we went back through it again, night had fallen. As soon as we hit the eye wall, it felt like we were going to crash! We dropped about a 1000 ft. in about a second. It felt like a ride at disney world! The pilot had to apply double the force (physic's equation E=m x v2) to stay in the air. You could hear the engin's roaring as they struggled to gain altitude. It last for about 30 seconds and then it would stop only to start again! It was increadible! A great experience. I can now say I flew through a CAT 3 storm (CAT 3 at that time)