Chase Case #7

[Marc Austin]

Final Results

The day was May 8, 2003. This day required a lot of patience as storms fired off very late in the afternoon. Below are storm reports as well as a final satellite image and some radar images from the outbreak. If anyone has any good pics or personal chase stories, they can be posted as well.

Final Results:

22Z Satellite

22Z Radar

SPC Storm Reports

I tried to display the images in the post, but it wouldn't work for some reason. This will work for now. I hope a lot of you bagged a tube today!

 

[Dean Baron]

Nice! Sups developed just to my west giving me time to find the best one and make the decision to head south or north but either way I was in perfect position to have a field day! Nice, big steak for me at Outback.

 

[Matt Gingery]

Excellent! I intercepted a tornado in N.Central Kansas. Got within 100 yards of this rope and got blasted with 90mph RFD. Was a beautiful cell, pancake stack wall cloud, and an eleveated elephant trunk tornado. It was really photogenic. Grapefruit size hail blasted my vehicle, so I left it in a field in Kansas as a chase trophy and bought a brand new BMW X5 in Manhattan Ks. See everyone on the next trip. I sold my exclusive video to all the networks, made 5000$ off the video in this chase.

 

[Bob Hartig]

I'm pleased. I would have seen tornadoes on this day. The only thing I wish I'd done differently would be to have stayed in my original position of Topeka rather than heading west. I could have saved myself a few miles backtracking east down I-70.

 

[Dann Cianca]

Look at all those tornadoes near Denver earlier in the day. Boo. Hey, at least I got a 75mph wind gust. Bet that dust felt good in my eyes.

 

[Patrick Martin]

Excellent! Sitting in Hutchinson really paid off. I was able to follow storms east as they initially formed and bagged me a nice tube, WOO HOO!

 

[Matt Gingery]

I like it Dan. You got sand blasted by dust. That is too funny. Im ready for chase case #9

 

[John Farley]

Looks like I put myself in the right general area and would have had a shot at the tornadoes in NC OK and southern KS. But I would have had to move a little from my last position to catch them. Forecast was definitely good, though.

In real life, this was about the only day that week that I did not chase - probably had a work conflict, or something!

 

[Leah Robertson]

Indeed that was a crazy weather day for eastern Kansas. I was directly impacted by the tornado that went through my neighborhood in Lawrence, KS that evening. It rained throughout the day until about 3pm in NE Kansas and the skies didn't start clearing up until after 4pm, which made me wonder if the atmosphere was going to be able to recover, despite the instability parameters and being in a high risk. Once the dry slot moved over eastern Kansas, the storms immediately fired up and went supercellular prompting numerous tornado warnings. Since one of the cells was heading directly towards Lawrence, I decided to let the storm come to me and adjusted my location accordingly which eventually put me along the K-10 corridor SW of Lawrence. The tornado formed in a open field and then proceeded to move into the city limits. Luckily, it was on the ground for only a short period of time but it did produce (E)F-2 damage to several structures, including the area I was living at the time. The rain earlier in the day did play a pretty significant impact on these storms as they moved across NE Kansas. The shallow layer of rain-cooled air almost immediately fizzled these storms and they quickly began to fall apart. Definitely an interesting day in the weather department.

Unfortunately, I don't have any of my own images of the Lawrence tornado as they were destroyed in a flooded basement the following year (which is just as well since it was terribly hazy and they didn't turn out very well) but here are a few links:

Video of Lawrence tornado (Note, some language): Link
NWS Report: Clicky!

 

[Randall Cooper]

nice! I would have seen a tornado or possibly two on this day!

 

[Corey Sloan]

Winfield, KS was a good spot for me as well....got to see a lot of severe weather today...good learning experience....thanks for the case study!

 

[Matthew Fischer]

i would have been in a good status on the ks/ok border most likely the exit before oklahoma, if i had a crew with me, we would have stop in oklahoma being so close then went back kansas. as i saw by final timing of event i was in a good spot most likely to get in on some fun!

 

[David Wolfson]

I remember the day now. I was on a commercial tour run by the best which ended up screaming around trying to get a view of the fast moving cells that would pop up and die. For many of those who think they virtually saw tornadoes this day, you may not have. Smoke and haze coming up from Mexico was a big problem with, as I recall, visibilities less than five miles. We were only a few miles south of the Lawrence tornado and might as well have been on another planet.

In this virtual chase I would have joined I-70 east from the north and had a good chance at a few of the storms as they zipped east. But this day was a definite "maybe" for me.

 

[Leah Robertson]

^ Ah, yes...I remember now. I was trying to recall why it was so hazy that day and couldn't remember specifically why. When the tornado struck Lawrence, I was about a mile away from the touchdown and it was rather difficult to see the funnel from my location, especially when the sun broke through the clouds.

 

[Brandon Ivey]

The day was May 8, 2003. This day required a lot of patience as storms fired off very late in the afternoon. Below are storm reports as well as a final satellite image and some radar images from the outbreak. If anyone has any good pics or personal chase stories, they can be posted as well.

Final Results:

22Z Satellite

22Z Radar

SPC Storm Reports

I tried to display the images in the post, but it wouldn't work for some reason. This will work for now. I hope a lot of you bagged a tube today!

Sorry for the late post. I have been going back through these chase cases and looking at all the data. I typically don't log into stormtrack much during the winter months due to lack of storm activity, but I must say, I am becoming addicted to these chase cases. I plan to go back and review all of them eventually.

Since nobody has posted any images or video of this event, I will throw a few up. My video is from the supercell that hit Lawrence, KS. I followed it to the southern side of Clinton Lake. This was back in my days of "Blair Witch" style shooting, I had not figured out yet that auto-focus and storm chasing don't mix, and I guess I though that I would eventually be a play-by-play sports announcer someday! Ahh, it is good for a nice laugh though. Almost falls in the bloopers category!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uo4SE1Y_oRQ

I will also throw Matt Hughes video up here. We began at the same spot that day, but he was smart and headed south to catch the tornado that hit near Osage City, Kansas. I however, hopped on the first storm tower of the day and rode it all the way up. Not good chase tactics but a good learning experience.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mVwW4NCvxNI