How Hard Do you beat yourself up for busting a big chase?

[Amos Magliocco]

Gabe mentioned Sunray, and that's an excellent precendent for the way Bob is talking about Mulvane. Look how Al Moller starts his chase report on his and Charles Doswell's Pampa chase:

Mention the word "Sunray" (see Storm Data, June 1971) to an old storm chaser and you will invoke a response similar to that received by whispering "Rosebud" to an newspaper tycoon or screaming out "Roswell" at a UFO convention. For years, Chuck Doswell and I have chased and wondered when our Sunray would come...

I can't say that I know exactly what Al meant, but my suspicion is that it's something like what Bob and Joe are describing: a sight so unimaginably beautiful and timeless that if you happen to never see anything like it again, it would sustain you. This makes it the most subjective of subjective judgements--everyone has to determine his or her own "Sunray," but my sense from those who saw the original, or the way Al speaks of Pampa, or how so many of my friends talk about Mulvane is that you know it when it happens.

I didn't see Mulvane in person, and I'm pretty sure my Sunray is still in the future. Whether or not I'll get it (Al and Chuck had been chasing over 20 years in June of '95), or know it when I see it, are among all the questions chasing presents.

 

[Bob Schafer]

You are all exactly right.

I didn't mean to suggest that nothing could exceed Mulvane, but Karen's points are correct. And, if I never experience "another 040612", I can die "fulfilled" at the age of 122.

Bob

 

[Karen Politte]

Yep all good replies here - all valid points.

I guess I am a more transient, perhaps laid-back chaser. I don't really believe that I have a date with destiny in the future, or, as Amos puts it, that my "Sunray's" waiting for me.......I feel privileged to experience what I can, and humbled by what I have already exerienced. I don't compare tornadoes one to another as that's just futile and pointless......and I somehow feel that it would be a bit offensive to the vortices themselves to be "compared" - :lol:

Anyways......good thread......now about those busts......

KR

 

[Joe Zemek]

comparison

Yeah, you don't want to offend vortices by comparing them: they'll come after you! ... Hey, actually that sounds like a plan!

The comparison here, as Amos said and I think Al Moller would agree, is the comparison of subjective experience rather than the objective qualities of the storm/tornado. Everything in Bob's life up to that point affected his experience that day, in a way unique to him, and he sounds like he's aware of that. I bet he's every bit as open to an experience that might eclipse Mulvane as his "Sunray" or peak of his experience. It's equally interesting to hear Karen's perspective in that she doesn't posit a "peak experience" per se, also in a way indicating a real awareness of her own chase sensibilities, and probably an exceptional memory.

 

[Jeff Wear]

All this talk about not being able to top a certain experience is interesting to me - since after I got home from seeing the Foss Lake OK tornado on 10/9/2001 I was saying how I could chase for 30 more years and never top that. Then after thinking about it more I realized there would be more great storms to come along that would be unique in their own way - and sure enough Mulvane happened.

As for missing tornadoes and chase opportunites....they bother me less and less the more experience I get. The ones that really bothered me though were ones I actually did see something interesting but wasn't able to get good pictures or video....those to me in some ways stung even worse than seeing nothing at all. Either way, the bad chases don't change the fact I've had good chases in the past - and they won't change the fact there will be better chases in the future.