Andy Wehrle
EF5
Ironically the dark red area is, if you had to pick just one to produce photogenic storms, probably the best you can to in terms of chase terrain.
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State of the Chase Season 2025
- Thread starter Dan Robinson
- Start date
Gotta add the south TX Rio Grande area: “Desperate chasers try to will Mexican supercells across the river but their efforts are futile.”
Jason N
EF5
This might be one of the best maps yet. Poignant, humorous, it gets a Rotten Tornadoes Score of 86.
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John Farley
Supporter
After yesterday's chase, I would say you could fill in some of that white in eastern New Mexico with the "Good luck finding a road within 20 miles of your storm" color. ;-) Getting a bit back on topic, looks like we have several days of decent opportunities upcoming in the southern high plains, before the action eventually shifts north.
JamesCaruso
Staff member
I agree that HP structure can be jaw-dropping. Problem is it’s not as visible unless you back out a few miles. Those trying to get right in the notch won’t have a great view like they might have from under the meso of an LP or Classic. On the latter two, you can see the structure *and* be in the bears cage / close to a tornado, but on an HP you have to choose one or the other, and most choose the tornado.
JamesCaruso
Staff member
Personal performance is a huge variable that can make Quantity more important. You need more at-bats for redemption from the strikeouts.
Andy Wehrle
EF5
Remains to be seen exactly how it'll go, of course, but you have to feel pretty good if you're out there chasing the Southern Plains today through Sunday. As I said earlier, there are ways this season could have gone better but it could certainly have gone worse. Although it hasn't always been easy or quality, at least there's been something to chase out there for the balance of May into early June.
Nice sequence of days over pretty much the same region of the Southern High Plains that wasn't clearly evident on the models a week ago as to where and when the highest-ceiling day(s) would be. Somewhat annoying if you're based east of the Mississippi and try to execute short-notice spot trips to the Alley whenever multi-day setups present themselves (like me or @Dan Robinson), but if you're committed to a chase vacation or on a tour right now it's a pretty good situation.
Nice sequence of days over pretty much the same region of the Southern High Plains that wasn't clearly evident on the models a week ago as to where and when the highest-ceiling day(s) would be. Somewhat annoying if you're based east of the Mississippi and try to execute short-notice spot trips to the Alley whenever multi-day setups present themselves (like me or @Dan Robinson), but if you're committed to a chase vacation or on a tour right now it's a pretty good situation.
Mikaela Norris
EF2
Looks like finally another opportunity is gonna present itself in CO today and tomorrow. I'm in the middle of a long stretch of time off with my kids, and they've been asking to go chasing. They are young though, 7 and 10, so I'm really on the fence. I'm leaning towards not going incase we get into trouble. I don't want to put them in danger. I'm doing yard work today (looking at the radar I'm really cutting it close, hopefully I can finish), but tomorrow if something pops up within an hour of Colorado Springs we may venture out on a VERY conservative chase keeping LOTS of distance. They've seen some structure shots I've taken and really wanna see it. We'll see how it unfolds. Best of luck to everyone heading out over the next few days! There should be some gems out there!
Brett Nickeson
EF2
**taps the dark red part of the chase map**
Dan Robinson
EF5
Yep, a gem of a pattern right now, the sleeper type that you'd normally get a day or two before/after a big trough ejection that gets you out there, but not one that normally gets you there by itself. A score for the vacationers and full-season crowd! Looks like it could be the last sequence of the season for the central/southern Plains.
Jason N
EF5
that storm out of Lubbock yesterday... definintely confirming that Dan ...
JamesCaruso
Staff member
I would encourage you to take your kids chasing if they are showing an interest. What an incredible experience for them and a great bonding opportunity for you all. This could ignite a liefelong interest in weather and chasing. (On second thought, why infect them with the same disease we have LOL). Safety is no issue at all, it’s completely in your control how close you get.
On the other hand, adults need time to themselves for their own pursuits too; completely understandable to want to keep this as your thing. Once they start coming with you, it will be hard to tell them they can’t come every time.
JamesCaruso
Staff member
Had a great couple days in the LBB area (reports to follow when I find some time) that have me feeling much happier about the season. As we all know, just one good day can make a season (or at least a trip) and we are all subject to recency bias when evaluating the state of the season.
I am supposed to be back to my normal work schedule on Monday and should be flying home this weekend, including for an “optional” family event Sunday evening. But now I’m trying to figure out whether to extend a day so I can chase on Sunday. I have not looked at model data yet. SPC seems bullish but it seems the main issue from a chase perspective will be too much forcing and potentially rapid upscale growth. The Norman AFD is curiously silent on the threat relative to SPC, despite their CWA being squarely in the threat area. AMA explicitly mentions the tornado threat being low, as does DDC, while LBB makes a matter of fact reference to tornados without much elaboration.
Hard to turn away from a 5% tornado risk, but at this point I’m looking for reasons *not* to chase. Easier to get home on schedule and travel on the weekend rather than burn more PTO just to travel and get back later than I told everyone at work. Not to turn this into an Events thread, but I would really appreciate others’ thoughts on tomorrow. I’ll be doing some more analysis myself later this morning, and may start an Events thread unless someone beats me to it, but wanted to get this out there in the meantime to gather others’ thoughts. I need to decide today whether to head to DFW for a flight *or* reposition for tomorrow (likely not chasing today regardless).
I am supposed to be back to my normal work schedule on Monday and should be flying home this weekend, including for an “optional” family event Sunday evening. But now I’m trying to figure out whether to extend a day so I can chase on Sunday. I have not looked at model data yet. SPC seems bullish but it seems the main issue from a chase perspective will be too much forcing and potentially rapid upscale growth. The Norman AFD is curiously silent on the threat relative to SPC, despite their CWA being squarely in the threat area. AMA explicitly mentions the tornado threat being low, as does DDC, while LBB makes a matter of fact reference to tornados without much elaboration.
Hard to turn away from a 5% tornado risk, but at this point I’m looking for reasons *not* to chase. Easier to get home on schedule and travel on the weekend rather than burn more PTO just to travel and get back later than I told everyone at work. Not to turn this into an Events thread, but I would really appreciate others’ thoughts on tomorrow. I’ll be doing some more analysis myself later this morning, and may start an Events thread unless someone beats me to it, but wanted to get this out there in the meantime to gather others’ thoughts. I need to decide today whether to head to DFW for a flight *or* reposition for tomorrow (likely not chasing today regardless).
Objectively speaking, commenting first not on how my season has been but the season in general, I think this week did everything to bring it up to average. The structure photos I am seeing as well as a couple photogenic tornadoes are top shelf. What a great week of tornadoes and structure, but like 90% of everything this year, all basically in the TX panhandle or immediately adjacent. I personally hated missing a couple of the best days due to work and social obligations, but such is my luck lately. I cannot call this a bad season though since there finally were opportunities in a chaseable location that were widely acceptable and at least somewhat predictable. For people who can/will only chase northern or central high plains, I still call the season an absolute dud unless something late June or July materializes, but the long range models are more interested in ghost hurricanes than the jet stream and moisture meeting somewhere up north.
It hurt to miss Morton on Thursday due to a rare unmoveable work obligation. I chased Friday and the Boise City > Spearman supercell had its moments but was often shrouded in stratus despite having a lot of potential, a tornado or two and some great concealed structure. As such, no photogenic tornadoes or structure for me this year so far, which is a first and stings a bit. I saw the Akron tornadoes but I was not up taking hail and able to get any of the photogenic angles (such as they were, I still think of that storm as overrated based on photos I have seen better than my own). Last year was similar for me with a few attempts and little for it, but I had one great nighttime structure day that gave me that 'worth it' feeling. I may have to return to the bigger efforts/exense of years past for several multi day chases and more risk of busts to get that 'worth it' feeling, as selective one day chases have failed me the last two seasons.
For many of us TX is a long haul one way, and with subtle setups or overperform days that don't clue you in much before hand, the potential for a one or two day out and back is not a good use of resources at least in concept. I'm noting recently that the jet stream oscillations very much lock in a particula pattern early each spring and don't cycle as naturally as they did before, so there is always one hot stop that frozen pattern overspreads with a long or shortwave and moisture similarly seems to get locked in a pattern for longer rather than surging and retreating. Last year eastern Nebraska was the sweet spot, this year TX panhandle. Actually every year lately the panhandle has been decent. Next year I will change my tactic to again return to multi day chasing regardless of the forecast by planting myself in a suspected hot spot such as the panhandle for a week, and then maybe one other week there or somewhere else.
I'd be curious how others with life obligations or hobbies to balance are choosing to manage the strange seasons we have been having where only certain areas do well and there are few dsitributed one or two day setups to choose from and instead we have these hotspots with often non traditional ingredients like shortwaves and stuck moisture. Are people just chasing everything until they get something good? I have a couple friends that seem to be succeeding on that premise, but I can't be out driving all season despite having decent day to day flexibility on many work days.
It hurt to miss Morton on Thursday due to a rare unmoveable work obligation. I chased Friday and the Boise City > Spearman supercell had its moments but was often shrouded in stratus despite having a lot of potential, a tornado or two and some great concealed structure. As such, no photogenic tornadoes or structure for me this year so far, which is a first and stings a bit. I saw the Akron tornadoes but I was not up taking hail and able to get any of the photogenic angles (such as they were, I still think of that storm as overrated based on photos I have seen better than my own). Last year was similar for me with a few attempts and little for it, but I had one great nighttime structure day that gave me that 'worth it' feeling. I may have to return to the bigger efforts/exense of years past for several multi day chases and more risk of busts to get that 'worth it' feeling, as selective one day chases have failed me the last two seasons.
For many of us TX is a long haul one way, and with subtle setups or overperform days that don't clue you in much before hand, the potential for a one or two day out and back is not a good use of resources at least in concept. I'm noting recently that the jet stream oscillations very much lock in a particula pattern early each spring and don't cycle as naturally as they did before, so there is always one hot stop that frozen pattern overspreads with a long or shortwave and moisture similarly seems to get locked in a pattern for longer rather than surging and retreating. Last year eastern Nebraska was the sweet spot, this year TX panhandle. Actually every year lately the panhandle has been decent. Next year I will change my tactic to again return to multi day chasing regardless of the forecast by planting myself in a suspected hot spot such as the panhandle for a week, and then maybe one other week there or somewhere else.
I'd be curious how others with life obligations or hobbies to balance are choosing to manage the strange seasons we have been having where only certain areas do well and there are few dsitributed one or two day setups to choose from and instead we have these hotspots with often non traditional ingredients like shortwaves and stuck moisture. Are people just chasing everything until they get something good? I have a couple friends that seem to be succeeding on that premise, but I can't be out driving all season despite having decent day to day flexibility on many work days.
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William Monfredo
EF4
Much of what you mention rings true. When I lived in San Marcos, TX for four years, I had an easier time chasing TX events, although I still had much to learn about how to go about it.
I live 15 miles from South Dakota border now, and I often think just wait for the season to work its way north. Used to be June.
But, yeh, if your schedule looks punctuated by days you can go and ones that you can't, agreed, TX becomes an issue.
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