Storm Chasing Hates?

[Justin Walker]

High Risk Days!!!! :shock:

 

[Scott Olson]

- Power adapter going out and not charging the computer no longer/ HP screen not bright enough when not plugged in. Both chase cars I've used this year have had this problem where they cannot keep powering a laptop after a while.

- Chasers that pass driving extreme speeds
- People that glorify or glamorize storm chasing to make money.
- Insects in the car (I think that was mentioned but I hate trying to kill mosquitoes while driving.)
- Gas prices!!!
- Going 500 miles to have a tornado or supercell near where I live. (Happened twice this year.)
- Chasers parking on the interstate.
- out of focus tornado footage

 

[Jerry Funfsinn]

Stuck driving behind semis hauling dead cows stacked over the boards ruining the fresh Nebraska air.

 

[bill mudd]

how about this: checking into a motel that is so discusting that you simply end up sleeping in your car and using the shower only.

 

[Mike Hollingshead]

how about this: checking into a motel that is so discusting that you simply end up sleeping in your car and using the shower only.

Camelot Inn in Amarillo TX? Jeans with an all white wife-beater on was required to get in. You also had to make whoever was with you scream a few times in the night. My room was lacking toliet paper, but not only that, it was lacking a place for toliet paper to hang. I looked. Those black beetles everyone saw roaming around TX in 2001, well they all came from those motel rooms. I noticed there seemed to be a bump in the mattress. I lifted up the top one and there was a dead guy stuffed in there. Ok, I'm making that part up, but it was quite bad.

 

[Bob Schafer]

HP screen not bright enough when not plugged in

Try this: As your computer is booting, press F2. That oughta bring up a menu of settings for your computer. Be careful to read the instructions at the bottom about how to change pages and settings, etc., because you don't want to mess up your settings. You should find a setting in there for screen brightness when on battery power. Bump it up as wished, but of course you will be reducing battery time.

I hope that works.

Bob

(Edited to correct to "F2")

 

[joel ewing]

Standing in the road trying to flag down a bunch of chasers that were speeding westbound in a chaser's caravan from a dying supercell in the badlands of south dakota this past june...and not one soul having the courtesy to stop. The lone exception was a chaser from texas who I begged to stop... finally he did...then rudely blew me off and sped away. For all they knew, I might have had a chase partner who was having a heart attack. Thank God I didn't.
Absolutely sickening, and completely, completely selfish.
And yeah........I remember who it was...and no....I won't forget. Am I bitter....you decide.

 

[Patrick Kerrin]

Those black beetles everyone saw roaming around TX in 2001

LOL Those were unreal! I stayed one night at the Super 8 in MAF and they were EVERYWHERE - on the sidewalks, on the wall, in your room. It was like a B horror movie.

Lots mentioned by many - I'll add a few...

Having had two occasions where I could chase for 4 weeks and having it be in 1992 and 1994.

Having only one week vacations and a ridge and then franticly chasing to get SOMETHING/ANYTHING on the last few days (1996 & 1997)

Have BIG days on the day that you fly back or on the day after you fly back (1995 & 1997 - and Jarrell was the next day and having a nowcaster who was ALL OVER that event and would have certainly mentioned the potential to me that morning)

Watching Supercells in NE OK from 40,000 feet as you fly back (1997 - actually it was kinda cool!)

Chasing alone.

The 55 mile an hour speed limit.

Backbuilding storms

Cold Fronts

Cold Fronts that won't stop plunging S

Chaser Interia ("must keep driving") - cost me the SC KS stuff on 25 May 1997 as I drove up I35 through Wellington, Harper, Anthony, and then down to Kiowa. Stopped and watch my first horseshoe vorts and the kept moving to the NW and N and ended up in Sawyer and saw NOTHING.

Hearing about tornadic storms up along the W Front and getting drawn N - and not having access to data (even a sfc map) to reinforce the notion that I was is where I wanted to be and keep me on my forecast (see Chaser Inertia above)

Pumping $10 gas (sucessfully!) in Arkansas City, KS in the dark in Bear's Cage wrapping raincurtains and with the sirens going off.

Almost running out of gas

Not knowing you're driving in "Drive" and NOT "Overdrive" for long enough to almost run out of gas.

Food Poisoning

Tossing one's cookies under mammatus and missing the ST Elmos Fire on my antenna

Mosquitos NE of LBB

Childress motel prices

but even with all the foregoing, the WORST one is:

Not being down there on years when I couldn't chase. :?

 

[brody_clifton]

My number 1 storm chasing hate has to be muddy clay roads, and after this year's chase vacation I vow to never again drive down a wet one on a chase no matter what. Below is a list of my chase hates all occuring sequentially during one 2-day event this year.

Starting at June 11, 2005, near Wayside, TX, about 7:45PM central time:

1. Making dumb chase moves:
Having spent the past two hours in pefect position just due south/SE of a supercell's four mesos, almost from cell birth, and then deciding it would be a good idea to make an 80-mile detour circle around the Caprock just to try to reposition a few miles east of current location. Watching the many lowerings disappear into the horizon as you drive farther and farther south away from the cell.

2. Delorme SA 2005 "roads" / Not listening to my instincts:
60 miles into the process of detour, seeing on Delorme what looks like a good "shortcut" TX county road cutting NW back towards the storm. After driving 1/2 mile down a clay road, currently dry at the time, seeing 6" deep tire ruts carved into it, and not listening to a gut feeling that it would be better to just turn around.

3. Muddy clay roads / Cows & bulls:
Continuing thirteen more miles, at speeds from 20-45mph, down "shortcut" on 4-cylinder Mazda with 13" wheels, as road gets muddier by the mile, having to stop several times and blow the horn to make the cows move out out of your way. Then after driving around a moderate curve with only 4 miles left to go to get off the road, seeing 80 percent of road 100ft. ahead covered in water, and not being able to slow down enough to avoid being sucked into the deepest section of the giant mud puddle, as your sensitive electronics lying on your passenger side floorboard quickly become engulfed under a foot of muddy water, instantly frying your WxWorx receiver.

4. Being stuck anywhere near the path of an approaching supercell at night/ Mosquitoes:
Having to huddle up in the driver's side backseat of your vehicle for 6 hours, after finally successfully describing what exactly this road is and where its located to the locals, and then waiting on the nearest tow service from 18 miles away to risk getting stuck themselves in order to come drag you out. Eying through the lightning for the past 90 minutes a suspicious cloud to ground lowering slowly making a b-line directly at you, and contemplating where to safely avoid tornadic winds should they occur in the pasture/wilderness area you are in. And adding fuel to the frustration, the 50 mosquitoes trapped inside your vehicle that have decided you make a great supper.

5. Having a late start on a chase day that has terrific severe parameters in place:
After being pulled out of the mud and water at 2pm the next afternoon, you make your way to the nearest carwash and spend 3 hours sccoping the muddy water out from the interior with a 32 oz styrofoam cup, and finally get the car decent enough to chase in at 5pm.

6. Missing all the action from a storm due to arriving to it late / Being very low on gas with no towns nearby:
With no data due to electronic failure to equipment from H2O, you make a feeble attempt at chasing the old way, with only your eyes for data. After driving what seems like an eternity towards a mammoth anvil far to your south, you finally approach the rear updraft area of a long dying supercell, learning from other chasers at a gas station you finally reach on fumes that the storm produced multiple significant tornadoes, some very large, around the time you had finally gotten the water scooped out of your vehicle 120 miles due north of it.

 

[Bill Tabor]

All this stuff mentioned which just keeps reminding me of of more. Seems we have only hit the tip of the iceburg of things that drive us crazy while chasing or chase related. All those things that just annoy the hell out of you which come and pass and you have mental thoughts about it while driving but then you just forget about it - on to the next thing.

It's a wonder any of us every get out the door to chase! Then again perhaps that just shows how rewarding and how much of an "adventure" chasing can be. Is it possible that all these crazy things actually add to what actually makes chasing great? When you finally bag that perfect photogenic tube that you've driven thousands of miles for perhaps that is just part of what makes it that much greater of a real reward!!

 

[John Gnuechtel]

Here's a few of mine in no particular order:

- Hordes of flies using your vehicle as a refuge from the winds
- Old men in pickups who refuse to leave the passing lane
- People without cruise control passing you going downhill, and then getting in your way going uphill (for 50 miles at a time)
- People without cruise control using you as a pace car
- Accidentally knocking your still camera off of manual shooting mode
- Motels that don't have the Cartoon Network (gotta watch my Adult Swim)
- Performing preventative maintenance on your vehicle at unfamiliar garages
- Gas station sandwiches

 

[Dave Lewison]

- Crazy W. TX deer that are able to time their sprint across the highway such that they run headfirst into the SIDE of your car without warning.

- The mean librarian in Woodward OK.

And my favorite:
- The old creepy gay cowboy that tried to pick up me and my chase partner with promises of a group soak in the hotel's whirlpool for free. I've never left a hotel so fast in my life!!
SIDE PERK: Rolling through small towns and having cute girls wave at you because they've never seen a real chaser before. :wink:

BTW, Mike H...you actually STAYED at the Camelot Inn in AMA? I'm so sorry! I was told to avoid it in 1997, and haven't ventured near it since!

 

[Aric Cylkowski]

My biggest chase hates?

Endless road construction on the best chasing paths.

Thick groves of trees that can quite literally hide the tornado until its on top of you.

I'm not going to get more into the specifics, but this all goes to a one word summary:

Michigan.