Storm Chasing Opportunity for Chasers from Outside of the U.S.A.

Joined
Oct 14, 2008
Messages
303
Location
Lake Tahoe, CA
Hi Chasers,

I have an offer for any overseas chasers looking to find a chase partner in the U.S. My wife and I want to open our house up to chasers from overseas.

Our names are David and Lisa Williams. We live in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

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(Near Daniel O'Connell's house, Ireland, July 2015)

We love traveling and meeting people from all over the world. This is a great opportunity for us to make some new friends. We have a very comfortable 3 bedroom house in Bixby (a suburb south of Tulsa). You are welcome to stay with us in one of our guest bedrooms. We have no children and no pets. We don't smoke and we don't have a TV (we mostly read and study subjects we are interested in). Together we will be splitting gas, hotels, etc as we chase storms anywhere in the U.S. I have a Camry that will fit 4 including me.


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(Hail Shield with Lexan side panels. Master Builder Pep Washburn in the passenger seat.)

I can only take 3 chasers at a time (Lisa doesn't chase). If we are all splitting gas, hotels, tolls, etc. you can see how cheap this can be for us all. When I accept people to come stay with us, I have to go on a first come first serve basis. I usually do a Skype session with people to see if we will work well together. So, pretty much, if we talk and decide we are a good fit, then you just tell me how long you want to chase with me.

Due to the fact that my wife and I are hosting people, we ask that each person pay $35 a day that they stay/chase with me. This "fee" covers a variety of things. Naturally, you will be staying in our house for some time and we will most likely be feeding our guests and hosting you etc. Also, I have outfitted my vehicle setup to be the most conducive for having a safe and reliable chase experience: I built a hail shield for my car (picture above); I will be purchasing a very powerful amp/antenna for data service (most likely something like Maximum Signal's Max Amp). In addition, it will cover multiple data plans/users at one time. We will be tethering data off of my cell phone via the booster, amp/antenna. Finally, I can't expect everyone to split any car maintenance that comes up. So, I will be covering those costs on my own. There are additional reasons, but I think you get the idea. If you have questions about this, just ask.

As for me, I have been chasing for 11 years. I have spent hundreds of hours studying meteorology; however, I did not go to university for Meteorology. I feel comfortable with meteorology and forecasting. I primarily chase to see tornadoes; although, I do love structure. A nice mothership can really make my day! I will drive long distances to chase something worthwhile. However, I can understand if people want to chase in order to photograph lightning or get distance shots of storms with landscape. One of the reasons I ask for the $35 a day, is that chasers from overseas are very enthusiastic about chasing anything. Naturally, they are only here for a short time, and they want to see anything. I have found myself driving a 12 hour round trip to see rain showers from a distance with some chasers from overseas. There's nothing wrong with that, but it certainly isn't something I would do on my own.

My wife (Lisa) and I are school teachers at an elementary school in Tulsa. Our school year ends on May 18th. If we have snow days, that end day is pushed back. My plan is to chase from the end of my school year (hopefully May 18th) until the end of June. I already have 1 chaser from Sweden that will be here from the end of May through sometime in June. Therefore, I have 2 spaces available for the last 2 weeks of May and the first week of June. If you would like to come stay and chase with me/us, you can respond to this thread or start a conversation with me. If you have general questions, please post them on the thread, and I can answer them publicly just in case anyone else has the same question.

Cheers and we hope to see you soon,
David Williams
 
Quick update for chasers interested in coming over and chasing with us. We have 2 guys from the UK that are going to come out for a couple weeks in June. So if anyone is interested, this means we'll probably only have 1 seat available in the car for the 2nd and 3rd weeks of June. Their dates aren't set yet, so I'll post again when I have specifics.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I337 using Stormtrack mobile app
 
Ok, we have some specific dates in case anyone is thinking about coming out. We have one chaser from Sweden that will be here chasing with me from May 27th until June 8th (His flights are booked). That means we have space for 2 more chasers during that time (if interested in this time, see note below). Also, 2 guys from England will be chasing with me from around June 8th until sometime around June 22nd (flights have not been booked yet). So, that leaves one person able to join us. At this point I haven't had any snow days at work, so I should be out for summer break by May 18th to start chasing full-time.

Another cool thing about chasing here from around that May 18th time until the beginning of June, is that the company that I take helicopter flight lessons with has agreed to take us heli chasing. We will be flying an R44 with 4 seats. Minus me and the pilot leaves 2 seats available for heli chasing if you are here when storms fire in the Oklahoma region. Obviously, circumstances must be excellent to take this opportunity (target area within an hour to an hour and a half of flight time, discrete cells, clear skies apart from a couple cells, daylight only).
 
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