Dan Robinson
EF5
In baseball, a "check swing" is when a batter indecisive about an incoming pitch has to start the motion of a swing before deciding whether or not to follow through.
In storm chasing, there are instances when available data is still unclear about an upcoming day's potential, but the clock is ticking on your latest possible departure time. Eventually, this period of indecision can reach the critical point when further delaying departure will leave insufficient time to travel to the target (considering the drive time and in the case of a long-distance trip, the time needed to sleep). Further delaying the decision past that critical point is effectively a no-go call, as you won't reach the target in time. In those cases, you have no choice but to begin the drive to the target until there is enough information to make a go/no-go decision. If it's a "go", you continue on to the target. If it's a "no-go", you turn around and go home. I've called these "check swing" chase trips.
I usually have several check swing chases each year that range from 1 to 2 hours before turning around. My longest one was last May, when I drove four hours toward Oklahoma for the event on the 11th before being discouraged by the lagging upper support, likely HP storms and instability-threatening clouds. That particular decision turned out to be the wrong one, as the Oklahoma setup ended up producing (analogous to a "called strike" in baseball terms).
How many of these have you had to do? What is your longest one? Do you have another name for the start-the-drive-then-turn-around trip?
In storm chasing, there are instances when available data is still unclear about an upcoming day's potential, but the clock is ticking on your latest possible departure time. Eventually, this period of indecision can reach the critical point when further delaying departure will leave insufficient time to travel to the target (considering the drive time and in the case of a long-distance trip, the time needed to sleep). Further delaying the decision past that critical point is effectively a no-go call, as you won't reach the target in time. In those cases, you have no choice but to begin the drive to the target until there is enough information to make a go/no-go decision. If it's a "go", you continue on to the target. If it's a "no-go", you turn around and go home. I've called these "check swing" chase trips.
I usually have several check swing chases each year that range from 1 to 2 hours before turning around. My longest one was last May, when I drove four hours toward Oklahoma for the event on the 11th before being discouraged by the lagging upper support, likely HP storms and instability-threatening clouds. That particular decision turned out to be the wrong one, as the Oklahoma setup ended up producing (analogous to a "called strike" in baseball terms).
How many of these have you had to do? What is your longest one? Do you have another name for the start-the-drive-then-turn-around trip?
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