Tornado or not?

[Gabe Garfield]

LOL I'm not making my decision based soley on the data... I have seen well over a thousand storms in the past few years of chasing, and from what I can see from the picture(s) is a high-based, outflow dominant thunderstorm (with a linear lowering).
[/b]

How can you tell that the storm is outflow dominated? Outflow dominance in a storm is sometimes difficult to assess even when you have 360 degrees of viewing freedom. If I remember correctly, there were several chasers (some quite experienced) who erroneously thought the Hiawatha, KS supercell of June 4th, 2005 had become outflow dominated. Much to their chagrine, the storm produced a highly photogenic tornado only minutes after they left the storm. I don't see how you can obtain this important information from a photo that only shows a very small portion of the storm.

Gabe

 

[Tony Lyza]

I'm certain that this was a wall cloud. This is a picture of the view from my house:
[attachmentid=365]

This is from my friend's a mile or so west of me. It shows the back of the wall cloud, and the dowburst (with the 75 MPH winds) that followed:

I know that I've already posted these pics, but I'm trying to make my case here.

 

[rdale]

It's really not a big deal... The friends pic doesn't really show anything that resembles a wall cloud to me, let alone rotation. But we've completely concluded over and over that you can make such a determination from a pic (or two.) All this started off with was figuring out if what you saw in the very first post was a tornado - and it clearly was not.

 

[nickgrillo]

I'm sorry if I sounded like I made the judgement to determin outflow dominance in the storm too quickly (or too loosely) -- but I guess I've seen too many storms identical to this one around this region during the late spring and summer (and tended to make the quick calls based on the two photographs and my own expierence and observations).

1. There was virtually no environmental flow on the 29th anywhere east of the cold frontal boundary (drapped across the eastern Dakotas and curved southwestward) -- with absolutely no mid-upper flow to seperate the updraft from the downdraft (which results in inflow being cutoff from the updraft -- which leads to quick termination of "pulse" cells).
2. All of the deep convection initiated well east of the boundary -- in zones of low-level WAA and lake breeze boundaries (especially in the case of the northern IL cluster) from differential heating.
3. Large dewpoint depressions and dry adiabatic low-level lapse rates from excessive surface heating allowed for plentiful evaporative cooling / downburst potential to occur with all of the storms (with many of the stronger cells dumping marginally severe hailstones and strong downbursts across the region during the afternoon).

All of the convection was made up of "pulse" (i.e. short duration) convective bands/clusters that ingested ample amounts of boundary layer buoyancy (some areas containing 3000-4000 j/kg SBCAPE) -- yet no environmental shear anywhere in the region.

I'm sorry, but I see nothing that represents a wall cloud anywhere in those images.

 

[Marc Austin]

I'm sorry, but I see nothing that represents a wall cloud anywhere in those images.[/b]

I agree. I personally don't see anything that appears to be a wall cloud or a tornado. I do see what appears to be a very heavy rain/hail core and very strong winds can indeed be expected from such a storm. I understand that one photo, even two.. hell.. even a half dozen pictures of this type cannot verify a torndo, but they also cannot deny that there might have been some circulation in the clouds above... this has already been determined throughout this thread. Nick... I wasn't negating your arguments, I am just tired of people with large egos ignoring plain and simple observation and opting to not issue warnings at times when people's lives and property may be at risk. Your arguments seemed sensible and rational... Other's who have posted to this thread seem to have let their egos leak out into their comments. I don't see a tornado here, but for all I know, it's wrapped up in rain and hail. And as Paul, my brother mentioned, there is no need for a wall cloud in order for there to be a tornado. Just because you are good at interpreting radar imagery doesn't mean that you can tell me what I saw and what I witnessed... that's basically my point and I think some people could benefit from it.

 

[rdale]

I don't sense anyone posting with an ego... If you recall (way back in the beginning) he posted an image saying that the radar indicated rotation. The radar image does NOT indicate rotation. Can a tornado occur without rotation on radar? Certainly. But if part of your "proof" of a tornado is rotation on radar, but it's a misinterpretation, the proof fails ;>

Again there is no tornado in that picture. Nobody (now) says there is. Or that there was one before, or after. Tony made it clear he did not report a tornado and did not see evidence of one. So given 1) spotter says no tornado 2) damage indicates no tornado 3) radar shows no rotation 4) environment doesn't support tornado 5) no pictures show a tornado - it is safe to say, without anyone's ego being hit, that there was no tornado with that storm.