Most
intense moment for me June 30th this year after being in MN the night before.
Darin Brunin and I had little sleep and decided what the heck on a 2 percent day, and targeted SE KS. We observe a nice shelf east of Overbrook , get blasted for awhile till we hit Lyndon KS, where we hear of a tornado warning in coffey county IIRC. So we haul arse towards it, find ourselves under the rotation and behind some highway patrol cars near Beto's Junction, and watch it go outflow dominant as it passes by. We meet up with Eric B' Hymer shortly after, and hear of a new cell to our west near Matfield Green. Our nowcasters guided us to the right storm
.
We see a base and a wall cloud starting to form near madison. We head west of Madison, where wall cloud is now in clear sight, rotating slightly. The cell makes a right turn, so we head south to watch this thing rotate like crazy, (Eric calls it in, it's now tornado warned) stopping shortly to take pictures feeling nickels hit our back. We continue to drive south, as the wall is now directly to our south and less than one mile away. Behind us is the core from hell, and we can't stay ahead of the storm, thanks to the poor road network, and get SLAMMED. After gripping the steering wheel, and trying to drive through 60-70 mph winds and some small hail we make it out.
End of part 1.
Thanks to a bridge being repaired we cant get south, so we must go back north and east to catch the tornado-warned cell. After navigating through the infamous flint hill road network, we are now on the NW side of the storm. Quick gas fill up at Yates center. (LOL, storm was passed, and they sounded the tornado sirens AFTER it was gone) Hearing reports of funnel clouds, frustrated, we make it to Buffalo, where Mike Johnston informs us would be a good spot to be. So we head south of there and head east with Eric in front. He calls it a day, we core punch it to the east and now south heading to parsons trying to stay away from the baseball hail being reported. At this time we are about 5 miles north of parsons when we hear of a half mile wide tornado on the ground 4 miles north east of parsons. Very low visibility so i head east on some dirt road, then south again, towards mccune? Can't remember the town east of parsons. It's now dark and the tornado is on the ground somewhere a mile or two in front of us (from reports). That's when the hail begins, nothing big, then bigger, then it just pours golfball-tennisball size hail with winds I couldn't measure but would estimate >70 mph. This lasts for an eternity.
We head back to parsons. Try to head home, where we get blasted by an MCS near Eerie. I have never been
sick of storms, but that day, I could have cared less. Awesome lightning show on the way home.
Most intense moment and most
frustrating moment for me. I think SPC has 8 tornadoes that touched down that day into missouri (tornado warned through 8 plus counties, IIRC) from that storm, and we were there from the beginning, just couldn't get ahead of it. *sigh* 2005 for me.
