It's been a fun ride, but this is gonna be my last post. For now at least, I may do it again when we go out with SLT in a couple of weeks, but we'll see. Either way, solo chase 2010 is now over. It's been a fun and exciting ride. I've learned a lot about weather as well as a lot about this country. The people out here are so incredibly polite and just plain nice. Life is so relaxed, people just don't seem to get hung up on crap the way we do in the northeast. That said...I miss home. Gonna be nice to get back home to my normal life.
Yesterday was probably the toughest day I've experienced since I've begun storm chasing. The set up was so dynamic. It was local. The chase country was flat and scenic. The only thing missing was storms. Our original target yesterday was a small town called Tecumseh in southeast Nebraska. We arrived in Tecumseh with the expectation that storms were going to explode rapidly. The atmosphere was incredibly unstable, to the point where you could feel it just being outside. It was brutally hot and tangibly humid, the kind of atmosphere where you would expect violent thunderstorms. Well...it just never happened. The cap was too strong. The cap is a layer of warm air a couple of thousand feet above ground level that suppresses condensation, thus not allowing clouds to form. Long story short, we "blue sky busted", as no storms fired in our target area. What an incredible disappointment it was. After waiting around for hours in Tecumseh, we called it a day around 6 pm, when the SPC issued a discussion that all but confirmed our fears that storms would not be occurring, or at least in a form that could produce tornadoes (a line of thunderstorms would go later, but nothing that would be remotely tornadic).
In any event, we went back to Adam's in Lee's Summit for the night, where we are again today. I leave tomorrow on a 645 am CST flight and will be home in the early afternoon.
I would like to extend my great thanks to Adam for making this all happen, as well as his family for graciously having me for the past three days. They have been so very hospitable to me, and I can't be grateful enough.
So the final statistics:
Confirmed tornadoes: 3
Possible tornadoes: 3
Supercells: 4
Largest hail (seen by me): Pea to penny size
Pizza Huts: 18
Well, that's it. Thank you and I hope you enjoyed reading my blog. I'll be sure to do it again next year.
Wednesday, June 2, 2010
Tuesday, June 1, 2010
Ouch...
Well yesterday was tough to swallow. figuring it was too marginal to chase, Adam and I, along with just about every other chaser in the world sat out of the tornadofest that was SE Colorado yesterday. Here is a picture taken by Roger Hill (www.stormchase.net/www.silverliningtours.com) of a tornado from a cyclical supercell over Baca County, Colorado yesterday. Never again will we be doubting the magic of Eastern Colorado...
In any event, rather than taking a chance yesterday, we hedged all of our bets on today, thinking it had potential to be a big tornado day. We ended up going to a Memorial day BBQ at one of Adam's family friend's lake front house in Lake Winnabego, MO, where we had a blast riding jet-ski's. It was my first time and I really enjoyed it. We made it all the way back to the dock without flipping over, then go figure, we tried to dock the jet ski and proceeded to flip right into the lake. Of course being the genius that I am, I didn't remove my one and only shirt before going on the jet ski, thus soaking it in the process.
So back to today. For a couple of days, today has looked like a half-way decent set-up on the GFS model, whereas the NAM model was a little less bullish. Well unbelievably, the GFS model, which generally in the short term is less accurate than the NAM is appearing to come to fruition today. As I write this, the Storm Prediction Center is in the process of upgrading today's risk to moderate, something we have not seen so far during our chase. They talk about the increased risk of Tornadoes, large hail and strong wind, mainly in IA ad NE. Iowa is yet to see a tornado this year, something that has never happened this late in the season since records began. We are hoping to change that today! So with that, we are gonna take off for somewhere near Beatrice, NE in about a half hour, which should leave us plenty of time before storm initiation. Beatrice should give us good road options in any direction on what could be a real good day. As always, there is plenty of bust potential today, but for me its the best setup we've had since the beginning of the trip. Tomorrow may hold some promise too, but it sure looks like our chance is today. Wish us luck!
PH count is now at 16.
In any event, rather than taking a chance yesterday, we hedged all of our bets on today, thinking it had potential to be a big tornado day. We ended up going to a Memorial day BBQ at one of Adam's family friend's lake front house in Lake Winnabego, MO, where we had a blast riding jet-ski's. It was my first time and I really enjoyed it. We made it all the way back to the dock without flipping over, then go figure, we tried to dock the jet ski and proceeded to flip right into the lake. Of course being the genius that I am, I didn't remove my one and only shirt before going on the jet ski, thus soaking it in the process.
So back to today. For a couple of days, today has looked like a half-way decent set-up on the GFS model, whereas the NAM model was a little less bullish. Well unbelievably, the GFS model, which generally in the short term is less accurate than the NAM is appearing to come to fruition today. As I write this, the Storm Prediction Center is in the process of upgrading today's risk to moderate, something we have not seen so far during our chase. They talk about the increased risk of Tornadoes, large hail and strong wind, mainly in IA ad NE. Iowa is yet to see a tornado this year, something that has never happened this late in the season since records began. We are hoping to change that today! So with that, we are gonna take off for somewhere near Beatrice, NE in about a half hour, which should leave us plenty of time before storm initiation. Beatrice should give us good road options in any direction on what could be a real good day. As always, there is plenty of bust potential today, but for me its the best setup we've had since the beginning of the trip. Tomorrow may hold some promise too, but it sure looks like our chance is today. Wish us luck!
PH count is now at 16.
Sunday, May 30, 2010
Why I will no longer be watching storm chasers on the discovery channel...oh and the weather channel? Forget that...
First, a brief synopsis of yesterday. Yesterday we waited around North Platte then jetted up to Hyannis, NE in hopes of getting a nice storm to go. Storms exploded at roughly 21z (4 pm) just north of Hyannis. Contrary to what normally occurs, the storms were moving northwest, as that was the direction of the prevailing wind. Shear was not great yesterday, as was evident with the storm mode. We ended up "chasing" a massive high precipitation blob, full of monster hail and flooding rain up into Cherry County, Nebraska. For those of you not familiar with Cherry County, it is roughly the size of Rhode Island...and has one road. You read that right. One road. We sampled the storm a bit, but knowing that all it was gonna do was blast us with baseball hail, we decided to get outta dodge before that one road was overtaken by the storm. We ended up going back to the same hotel in North Platte for the night.
One big gripe from yesterday though. It is totally clear that there are some people out there who are willing to do anything for the almighty dollar...even put other innocent people in danger. I'm talking about you Tony Laubach. Tony is a fairly well respected chaser based outta Denver who is a main chaser on the discovery channel's "Storm Chasers". Up until yesterday I had no reason to have anything other than the utmost respect for the guy. In fact, two posts ago I posted a link to his video from last Tuesday. Well, I can no longer say that.
While trying to approach the storm, which was cozily nestled in the scenic sand hills of Nebraska, we found ourselves on a highway with a speed limit of 55. Now this is important as being that it was in the sand hills, the highway was full of very sudden twists and turns. We felt that a fairly safe speed on this highway was 60 to 65 miles per hour. While doing a speed somewhere in that range, Tony and his three car/van caravan decided it best to tailgate us until we were doing almost 80, at which point they got sick of being behind us, and decided to pass us, scowls on their faces. Fine. Whatever.
So we finally get on the storm, where in order to assure ourselves of not only a nice view, but a decent escape route as well, we pull onto some kind of driveway that lead up to a real nice house on top of a hill. We stop their briefly to watch the storm get closer. Upon noticing the monster hail core beginning to come down the road in front of us, we decide it best to turn around and make our escape. Upon turning around we were pleasantly surprised to see Tony and all of his cameramen standing in the middle of the road, blocking our exit. They finally decided to allow us to go through, and we were able to get out just in time. Fine. Whatever.
It was this last straw though that finally broke the camels back. As if it was not enough that they had almost had an accident with us getting to the storm, and then almost forcing us to get stuck in a violent hail core, Tony and his "twistex" group decided to once again tailgate us through the sand hills...AWAY FROM THE DAMN STORM! At this point, we were no longer even chasing. We were merely heading back for the night. But apparently that didn't matter to Tony and his crew. No, they needed to make sure they got back to where ever they had to go faster than the speed of sound. At one point, we found ourselves going 87 miles per hour with three cars trying to pass us! Finally they did pass us...at which point they probably did close to 100 miles per hour back into the small town of Mullen, NE, where they were finally forced to slow down. I can tell you this. After seeing what the people on that show are like in real life (I already hated Reed Timmer, who is the big guy on the show), I don't think I'll be watching anymore, something that given how much I enjoyed the show, truly upsets me to write.
So I guess I'm done ranting...for now...
So today was strictly a travel day. Woke up this morning in North Platte after the cold front went through to mid 60's temps and a brisk north-northwest wind. Not exactly conducive to severe weather to say the least. Not seeing much tomorrow (although I wouldn't be surprised see a couple of storms real late in the Texas panhandle tomorrow), we decided to head to Adam's house (big thanks to him and his family for having me) in Lee's Summit, MO (near Kansas City) for a couple of days. The rest of our chase looks like it's gonna be further east than where we've been, so it puts us in good position for what could be a couple of good days to end the chase. Tuesday and Wednesday appear to have great potential, but could go the other way real quick. We'd obviously love to squeeze another good day in before the end, but having seen three, maybe more tornadoes, as well as about five supercells, I really can not complain about the trip. I really like what the GFS does with the wind profiles on Tuesday, so hopefully that can come to fruition. One person on a storm chase board that I am on likened the set-up Tuesday to May 22, 2004, when a 2.5 mile wide tornado touched down in Hallam, NE. That wouldn't suck.
Before I go, its time for one more rant.
I have to say though over the last couple of days I have learned not to trust anything supposed severe weather expert Dr. Greg Forbes says. Dr. Forbes is the "severe weather expert" for the weather channel, and is fairly well respected in the meteorological community. The reason I am so upset with Dr. Forbes is this. Every day for the past week or so, on his Facebook, Dr. Forbes has talked about possible tornadoes in a large number of states, including some in places where the National Weather Service's Storm Prediction Center outlines as areas where storms would not even occur. Moreover, Dr. Forbes has for two days now talked about a possible tornado outbreak on Wednesday in this area, and then ever more interestingly, in NEW JERSEY on Thursday. That is just not going to happen. NONE of the models show anything conducive to a tornado outbreak for either of those days. What's more, very few of the NWS hazardous weather outlooks for those areas even talk about severe thunderstorms.
Now Dr. Forbes is in a position where it is his responsibility to give a good forecast without causing any kind of unnecessary nervousness. What he does on these facebook updates is incredibly irresponsible. He broad-brushes multiple areas where tornadoes will be possible, rarely with tornadoes actually occurring. To insinuate that a tornado outbreak is even possible, in an area where all it will do is cause people to become scared is not fair to his viewers and followers. People on Facebook are already starting to become nervous about an outbreak in their area.
There will be no tornado outbreak on Wednesday nor on Thursday. If we see even ONE tornado in NJ on Thursday I will be INCREDIBLY surprised.
As a chaser, god knows I hope he is correct in his saying that tornadoes will occur on those days, but as someone who can make a forecast, even at my level of ability, I know he is incorrect. Dr. Forbes may have once been great...but now he is clearly burnt out. Time for good ol' Doc Forbes to hang em up.
FINALLY...one last important thing. PH count is up to 15. Only seen one buffet though :(
One big gripe from yesterday though. It is totally clear that there are some people out there who are willing to do anything for the almighty dollar...even put other innocent people in danger. I'm talking about you Tony Laubach. Tony is a fairly well respected chaser based outta Denver who is a main chaser on the discovery channel's "Storm Chasers". Up until yesterday I had no reason to have anything other than the utmost respect for the guy. In fact, two posts ago I posted a link to his video from last Tuesday. Well, I can no longer say that.
While trying to approach the storm, which was cozily nestled in the scenic sand hills of Nebraska, we found ourselves on a highway with a speed limit of 55. Now this is important as being that it was in the sand hills, the highway was full of very sudden twists and turns. We felt that a fairly safe speed on this highway was 60 to 65 miles per hour. While doing a speed somewhere in that range, Tony and his three car/van caravan decided it best to tailgate us until we were doing almost 80, at which point they got sick of being behind us, and decided to pass us, scowls on their faces. Fine. Whatever.
So we finally get on the storm, where in order to assure ourselves of not only a nice view, but a decent escape route as well, we pull onto some kind of driveway that lead up to a real nice house on top of a hill. We stop their briefly to watch the storm get closer. Upon noticing the monster hail core beginning to come down the road in front of us, we decide it best to turn around and make our escape. Upon turning around we were pleasantly surprised to see Tony and all of his cameramen standing in the middle of the road, blocking our exit. They finally decided to allow us to go through, and we were able to get out just in time. Fine. Whatever.
It was this last straw though that finally broke the camels back. As if it was not enough that they had almost had an accident with us getting to the storm, and then almost forcing us to get stuck in a violent hail core, Tony and his "twistex" group decided to once again tailgate us through the sand hills...AWAY FROM THE DAMN STORM! At this point, we were no longer even chasing. We were merely heading back for the night. But apparently that didn't matter to Tony and his crew. No, they needed to make sure they got back to where ever they had to go faster than the speed of sound. At one point, we found ourselves going 87 miles per hour with three cars trying to pass us! Finally they did pass us...at which point they probably did close to 100 miles per hour back into the small town of Mullen, NE, where they were finally forced to slow down. I can tell you this. After seeing what the people on that show are like in real life (I already hated Reed Timmer, who is the big guy on the show), I don't think I'll be watching anymore, something that given how much I enjoyed the show, truly upsets me to write.
So I guess I'm done ranting...for now...
So today was strictly a travel day. Woke up this morning in North Platte after the cold front went through to mid 60's temps and a brisk north-northwest wind. Not exactly conducive to severe weather to say the least. Not seeing much tomorrow (although I wouldn't be surprised see a couple of storms real late in the Texas panhandle tomorrow), we decided to head to Adam's house (big thanks to him and his family for having me) in Lee's Summit, MO (near Kansas City) for a couple of days. The rest of our chase looks like it's gonna be further east than where we've been, so it puts us in good position for what could be a couple of good days to end the chase. Tuesday and Wednesday appear to have great potential, but could go the other way real quick. We'd obviously love to squeeze another good day in before the end, but having seen three, maybe more tornadoes, as well as about five supercells, I really can not complain about the trip. I really like what the GFS does with the wind profiles on Tuesday, so hopefully that can come to fruition. One person on a storm chase board that I am on likened the set-up Tuesday to May 22, 2004, when a 2.5 mile wide tornado touched down in Hallam, NE. That wouldn't suck.
Before I go, its time for one more rant.
I have to say though over the last couple of days I have learned not to trust anything supposed severe weather expert Dr. Greg Forbes says. Dr. Forbes is the "severe weather expert" for the weather channel, and is fairly well respected in the meteorological community. The reason I am so upset with Dr. Forbes is this. Every day for the past week or so, on his Facebook, Dr. Forbes has talked about possible tornadoes in a large number of states, including some in places where the National Weather Service's Storm Prediction Center outlines as areas where storms would not even occur. Moreover, Dr. Forbes has for two days now talked about a possible tornado outbreak on Wednesday in this area, and then ever more interestingly, in NEW JERSEY on Thursday. That is just not going to happen. NONE of the models show anything conducive to a tornado outbreak for either of those days. What's more, very few of the NWS hazardous weather outlooks for those areas even talk about severe thunderstorms.
Now Dr. Forbes is in a position where it is his responsibility to give a good forecast without causing any kind of unnecessary nervousness. What he does on these facebook updates is incredibly irresponsible. He broad-brushes multiple areas where tornadoes will be possible, rarely with tornadoes actually occurring. To insinuate that a tornado outbreak is even possible, in an area where all it will do is cause people to become scared is not fair to his viewers and followers. People on Facebook are already starting to become nervous about an outbreak in their area.
There will be no tornado outbreak on Wednesday nor on Thursday. If we see even ONE tornado in NJ on Thursday I will be INCREDIBLY surprised.
As a chaser, god knows I hope he is correct in his saying that tornadoes will occur on those days, but as someone who can make a forecast, even at my level of ability, I know he is incorrect. Dr. Forbes may have once been great...but now he is clearly burnt out. Time for good ol' Doc Forbes to hang em up.
FINALLY...one last important thing. PH count is up to 15. Only seen one buffet though :(
Saturday, May 29, 2010
Waiting...
Sitting here waiting for today's convective initiation in North Platte, Nebraska. Stayed here last night after about a four hour drive from Denver. Today is looking pretty marginal. Storms will go, but only time will tell if they will be supercells. Adam and my current thinking is no, but Vortex 2 just posted on there facebook that sups are a possibility today, so we are hoping they are correct. Tornado threat looks pretty damn low today, but who knows, maybe we can get an accident.
In unrelated news, it is time to fire Jerry Manuel. There is no excuse for taking Johan out of a game where he is pitching a shut out throw 8 complete innings. And to take him out for another lefty? Why?
Finally, a black widow just crawled into our car. Adam proceeded to kill it with his shoe. Pretty creepy to see one in real life.
Anyway, I'll post anything that may happen later.
In unrelated news, it is time to fire Jerry Manuel. There is no excuse for taking Johan out of a game where he is pitching a shut out throw 8 complete innings. And to take him out for another lefty? Why?
Finally, a black widow just crawled into our car. Adam proceeded to kill it with his shoe. Pretty creepy to see one in real life.
Anyway, I'll post anything that may happen later.
Friday, May 28, 2010
Hail from the other day
Check out this video (not mine) of hail from the storm on the 26th. Glad we didn't try to get into it. Wouldn't have ended well.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VPSWQTYrzpQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VPSWQTYrzpQ
Thursday, May 27, 2010
What to do on a down day...
Definitely a down day today. Originally we had been looking at Montana today, but I'm glad we didn't go. At this moment (8.25 MDT) storms are just starting to pop up there, so anything that may mature is gonna do whatever it's gonna do after dark.
In any event, we woke up today with nothing to do. So we figured we'd try to take in the Rockies game. Found some $20 tickets in right field and got there just before the start of the game. For a couple of guys going on a vacation based on weather, you'd think we'd have realized that it was gonna be 97 degrees in Denver today. Well we didn't.
Watched seven innings of the game and just couldn't stand the heat anymore. Being a mile high, you're a mile closer to the sun...something we learned the hard way. I am ROASTED. Burnt to a crisp. Extra well done. Fried. You get it.
Got back to the hotel and chilled for a while, before heading to get this...NOT A PIZZA PLACE...for dinner. We went to a place called Noodles and Company, a great pasta place that apparently is a nicer chain place here in the midwest. Kinda reminded me of Panera but a lot better. If you ever have a chance definitely hit it up.
Tomorrow is again kinda meh. Might be a chase day in Western Nebraska or Northeast Colorado. IF a storm can go up, it will probably do something good, the question tomorrow is really gonna be initiation, at least this far south. Saturday still looks quite good. A bit conditional again however, similar to tomorrow. IF...IF a storm can go, it should be able to spin hard, but will a storm go? We can only hope at this point. Either way we plan on ending up in North Platte, NE tomorrow night, as it gives us nice options for Saturday. It also won't be too far from any storms that we may get tomorrow.
Added two more huts to the list today. 10.
In any event, we woke up today with nothing to do. So we figured we'd try to take in the Rockies game. Found some $20 tickets in right field and got there just before the start of the game. For a couple of guys going on a vacation based on weather, you'd think we'd have realized that it was gonna be 97 degrees in Denver today. Well we didn't.
Watched seven innings of the game and just couldn't stand the heat anymore. Being a mile high, you're a mile closer to the sun...something we learned the hard way. I am ROASTED. Burnt to a crisp. Extra well done. Fried. You get it.
Got back to the hotel and chilled for a while, before heading to get this...NOT A PIZZA PLACE...for dinner. We went to a place called Noodles and Company, a great pasta place that apparently is a nicer chain place here in the midwest. Kinda reminded me of Panera but a lot better. If you ever have a chance definitely hit it up.
Tomorrow is again kinda meh. Might be a chase day in Western Nebraska or Northeast Colorado. IF a storm can go up, it will probably do something good, the question tomorrow is really gonna be initiation, at least this far south. Saturday still looks quite good. A bit conditional again however, similar to tomorrow. IF...IF a storm can go, it should be able to spin hard, but will a storm go? We can only hope at this point. Either way we plan on ending up in North Platte, NE tomorrow night, as it gives us nice options for Saturday. It also won't be too far from any storms that we may get tomorrow.
Added two more huts to the list today. 10.
off day
Well today is looking like a down day. Storms are gonna go but they'll be too far north for us to get them. Gonna take in the Rockies game instead. Tomorrow will probably be a driving day, for a potentially big day Saturday.
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