21 Apr, 2010: Oil tanker fire from 30,000 feet

Left St. Petersburg, FL on Southwest Wednesday afternoon. We flew over the gulf to Houston, and along the way, I snapped these pics of the oil tanker fire with my cellphone. We flew almost directly over it, although at the time, I had no idea what had happened. I just new it was a large fire.





Arrived at Austin about 11 p.m. Prepared quickly for a multi-day chase and tried to get some sleep.

Chase Report: 6 Apr, 2010, Part 2 - Mulhall, OK wall cloud and funnel

Depart Hiawatha, KS: 11:00 a.m.
Arrive Austin, TX: 4:30 a.m.
930 miles, Solo chase
3 day total - 2030 miles

I caught up with Austin chaser Randy Denzer and his partner Cynthia at Perry, OK about 9:00. Reed Timmer was there, too, with the newly designed Dominator. Looks much better than last year's version, from what I saw. I fueled up, and Randy and I hit I-35 south towards Austin.

As soon as we hit 35, we began seeing rapid lightning flashes to our SW. We pulled off and found a good viewing location right off the interstate, near Mulhall, OK.



Our vantage point was relatively elevated, so we had a clear view for a good ways to the SW. There was one cell just to our SW, with a nice tower and RFB putting out continuous lightning. Soon after that, more cells fired to the SSW of the initial cell- a line was forming and backbuilding.

The initial cell was almost stationary, and soon exhibited a nice wall cloud. The tower was almost directly overhead, and would glow from within with the frequent lightning flashes. To the North and East of the tower, the sky was clear and starry. It was truly an incredible sight. At one point, a stout barrel of a wall cloud/funnel cloud formed and began to build toward the ground. The sequence of pictures here begins about 9:30 CDT and spans about 20 minutes. And next time, must remember to turn wipers on intermittent setting...











Shortly thereafter, we began to feel cool outflow, and the cell translated to our NE. The entire line began slowly moving E, so we took off down I-35 to stay ahead of it. Here is the backside of the initial cell:



Stopped once North of OKC to try to observed an area of enhanced shear indicated on GR3. Soon, we were engulfed in blinding rain, and took off south again to try to get back ahead of the line. Emerged from the core south of OKC, and continued southward, stopping once at a scenic overlook to observe the approaching line. Randy almost had a utility truck tip over onto his van, also. That was bascially the end of the excitement for the evening. The initiall cell near Mulhall was one of the more beautiful nighttime cells I have ever encountered. The low-light video captures from the Sony can't even remotely capture what we saw that first 20 minutes after the cell initiated.

We arrived back in Austin about 4:30 a.m., tired and exhausted, but rejuvenated thanks to that last storm.

Chase Report: 6 Apr, 2010, Part 1 - East Kansas Severe Multicell

Depart Hiawatha, KS: 11:00 a.m.
Arrive Austin, TX: 4:30 a.m.
930 miles, Solo chase
3 day total - 2030 miles

Woke up after a nice night's sleep (for a change) in Hiawatha, KS, and drove down to Topeka to eat lunch and plan my strategy for the day. Like on Monday, there were two potential plays. The first would be near the warm front, similar location to Monday, but a little further East and North. The second was eastern KS, down the dryline through Central OK. Parameters were a little better for tornadoes on the warm front, but I opted to drive south and chase in Eastern KS, largely because it was closer to home, and I would be able to chase southward as the day progressed.

The KS target was the first to light up. Unfortunately, mode was instantly multicellular in the form of a long SSW-NNE oriented line. I got to it quickly, as I was only a couple of coutnies away at initiation. Cells were racing NE at 40-50+ mph throught the line, but the line itself was not making much progress eastward. As such, I was able to drive up to it and catch cells as they translated NE.




They were mostly small hail and wind producers. At times, they were quite stunning, with huge dark rainsahafts, green-white hailshafts, and shelf clouds being the order of the day. There was an occasional shelf-cloud lowering which would catch my attention, and maybe one bonafide wall cloud in an updraft region, but I could not keep up with it for long enough to confirm. Various pics of shelf clouds, rain/hail curtains, and mammatus from the daytime storms:









Around 6:30, I gave up and decided to head home. Was on the Kansas turnpike at that time, so I still had many hours to drive. Little did I know that I was in for an after-dark surprise on the trip home...

Chase Report: 5 Apr, 2010 - Funnel cloud near Fortescue, MO

Depart Perry, OK: 9:30 a.m.
Arrive Hiawatha, KS: 11:30 p.m.
630 miles
Solo chase, day 2

After a fitful three hours of train-horn riddled sleep, woke up and headed North from Perry, OK. There were two potential plays. The warm front/Triple point scenario target was SW IA. The dryline play was Central/S KS. I went up to Wichita and waited for a whle trying to decide which area to take. I did not like the prospects of a blue-sky bust for the DL target, so I went the safe route and headed towards KC and the warm front.

Took 44 up to KC, and then went north to St. Joseph's, MO. There were agitated Cu streets going in NE KS/NW MO going much of the afternoon. Saw and briefly filmed a nice horseshoe vortex up somewhere near St. Josephs. As the day waned on, the Cu could not break the cap. Things looked pretty bad, so a little after 7, I headed south to get in position for Tuesday.

About this time, fellow Austin chaser Bill Tabor called and told me about a radar fine line showing up on Topeka, KS moving N in NE KS. I had lost data earlier, so was unaware this had kicked off (thanks, Bill!). I turned west, and about 15 minutes later, started seeing towering Cu and Cb tops in NE KS. This view is looking West across the MO river from I-29 parallel with the KS/NE border, 7:35 CST:

Headed in that direction, and ended up crossing the MO river on 159 at Rulo, NE. By now, the fine line had exploded into an E-W oriented series of 3 supercells (initially 2, but the western cell split, I believe). I got on the leading cell near Falls City and followed it east as it went towards the MO river North of 159.

It was about 8:30, after dark, when lightning illuminated a solid wall cloud to the north of Hwy 159. Terrain made it difficult to see what was going on, but it appeared to have a lowering. I filmed briefly, then repositioned further E to get a better view.

At ~8:40, I found a nice spot to observe along Hwy 159, about 2 miles east of the Missouri River between Rulo, NE and Fortescue, MO.

I got a nice clear view of the wall cloud feature, and noted a definite funnel cloud at around 8:40. Here is a sequence of three shots, spanning ~ 90 seconds. They are video stills taken using the low-light mode of my Sony:

Tried to phone in report, but could not connect to the 800 number (was having numerous problems with phone at the time). I called Austin chaser Randy Denzer to possibly have him relay a report for me, but by then funnel cloud had dissipated. The wall cloud persisted and continued moving east. Chaser Bart Comstock lodged a SN report of the wall cloud at 8:41. Phone went completely dead about this time. The charger had bitten the dust, and it took me a while to locate my backup charger and get the phone going again. Computer also died and had to be rebooted. The usual techno-gadget nonsense that always occurs at the worst possible time.

I turned west towards the western two cells, which both had nice, supercellular appearance on radar (thanks to two KC chasers who were watching the Falls City cell with me for letting me look at their radar). By the time I got to Hiawatha, KS and turned west on 36 to intercept, the cells were weakening. Called it a night and stayed at the Hiawatha Inn (much nicer than the previous night's stay in the Budget Inn in Perry).

Chase Report: 4 Apr, 2010 - Getting there is half the fun?

Depart Austin, TX: 4:30 p.m.
Arrive Perry, OK: 11:30 p.m.
470 miles



Left Austin Sun, Apr 4 at ~4:30 for a multi-day Central plains chase. A series of cells fired up after dark North of OKC. I actually caught the southernmost of these. Saw some nice anvil crawlers, but as I approached it, the cell died.

Arrived Perry, OK ~11:30, where I stayed at the “Budget Inn” for $35. Among the amenities provided by this fine establishment- glass shower doors hanging off the tracks, which caused water to spray everywhere when attempting to shower. I desperately needed sleep, and had to be up early the following morning to forecast and hit the road.

Apparently, I did not notice the train tracks located relatively close to the motel. About every half hour, a train would pass by, laying on its horn the whole time ( I guess car-train accidents are a big problem in Perry, OK at 4 a.m.). Needless to say, I did not sleep well. Fortunately, a lukewarm shower woke me up in the morning, and I headed North.