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SW Oklahoma Chase 10/13/2012

Jason Caster and I left Cordell shortly before noon for what at first appeared to be a promising chase day, but in the end yielded only a line of severe storms and little tornadic threat.

Whale's Mouth on advancing line of storms near Ft. Cobb:

Chase stats:
Team Chase: Eugene Thieszen and Jason Caster
Miles: ~200
Tornadoes: 0

Other Recent 2012 Chases:
Lubbock, TX Area Chase 10/12/2012
W-N Texas Chase 05/30/2012
Adrian, TX Solo Chase 05/21/2012

Lubbock, TX Area Chase 10/12/2012

Jason Caster and I left Cordell about mid-morning and met up with Walt Gish in Canyon, TX and we headed out to our initial target about 40 miles WNW of Lubbock.  Nothing developed on the dry-line but eventually some storms, initially with a multi-cellular look, developed in the I-27 corridor NNW of Lubbock.  It took a bit of doing to get into position, but having done so we were treated to an incredible mid-autumn supercell and three tornadoes.

Tornado near Underwood, TX at 7:15 CDT (HD video capture):

Chase Stats: 
Team Chase: Eugene Thieszen, Jason Caster and Walt Gish
Miles: 547
Tornadoes: 3

Other Recent 2012 Chases:
W-N Texas Chase 05/30/2012
Adrian, TX Solo Chase 05/21/2012
Much More Than Expected in South Central Kansas 05/19/2012

W-N Texas Chase 05/30/2012

Walt Gish and I headed out for the Childress, TX area on this chase.  Did not get on target early enough to get in position on the first tornadic supercell, but were treated to an incredible early evening "dust-eater" supercell which we chased from near Paducah down to E of Guthrie.  Witnessed one brief tornado E of Guthrie just after 8:00 CDT.

The "dirt-eater" along US 83 near Grow, TX at about 7:35 CDT:

Brief tornado E of Guthrie as it dissipates at 8:05 CDT.  The well-defined funnel had already disappeared by the time we stopped to take this picture, but the ground circulation remained under what looks like ragged scud:

Chase stats:
Team Chase: Eugene Thieszen and Walt Gish
Miles: 412
Tornadoes: 1 (very brief)

Other Recent 2012 Chases:
Adrian, TX Solo Chase 05/21/2012
Much More Than Expected in South Central Kansas 05/19/2012
Kansas - Oklahoma High Risk 04/14/2012

Adrian, TX Solo Chase 05/21/2012

A couple of pictures from Gene's solo chase to the western TX panhandle on May 21, 2012.  A patient wait eventually resulted in a slow-moving supercell with wonderful structure and a brief tornado near Adrian, TX to top off the day.  Not much to report since I stayed in the same area near Adrian and Vega for most of the afternoon patiently waiting for a supercell to make an appearance on a subtle N-S boundary.  Nearly gave up the wait at about 7:00 pm.  Supercell shot from about 8:32 CDT and the tornado shot from just after 8:37 CDT.

Chase Stats: 
Solo Chase: Eugene Thieszen
Miles: 434
Tornadoes: 1


Other Recent 2012 Chases:
Much More Than Expected in South Central Kansas 05/19/2012
Kansas - Oklahoma High Risk 04/14/2012
Central Oklahoma Surprise 03/21/2012

2012 Chase Season Continues!

Most of May has been rather slow, but perhaps things will pick up as we near the Memorial Day weekend. Certainly Gene and Jason Caster had a really great chase on Saturday, May 19  in South Central Kansas.  Check out the most recent illustrated log here.  More Chases on the  2012 Illustrated Chase Logs page.

Video of Tornado Near Varner, KS 05/19/2012

Much More Than Expected in South Central Kansas 05/19/2012

Chasing is always full of surprises.  Sometimes we head out to a target with hopes of a significant event only to get sunburned in a cap bust.  And sometimes we head out prompted by a bad case of Supercell Deprivation Syndrome (SDS) on what looks to be a probably waste of gas, only to be caught off guard by what we find.  Saturday May 19th, 2012 was such a day.

Gene and Jason Caster met up in Cordell, OK and headed out at about 11:30 am for an initial staging point at Pratt, KS.  As we passed Medicine Lodge a short line of agitated cu was visible to the NW and by the time we arrived in Pratt to fuel up and set up for the chase we had towering cu and before long some rather high-based cells which we observed for a bit from the Wal-Mart parking lot.  First good sign that this would be a memorable chase...initiation within 25 miles of our staging point.   Eventually we headed N toward St. John and then E on US 50 toward Stafford encountering a bit of penny-sized hail on the way.  We set up on an initial observing point just E of Stafford at noted that, although the storm bases were quite elevated, there was some strong cloud-level rotation as RFD cut into the storm as it moved ENE.

Deeply-cut RFD slot with all kinds of crazy motion near Stafford at 4:01 CDT:

Video of Cherokee, OK Tornadoes 04/14/2012

Dance of the Twins:

Tornado narrowly misses farmyard:

Kansas - Oklahoma High Risk 04/14/2012

Two members of the WXtreme Chase Team, Walt Gish and Eugene Thieszen departed Cordell at about 10:00 am for an initial staging point of Medicine Lodge, KS with a brief stop in Enid to pick up Jason Caster.  The third chase team member, Eric Sipes, traveled with John Hall and Ashley Mills for more or less the same target area.  While on the way a PDS tornado watch was issued for the target area and storms began to develop NE of Meade, KS and move toward the Bucklin area.  There were reports of some brief tornadoes with those cells.  So, instead of staging in Medicine Lodge as planned, we headed toward Coldwater to refuel and strategize.  By that time a new supercell was ongoing to the S near the Oklahoma border so we headed E along US 160 to intercept it on its NE course.  Setting up on the Aetna Road, we observed its approach.  It developed a large wall cloud and perhaps a few brief funnels, but no tornado seemed imminent.

View to the SW from Aetna Road at 3:58 CDT:

SW Oklahoma HP 04/13/2012

Chase log coming...

Anticylonic Satellite Tornado near Sharon, OK 04/09/2012

Woodward-Sharon Monster 04/09/2012

Chase log coming..

Central Oklahoma Surprise 03/21/2012

After noticing that some low-topped storms were on the way to developing, and with minimum equipment on board (iPhone and DSLR) I (Gene) left Cordell shortly before 1:00 CDT heading out east on SR 152 to observe what might happen - expecting a bit of hail and maybe a funnel-cloud or two.  On the road a few miles east of Cordell, it became apparent visually and was confirmed by radar that a storm moving NW from the Carnegie-Ft. Cobb area was gaining strength so it was a go for Eakly and points south to intercept.  Noted a few strokes of lightning while on the way.  Upon reaching the SR 58 junction I headed south toward Alfalfa and set up to watch about a mile south of the little town.  As the storm strengthened further, a rather ragged wall-cloud began to come together.

View to the W from 1 mile S of Alfalfa at 1:29 CDT:

Video of Tornado Near Willow, OK 03/18/2012

Video of Tornado W of Mangum, OK near Reed 03/18/2012

Late Winter SE TX Panhandle/SW Oklahoma Chase 03/18/2012

The WXtreme Chase Team together with Jason Caster, Brendon Lindsey, Sarah Manners and Ashley Mills staged initially in Shamrock, TX for some potential dry-line action.  After spending some time in McLean hoping storms would fire to our W or SW we eventually decided to head toward some development to our S.  After watching a small, strongly rotating tower continue to struggle with the cap NW of Wellington we made the decision to intercept the storms already in progress moving NE from the Childress area.  Although the radar returns looked pretty messy at this point our view of the back-shear on the south-western most storm gave us the impression that this might be the storm of the day.  (Two storms further south in TX had gone tornado warned, but had yet to produce anything more than funnel clouds.)

View of the developing storm near Childress at 5:15 CDT: