Storm Chasing, Disasters and Our Shared Humanity: Sorting Out Emotions and Ethics

I am a storm chaser and I hate tornadoes. I hate them because they are monsters, even more so because they are beautiful monsters with an irresistible, mesmerizing attraction that both confuses my emotions and challenges my ethics. Moore has jolted me out my my stupor!

I was on a storm chase along the Red River when the first pictures of the devastation in Moore showed up in my social media feeds. And inexplicably, I began to search those same feeds for pictures or video. Just how screwed up that response was became overwhelming clear as I watched news media reports documenting the frightened screams of school children searching for their parents after the monster did its devilish work. I saw pictures of parents and teachers with bloodied faces carrying their precious little loved ones.

Oklahoma and Kansas Severe Storms 5/8/2013

Gene and Jason both decided to chase Wednesday as reasonable parameters were in place conducive to severe storm development.  Jason left from Clinton at around 1:30 and headed towards Woodward again trusting the RAP's placement of a cell on the TX/OK border at around 2.  Gene headed south with a target of Greensburg, KS as he was visiting family in Nebraska.

The RAP continued its accuracy as a cell went up near the border and headed just south of Woodward at around 2:45.  It formed into an LP Supercell and quickly lost steam.  A new cell began to form to the south so Jason headed that way to watch it form.  The cell quickly became severe warned and took on some interesting features.

Looking east at high-based shear funnel 10 miles east of Vici

Photogenic Supercell 5/7/2013

On Tuesday Jason headed up to the Woodward area on a marginal setup in hopes that the RAP model would be correct in projecting a late afternoon supercell.  At around 5pm a cell started to form just NW of Woodward.  The cell was slow moving so I was able to find a good vantage point and watch the evolution of the storm.

My first exciting moment of the day was the formation of a slightly active wall cloud which was unexpected.

View of Wall Cloud to the West of Woodward