On Sunday, October 21st, tropical moisture was in place over Arizona, with a low impinging on it from the west. So southwest flow was in play over the Mogollon Rim Convergence Zone (MRCZ). Work had been a bear and I’d been dealing with a chest cold the previous few days so I wasn’t exactly eager to get out. But I felt better by Sunday morning, and was watching conditions and browsing HRRR/UofA WRF CAMs. HRRR had been pretty set on some stronger storms initiating and moving across the MRCZ, from Twin Arrows through Winslow. RAP surface vorticity suggested elevated vorticity in that same area. WRF CAMs didn’t have the same consistent signal, but with HRRR being so interested in it, I figured I’d mosey out there around 1-2PM and see what was up.
Forecast, nowcast, SPC data
While I was out running an errand, radar showed convection trying to fire. It was pulsing inside a notch in the convergence boundary that had formed southeast of Flagstaff around 12:30PM. That was earlier than I expected, so by the time I was on I-40 heading east, one cell was already looking pretty good. With 30ish knots of bulk shear, I was mainly interested in some brief structure.
As I got near Buffalo Range Road, about 12 miles from the cell, it looked like a funnel was poking out of the southern tip of the base. So I started the cell phone rolling video on it.
— 2057Z — Developing funnel with possible dust on horizon above truck
About a minute later, 2058Z, dust appeared on the horizon where the funnel was aimed, so landspout! You never know how much time you’ve got, but I didn’t want to pull over on the interstate. Fortunately, the Two Guns exit was just a couple more minutes down the road. Once I got there, I realized terrain to the west was going to hide the point of ground contact, but I couldn’t waste more time hunting down a better spot.
— 2058Z — Funnel and clear evidence of dust/debris
— 2059Z — Growing dust column with 1 mile to go to next stop
— 2100Z — Landspout strengthening beyond Two Guns
The condensation funnel gradually stretched down into the lengthening dust column. With the sun reflecting off orange dust and white vapor, it was more stunning than I could have hoped for an Arizona tornado. It’s one of the sights I imagine when heading out for a Plains chase — wondering if I’ll catch a high-definition, colorful rope-out among other things. And there I was, 30 miles from home, watching it happen on a Sunday afternoon.
— 2104Z — Looking east-southeast from the east side of Two Guns
— 2104Z —
— 2107Z —
Tornado warning polygon
Family chat recap
While the storm continued drifting northeast, the base of the landspout drifted slowly southward, stretching the funnel longer as they separated. It dissipated after about twelve minutes, lasting from 2058-2110Z.
— 2108Z —
Once it wrapped up, I made my way up Rt 87 north of Winslow to see what new development might look like that way. I got some time lapse running at the Painted Desert Rim View and watched rain, hail and sunbeams roll across striped buttes and hills. Around this time I got a request from 12 News Phoenix for an interview. They were okay waiting a couple hours so I could finish up and get to a spot with better than 1x coverage. On the way back to Winslow, an isolated cell near Mormon Lake eclipsed the sun and while grabbing shots of that, I had a couple cars honk and wave as they drove by. I couldn’t tell who they were, but It kind of added to the feeling of being out on a Plains chase.
— 2310Z — Looking west-southwest from Painted Desert Rim View
— 0005Z — Looking northeast along Rt 87 at receding convection
— 0020Z — View to the southwest of an isolated cell near Mormon Lake
Down by Winslow, I grabbed a few last sunset shots and did a FaceTime interview with Ryan Cody. Funny to see a news camera set down on a desk and aimed at a cell phone to capture the interview. I barely watch broadcast news anymore, so these things are surprising to me.
— 0035Z — Last light on receding storms from north side of Winslow
Based on information available at the time, SPC plotted the tornado report further north than I think it actually occurred. I drew up my line of sight in on Google Maps. Then using another series of shots from a visitor at Meteor Crater, I lined those up over the top of a recognizable structure which put it directly north of there. So that puts it over a rocky outcropping about a half mile east of Meteor Crater Road and 2 miles south of I-40.
Line of sight map of Meteor Crater landspout
Facebook reference photos for Meteor Crater reference view
Watching video later, it was fascinating to see the outer sheath of dust rippling downward around the smooth inner column. Such a spectacular thing. And then there’s the strangeness of chasing over eight years, a couple dozen tornadoes later, and suddenly in 2018 to finally get landspouts on three different chase days — two of them a half hour from home. Wish I could say I now feel more confident in being able to forecast and catch this special kind of twister. But no. The needle gets mixed to a different spot in the haystack each time. That really makes it rewarding when it pans out though.
Arizona is not prime territory for supercells. Moisture, instability, and shear don’t superimpose often. The tail end of monsoon season is when that exciting combo is most likely to happen. And it set up perfectly this year on September first. This wound up being my best storm chase in Arizona yet, and rises above a lot of Plains chases.
A few days before, GFS was sparking my interest, hinting at a shortwave moving over monsoon moisture. By two days prior, 3KM NAM was indicating enough instability, bulk, and directional shear for supercells with tornadoes as a potential hazard. The day before, John Sirlin and I discussed target options. The MRCZ area on the Navajo reservation looked good early on, with options gradually moving southeastward toward New Mexico later in the day. John wound up driving north overnight to avoid Labor Day traffic and was in the Winslow area to catch an early morning shelf cloud over the Painted Desert.
I finally got moving and was hanging out on Sand Springs Road northwest of Tolani Lake by 1830Z. The sky was clearing after the morning storms and new convection was bubbling along Hwy 89 north of Flagstaff and gradually moving into the Little Colorado River Valley. The new cells struggled for a while, but even in their meager state showed they wanted to shear downstream and spin.
— 1910Z — Convection building over the San Francisco Peaks
— 1941Z — Weak convection drifting over Sand Springs Road
— 1957Z —
— 2016Z — Mesoanalysis indicating conditions were primed for strong storms
By 21Z, a line of convection from Tovar to Garces Mesas was strengthening rapidly. And doing so further east than I was expecting. I raced to Tolani Lake and headed east on Indian Route 6820—a road I haven’t traversed before. It led me across dusty plains, mud pits, semi-dry washes, and encroaching dune fields as storms darkened to the north.
By 2130Z, I was about 10 miles east of Tolani Lake and the lead cell was directly north of me. It had an inflow tail, RFD cut and was showing a velocity couplet on radar. Fifteen minutes later, a wall cloud was evident, but contrast was poor and I couldn’t tell what it was doing. Dust was getting dragged into the storm, encouraging me to find spots to stop that weren’t obscured by trains of cascading dirt.
— 2113Z — Heading down Rt6820 as the eastern cell rapidly strengthens
— 2134Z — Structure taking shape on the lead cell, looking north from ten miles east of Tolani Lake
— 2145Z — Wall cloud taking shape
— 2147Z — Dusty inflow was an ongoing problem for visibility
— 2129Z — Velocity couplet developing on the lead cell
At 2147, the wall cloud got fairly pointy, but I was still too far out and squinting through a bright sunlight to tell what was going on. The velocity couplet intensified at this point and the storm received a tornado warning a few minutes later. I just kept shooting photos and video in hopes of enhancing contrast later to see what was back in there. I wish I could have tightened zoom on video, but sun was too bright to finesse using the LCD viewer, so I had to keep it wide. That’s happened to me before. I need to work out a solution for that.
— 2148Z — Wide view of the storm
— 2148Z — Close view of the wall cloud
— 2148-2152Z — Reflectivity/Velocity Scans with the storm at its peak
— 2155Z — Tornado warning issued by NWS Flagstaff office
Pulling detail out of the shots and video later clearly showed rotation in the wall cloud. From 2147-2148Z, shots picked up a funnel rotating with the wall cloud. A couple zoomed images show what could be debris beneath the funnel at ground level. Right after this, the entire scene flooded with inflow dust and I had to move on.
— 2148Z — Zoomed view of wall cloud and funnel
— 2148Z — Contrast enhanced to show dust at surface
— 2148Z — Contrast enhanced 7 seconds later
— 2147-2148Z — Accelerated footage of rotating wall cloud 2147-2148Z
Meanwhile, over the last hour, John was right up under the storms, picking up at least one convincing tornado (to my eyes) at 2123Z, followed by other shots that I can’t wait to check out.
The RFD cut on the storm grew and continued to look promising, but I got detoured by a washed out section of road near Honey Spring and lost track of things making my way back to a different road. By 2213Z, the circulation had fully occluded and looked like a huge ice cream cone as a burst of hail and a high-based, roping funnel draped around it.
— 2152Z —
— 2205Z — RFD cut from a muddy wash near Honey Spring that was too risky to cross
— 2214Z — Occluded updraft and elevated funnel
The entire time this cell was being awesome, two other trailing cells were also spinning away. The middle one wasn’t faring too well and seemed to be riding elevated behind the lead cell’s outflow. I figured the third in line would be dealing with the same thing. However, it managed to hop south far enough to get surface based. So, eight minutes after the great ice cream cone view, I glanced over my shoulder and saw an awesome cow catcher RFD shelf scooping out of its base. Over the course of about five minutes, it picked up a shaggy wall cloud/tail cloud combo.
— 2221Z — RFD shelf/rooting base beginning to develop on the trailing storm
— 2223Z —
— 2229Z — Wall cloud/tail cloud developing
— 2218Z — Reflectivity/velocity of lead and trailing cell along with struggling middle cell
It’s both an awesome and frustrating problem to have two beautiful cells competing for attention with spectacular volcanic plugs taking turns hiding them with each turn in the road. The lead cell was moving into lower instability and weakening, but still looked awesome and I didn’t want to lose it. So I kept after it, figuring the trailing cell was headed my way anyway. I just needed to get to a spot where the terrain would let me see them both.
— 2229Z — Trailing cell vs. encroaching terrain
— 2244Z — Lead cell vs. encroaching terrain
I finally found that spot just east of Dilkon. The lead cell was losing its battle to remain surface based. But before it went fully elevated, it wrapped up one last occlusion. Not as beefy as the previous one, but still lancing out with one last funnel.
— 2249Z —
— 2310Z —
Meanwhile to the west, the trailing cell was getting a classic, sculpted look. At 2307, I realized a knobby wall cloud was dipping down out of its base. It was tough trading focus between the two storms, and wish I had been shooting the trailing one just a few minutes sooner, since reviewing radar later showed a low CC value under that circulation at 2304Z. Would love to have a few zoomed shots at that point.
— 2308Z — Trailing cell and wall cloud
— 2308Z — Tight view of wall could
— 2303Z — Reflectivity, Velocity, Differential Reflectivity, and Correlation Coefficient
As the lead cell withered away, I set up for a time lapse of the trailing storm as it approached. It was a perfect spot with the stacked base spinning, morphing, spitting lightning, and draping feathers of precipitation as it aimed slightly to my south.
— 2326Z — The trailing cell is now the main show as it slowly approaches
— 2336Z —
— 2351Z —
— 2323-2357Z — Time lapse of approaching supercell from Dilkon
As it moved in, a new line of convection had filled in and was advancing quickly, shoving a low, gnarly shelf cloud as it tried to catch up to this spinning monument of rough pottery in front of me.
— 0007Z — Lead cell now with a line of storms hot on its tail as seen by shelf cloud hugging the horizon to the left
— 0024Z —
— 2312Z — Reflectivity/Velocity of line of storms rushing in
Staying ahead and in good position with that isolated cell seemed like a simple thing. I was planning to jog south on Rt 77 to Holbrook to get parting shots of it and pick up whatever new developments were inbound. But radar was showing me that the trailing line was getting serious, loaded with some big hail, and quickly expanding. I realized if I didn’t start hustling, it might cut me off from my planned route south, and punish my wife’s car in the process. So I only had time for quick stops or through-the-windshield shots as that isolated cell started to gust out and merge with the approaching line of storms. It wish I could have spent more time along that road. It looked down on an expansive, almost alien landscape with warm, late afternoon light flooding beneath approaching storm bases and greenish cores dumping on blackened buttes and red cliffs. Such a fantastic view.
— 0042Z — Once great supercell now dying out
— 0043Z — Panoramic view from Rt 77 as the hail-filled line of storms rushes in
— 0030Z — Reflectivity/Velocity of my new predicament for heading south
With just a few miles to go before reaching I-40, radar showed that line of storms accelerating into a bowing segment with a very menacing load of hail. I wanted to get onto Hwy 180, but to do so, I had to head southwest on I-40 into Holbrook before catching 180 back east. I had a tough call—either bail east at I-40 to escape the looming core, or jog in front of it to get to 180. When I got there, it looked like I had enough time to spare and I made for 180. That turned out to be a very tense six miles. The wind was picking up ahead of the dark, towering column of hail, and bits of ice were starting to hit as cars and trucks began hesitating, not sure what to do. I finally breathed easier as I got around the curving arc of monstrous ice and heading back east on Hwy 180. The views were incredible again. The bowing segment was reorganizing and developing a mesocyclone as it sailed over Sun Valley. The core looked fierce as the sun lit it in orange highlights agains black shadows. Around this time, the travel stop where I had to make that tough east-west decision was getting torn up by baseball size hail.
— 0103Z — Menacing wall of hail rapidly approaching my route to Holbrook
— 0134Z — Bowing segment has organized back into cellular mode after dropping baseball sized hail east of Holbrook
— 0135Z — Tight view of sunlit core and rugged shelf cloud
— 0051-0114Z — Reflectivity/velocity of baseball filled bowing segment
The big hail-maker continued onward to the east, spitting lightning as it departed. Further to the west, another cell was working on a weak mesocyclone of its own. Not as persistent and strong as the others had been, but still winding up a beautiful storm. As sunset and twilight deepened, the lightning from that cell served up a perfect combo of purple strikes on an orange and yellow sky.
— 0136Z — Sunset on Hwy 180 with a weaker cell trying to drape an inflow tail across the setting sun
— 0151Z — Lightning dropping out of the core of the stronger cell to the east
— 0153Z — More from the core of the east cell
— 0214Z — Western cell gusting out with a spectacular lightning display against the twilight sky
A short time later, John and I caught up and shared a few stories and LCD previews before heading off to attempt some final sprite photos. No sprites for me, but still a serene view of Mars and the summer Milky Way drifting westward as distant storms flicked light across bubbling cloud tops and coyotes yipped amid the surrounding hills.
— 0346Z — Mars, Milky Way, and flickering storms 130 miles to the south from Hwy 180 southeast of Holbrook
Our May 24th chase started out in Shamrock, OK. We got a really good rate at the Shamrock Country Inn—it was clean, new beds, recently refurbished by a motivated new owner. The doors are a bit sticky, but I can definitely recommend it.
We made our way north, looking for likely spots for storm initiation along the dryline or intersecting boundaries from the Oklahoma Panhandle up into southwest Kansas.
Backroad scenery in the Oklahoma Panhandle between Logan and Slapout.
Indian blanket flowers east of Slapout, OK.
Eventually, satellite imagery showed the cumulus field getting more agitated north of Englewood, KS. This gave us a chance to drive through Englewood and revisit a view we had over four years ago when we chased a lonely, low-topped LP supercell north of town (14 March 2012). I noticed Stephen Locke—another storm chaser whosephotography I admire—filling up at the gas pump. I had a chance to say hi before moving on to the growing towers to the north.
Silos and developing towers from Englewood, KS. [2102Z]
We made our way to about six miles west of Ashland and shot time lapse of the building towers to see what would take hold. The one I was shooting wound up gaining strength and we headed off to watch it develop.
Vorticity and random high-based funnels showing up in the developing cumulus field. [2138Z]
The storm of the day looms in the distance—west of Ashland, KS. [2156Z]
Roads were dry and in pretty good shape, so we stayed off the main highways for hopefully more unique perspectives and less crowds. It worked out pretty well. As we got about eight miles east-southeast of Minneola, the storm was developing a wall cloud that looked like it had potential.
Traveling the dirt roads but avoiding the dicier ones. [2238Z]
Wall cloud developing in the base of our rapidly strengthening supercell near Minneola, KS. [2240Z]
I hated to leave our spot in case it put down a brief tornado while we were on the move, but we needed to keep up. We made our way north and by the time we were a couple miles north of Bloom, the tendrils dropping out of the wall cloud looked pretty imminent. So we stopped in time to capture a developing condensation funnel touch down for our first tornado of the day. It turned out to be a great spot, with enough altitude to capture some intervening countryside as the silhouetted funnel danced and twisted against a distant tree line. We were about 12 miles away at this point, but the view was great. We hung out at this spot for nearly 15 minutes as it grew in size. At one point I was thinking that this must be how Rozel looked in silhouette—apparently this one is being referred to as Rozel #2 by some :)
Condensation funnel of the first tornado reaches for the ground. [2301Z]
Tornado #1 churns in silhouette west of Minneola—about 12 miles from our location. [2303Z]
Inflow tugs at my daughter and chase partner as the first tornado strengthens north of Minneola. [2308Z]
Tornado #1 bulks up as it moves northward. [2313Z]
We eventually had to keep moving to stay with the storm. While repositioning, the original tornado began to occlude behind a haze of precipitation. My daughter asked if there was a different tornado forming further to the right. Sure enough, a thin rope had descended from the fresher wall cloud while the previous tornado was still in progress. This was our first tornado pair. I hate to call them twins, because the emaciated second one wasn't even close in appearance to the first—more like the mole that shows up on the stronger twin when it absorbs its sibling I guess.
Tornado #1 occludes while whisker-thin tornado #2 reaches down to the right. [2321Z]
About seven miles south of Dodge City and still on the dirt roads, we found a really good spot to watch as a new tornado took on Rozel-like proportions as a thin rope tornado flicked around on the east edge of the elongated wall cloud. There may even have been another tornado intertwined with that rope, but from my perspective I couldn't tell if it was just extra scud tendrils. The view of the main tornado at this point was spectacular. We were further south of it, so now it had some side lighting and showed a lot of dimension. We hung out at this spot for another 13 minutes or so before heading off to the dreaded main highway. (Rain was starting to effect the area and I didn't want to get us stuck in the mud.)
Tornado #3 gains strength while at least one rope—tornado #4—reaches down at far right. [2330Z]
A wider view of tornado #3 as it is southwest of Dodge City and about 10 miles to our northwest. [2331Z]
Tornado #3 taking on Rozel characteristics. [2332Z]
A wide view of tornado #3 as seen from about 7 miles south of Dodge City. [2333Z]
Wide view of the second pair of tornadoes we observed. [2335Z]
A wide structure view as the storm feigns being tornado-less. [2338Z]
Ropeout of tornado #3 rematerializes while its parent supercell continues northward. [2338Z]
Closer view of tornado #3 ropeout. Wall cloud at right is producing ground circulation—not sure if it's a continuation of tornado #4. [2339Z]
Hwy 283 was about as insane as I was worried it would be—absolutely packed with chasers and locals. Despite how crowded it was, most everyone was driving, parking and loitering in an orderly fashion. We parked at a couple spots to get photos as a fifth tornado morphed into various forms—barrel/multi-vortex/cone/elephant trunk/rope—west of Dodge City. We took the highways around the east side of the city, watching as the #5 occluded and roped out while a new, sixth tornado descended from the apex of a wasp-nest shaped meso. The highway was at a decent elevation, so we had pretty good views of the action north of the city as we made our way around. By the time we got northeast of Dodge, the sixth tornado had sprouted a satellite rope funnel of its own—video from other chasers shows this in contact with the ground as well, so—tornado number seven.
One of the many forms of tornado #5 as it was moving northwest of Dodge City—as seen from Hwy 283, about 9 miles away. [0002Z]
Ropeout sequence of tornado #5 as we navigated the east side of Dodge City. [0004-0008Z]
Tornado #5 occludes while tornado #6 drops north of Dodge City. [0010Z]
Tornado #6 sports a satellite, tornado #7 north of Dodge City—about 9 miles to our northwest. [0016Z]
By this time, new supercells were encroaching from the south it looked like our original cell was jogging to the east. So to avoid getting pinched, we bailed out to the east and made a half-hearted attempt to get on some other tornado warned cells east of Kinsley. That wound up seeming like more effort than it was worth, especially after the spectacle we just experienced, so we hung out for a while just west of Lewis on Hwy 50 and grabbed sunset photos.
One of the DOW vehicles samples a different storm east of Kinsley. [0109Z]
Sunset lights up the cold west flank of a passing supercell east of Kinsley. [0134Z]
Sunset and flooded back roads east of Kinsley. [0144Z]
A fire rages south of Lewis—presumably lightning caused. [0150Z]
A spectacular roll cloud sporting Kelvin-Helmholtz waves drifts by west of Lewis, KS. [0215Z]
After the stunning sunset, we headed back to Dodge City for dinner and a hotel for the night. While eating dinner, Arizona storm chasers Adri Mozeris, Trey Greenwood and Corbin Jaeger stopped by to say hi and we got a chance to talk about all the unbelievable things we had seen that afternoon.
Throughout our chase, I'm pretty sure we observed seven tornadoes, where two were on the ground at the same time on four occasions. I'm still having trouble believing we actually witnessed all of this. Other chasers reported seeing on the order of twelve tornadoes. So the numbers in my account don't represent the actual sequence of tornadoes on the storm—just the ones we saw ourselves. Like the Rozel/Sanford tornadoes, I could be convinced that what I counted as two tornadoes may have been continuations—where say one of the thin ropes seemed to disappear, but may have actually still been stirring up ground circulation before turning into a larger tornado later. I'll update things if I find out differently.
Chase map for the day — 24 May 2016
Close up chase map showing photo locations and approximate tornado locations.
I had my eye on potential for this setup in the days leading up to an annual visit to Elk City. I headed out about 7AM with an initial check-in target at Hope, Arkansas.
Crossing the threshold on Hwy 70
I wasn’t sure I’d ever take the plunge into chasing Arkansas, but after working on my chase map last year I had a better idea where potentially decent chase terrain/road network would be. I also spent the night before studying how highway/secondary roads would play out with northeast moving storms. Even the heavily treed areas (outside the mountains) still have patches of farmland where some peeks can be taken. I had resolved to stay far ahead of storms as long as I was in the heavy trees. Turns out I didn't need to mess around with them in the thicker areas. I figured I had time to shoot some landscape photos on the way—southwest Arkansas is beautiful.
Hwy 371 and Prairie Creek - Howard County
Outbuilding along Hwy 371 - Howard County
Fenceline along Hwy 278 in Washington, AR
Once I got to Hope about 2:30PM, I knew I had to keep moving. Convection was initiating and I was going to be in the middle of it instead of out ahead.
I made my way through Camden, Fordyce, and then to Star City where I was far enough ahead of the developing line of storms to figure out the best option. I wanted tail-end-charlie in the southernmost batch of convection—closest to better moisture before the cap pinched the line off. At 2230Z, the southernmost convection was about 30 miles to my west near Fordyce. There would be clearer views in farmland just to my east, so I headed that way and looked for a good intercept spot along AR-11 about 3 miles south of Grady.
Reflectivity at 2238Z
Fields and farm roads were flooded everywhere, so I knew any use of the road grid was out of the question. Paved roads were dense enough to get within 5 miles of anything in the area, with the main issue being river crossings for the Arkansas River spaced about 35-40 miles apart at Little Rock, Pine Bluff and Pendleton. The end cell did me a lot of favors and strengthened nicely as it approached. The flooded fields made for some interesting photography options that I wasn’t planning for.
Tail end cell approaching on AR11 - 2239Z
As the rain free base moved closer, I could finally see that RFD was carving out a glowing hole punctuated by a wall cloud with nice tendrils and rising motion.
Rain free base sturdying up with rising scud - 2306Z
Lightning strike poses with my time lapse and video setup - 2315Z
Wall cloud taking shape across flooded fields - 2322Z
Closer view of rotating wall cloud - 2322Z
It was far enough off that I had plenty of time to set up for time lapse and lightning shots as it moved in. As the cell got more to my north, RFD finally punched a huge skylight in the base. A line of trees was blocking my view somewhat, so I raced about a half mile up the road and did another quick setup to watch events unfold.
Looking up AR-11 as RFD cuts open the rain free base - 2330Z
I got video and still cameras tripoded up for shots just seconds before a noodle slipped out of the wall cloud and made contact (2335Z). The fact that I just broke a three year tornado drought with an Arkansas tornado was freaking me out. The seemingly imminent grief of chasing Arkansas with trees, vegetation and flooding actually made for the best tornado photos I’ve gotten so far.
Funnel reaching for the ground - 2334Z
Funnel making contact - 2334Z
Evidence of debris - 2336Z
Arkansas tornado over flooded fields - 2338Z
While I was snapping away, a couple drove up in a car, motioning for me to come over. Trusting that the video camera was doing its job, I headed over to find them in Heightened-Awareness-Mode (understandably), fumbling with a cell phone trying to show me a picture of a tornado that just touched down, and how careful I needed to be. It took a few tries before they understood that, yes, I was actually trying to take pictures of it right now. Meanwhile my unattended SLR & tripod had blown over and face planted into the soil while I wasn’t watching. So as they took off, I ran back, lamented my fallen camera, unscrewed the thank-goodness-for-that UV filter and kept shooting.
Inflow winds and the toppling of a camera
Still can’t believe I’m watching a tornado over this waterscape - 2340Z
The tornado roped out about 9 minute after it touched down and I took off for the Pendleton river crossing.
Starting to rope out - 2341Z
Last bits of the rope out - 2343Z
I couldn’t catch back up or get in good position to catch some newer convection to the south, so I tried for parting lightning shots that didn’t turn out any good. After that, I crossed the Mississippi at Helena and boondocked along US 61 before heading north for the March 15th setup.
Reflectivity and Velocity at 2335Z
As I downloaded my photo and video media, something didn't seem right about my video footage—there wasn't enough of it. As I dug into it, I came to the terrible realization that I had the video camera in pause mode during the entire 9 minute tornado sequence. The anguish is making my guts clench as I type this. I had that video framed and focused perfectly the entire time. But I guess I was juggling too much photography and planning the next move to get everything right. I keep working on the fact that I got a lot of good still shots and just a tidbit of the first touchdown on the far edge of my dashcam video.
Not realizing at this crazy moment that the video camera (bottom center) is not recording — ouch
Chase Map - 13 March 2016
Photography locations for approaching supercell and tornado
This was the craziest and best chase of our five-day trip. After overnighting in the car near Wray, we headed back to a target area east of Denver and spent about an hour with a storm that struggled south of Strasburg. I was unsure about veered wind profiles downstream in the deeper moisture, especially noting SPC guidance that storms would probably tend to grab supercell structures early on before lining out. And that's kind of what this storm was doing. It had joined some friends and wound up on the south end of a mushy line of storms moving to the east and northeast by 21Z. And it appeared to be weakening after that.
Developing storm south of Strasburg || 2020Z
Storm struggling south of Byers || 2045Z
So I let it go, figuring I didn't want to waste energy on eventual garbage. Not a good idea, as it turns out. But I was worn out and feeling kind of sorry for myself about missing the Simla storm a couple days earlier and not seeing so much as a cold air funnel on anything yet. As we sat in a spot with horrible data for accessing current radar, I figured the whole day was probably destined to be a wreck of grungy, linear convection. To show how miserable I was making myself, I even mulled the idea of heading into Denver to catch a movie so the whole day wouldn't be a complete disappointment.
South end of line of convection moving away || 2135Z
I probably spent a good twenty minutes in my pity party, facing west, watching sad blobs of convection trying to get going over I-20. When I finally turned back 180 degrees, to my immense shock, the departing storm had separated from its linear friends and blossomed into an enormous, incredible mushroom cloud on the eastern horizon. My self pity turned to shock and then anguish. It seemed too far gone to catch up to. I had been re-defeated.
Sudden, explosive convection south of Last Chance || 2200Z
I'm not sure what kind of soliloquy I was rendering at that moment, but my daughter finally decided it needed to stop. With simple optimism: "We should try to catch it anyway." I love that kid. I'm glad she said it and glad I listened to her. We hopped on I-70 and made our way eastward. The whole time I was working the math of two moving targets and the time/location of intercept. If only the storm would stay interesting that long.
RFD and wall cloud as we approached Bethune || 2345Z
We finally caught up to it near Stratton with decent wall cloud and RFD action ongoing. Then we got ahead of it a couple miles north of Burlington. There was a sleek, saucer shaped lowering on the original meso with a new base forming to its south. I'm not sure whether that bell-shaped base was receding behind its own RFD curtain or if it was getting hidden by the developing forward flank of the new updraft. Either way, it was the greatest view of a meso handoff I've had so far.
Saucer shaped base north of Burlington || 0000Z
Meso handoff in progress north of Burlington || 0005Z
We were in good position on a fantastic road grid with an easy-moving storm, so the photo ops were excellent. At one stop, the new base was looking particularly awesome and I stopped to grab shots while the video camera was running. It wasn't until reviewing video later that I realized a cold air funnel had been twisting around for a couple minutes on the west side of the base.
New base northeast of Burlington || 0015Z
Cold air/shear funnel behind rain free base || 0013-0016Z
We paralleled the storm as it moved eastward. An RFD surge carved an inverted soft-serve ice cream cone into the base at one point. Not ten minutes after that, a glance out the window revealed a beautiful funnel whirling away inside some sort of strange RFD eddy on the south edge of the storm. We pulled over quickly to hop out and get shots. Time was of the essence, so we didn't wind up with the best foreground elements for photos. That issue took a back seat to the fact that we were standing on the side of the road looking up as a gorgeous funnel stared us down. Turning around to find my daughter embracing the outflow topped this off as the best storm chase turnaround ever.
RFD carving the base northeast of Burlington || 0025Z
Funnel and core between Burlington and Kanorado || 0035Z
My daughter embracing the outflow as the funnel dwindles || 0035Z
By now, the storm had fallen too far behind the expanding outflow boundaries and started to wither away. So, we paused to photograph an idyllic farmscape south of Kanorado. Then we enjoyed the view of an inbound gust front moving in from Colorado before calling it a night at a comfy hotel in Goodland.
2015 went down as another year without a tornado. However, awesome weather was still in abundance, and I got to enjoy some exhilarating storms with at least one gorgeous, white funnel that stared us down between Burlington, Colorado and Kanorado, Kansas.
This year I put a lot more effort into tracking down mesocyclone potential in Arizona and wound up with some beauties. Three of them were solid, daylight examples of Arizona supercells, with deep rotation lasting over an hour. A couple more nocturnal supercells hid their structure behind terrain and darkness while other daylight examples of rotating storms were more transient and weak—but still fascinating during their brief, messy lives.
This is a video and time lapse compilation some of the amazing storms I chased and photographed across the high plains and Arizona in 2015.
The trough that led to the amazing Rozel, Kansas tornadoes on May 18th, 2013 was positioned to support another round of severe weather on the 19th. Dew points were reaching into the upper 60s into eastern Kansas and Oklahoma. With steep mid-level lapse rates, mixed layer cape levels were heading over 3000 J/KG. Ample shear was in place to support supercells. The exit region of an advancing speed max ended up giving further support to strong, widespread convection over eastern Kansas.
An outflow boundary was positioned just south of the Oklahoma-Kansas border. With the advancing dryline, these two would help focus storm initiation and increased tornado potential along the outflow boundary.
500 MB
Synoptic
Surface Obs/DP
MLCAPE
0-6km Shear
300 MB/Divergence
I chose to begin my chase further north in Kansas because I anticipated Oklahoma storms along the boundary would propagate into difficult chase territory and storms further south along the dryline would enter dense urban areas along the I-35 corridor.
Storms ended up erupting in two clumps: one area from east-central to south-central Kansas, and another pretty much right over the OKC metro area.
21Z Visible Satellite
21Z / Oxford Storm
23Z / Newkirk Storm
01Z / Maple City Storm
Video documentary of the chase.
Thematic spot to park and check data south of Moline, Kansas (1800Z)
As storms matured, I made my way toward a cell approaching Oxford, Kansas. By the time I was positioned east of Oxford, the storm was HP and had a tornado warning. The look of the storm was incredibly menacing. The forward flank was lofting a ragged, low shelf that had the train-like appearance of an inflow tail as it led into the sealed notch between forward and rear flanks. Positive lightning strikes were landing just ahead of it and casting off fearsome canon-shots of thunder.
Reflectivity and position near Oxford, Kansas (2133Z)
Approaching forward flank (2133Z)
Positive charge lightning strikes ahead of the Oxford HP Supercell.
The green rear flank rolls northeastward along the heavy forward flank of the Oxford HP Supercell.
As the green RFD curtain approached, like it was rolling along the gears of the forward flank, I repositioned three miles further east. From this new spot, I witnessed the spectacle of rapid circulation developing in the rain free base just ahead of the FFD/RFD notch as a new RFD seemed to push out, trying to get ahead of the occlusion. The established RFD was moving in quick, so I had to abandon that spot and drive east to stay ahead. So I wasn't in position to see the tornado that was reported 6 minutes later about 6 miles northeast of that spot.
Circulation developing in the rain free base just ahead of the Oxford HP Supercell.
About that time, the Oxford storm started to congeal with others and form into a severe squall line. This convinced me to work my way southward to stay out of the mess and look for opportunities with any isolated storms on the tail end of the squall line. I had some pretty impressive views of the advancing line as I headed south.
Massive gust front on a congealing squall line from Winfield, Kansas (2158Z)
Another gaping gust front as seen from 4 miles south of Arkansas City, Kansas (2242Z) A brief rope tornado was reported 1 mile north of Arkansas City about 17 minutes later.
I eventually wound up on an isolated supercell near Newkirk, Oklahoma. I was able to hang out for a half hour in that spot and watch it approach. RFD was working its way into the base and encouraging a slender wall cloud to inhale scud, but it just wasn't strengthening. I was also concerned about the quality of roads to my east, so I let it go. It picked up a tornado warning not long after.
Reflectivity and position near Newkirk, Oklahoma (2304Z)
RFD cuts into the rain free base of a supercell 3 miles north of Newkirk, Oklahoma (2311Z)
Scud rises into an anemic wall cloud on the Newkirk supercell (2313Z)
RFD and wall cloud on the Newkirk supercell (2316Z)
Since new development still seemed likely, I decided to give the farm roads to the east a try. They were a lot better than I thought--pretty rocky actually--so I spent over an hour navigating north and east as I watched a very thin line of convection do pretty much nothing exciting stormwise, but did make for an excellent sunset display.
Tail end of a line of convection on the Kansas-Oklahoma border (2357Z)
After finally getting back onto a paved road, back into Kansas, I noticed a severe-warned storm, moving up out of Oklahoma. I tried racing south to get ahead of it, but couldn't manage it. After it passed, I did get to sift through its wake and picked up hail as large as 3 inches along the roadside about 7 miles east of Maple City, Kansas.
Collection of large hail (0130Z)
Three inch hail near Maple City, Kansas (0130Z)
Three inch hail near Maple City, Kansas (0130Z)
My first contribution to an SPC storm report.
So, no tornadoes, but definitely some awesome sights on this chase. The dynamics near Oxford were unforgettable, and even though I missed seeing the tornado, I had an amazing perspective on that storm.
This was the third day of a week-long trip to the plains and the first heightened possibility for strong supercells.
The setup featured a negatively tilted upper level trough over the western US that put southwesterly flow over the plains. This led to the formation of a surface low over southwest Kansas with a dryline draping from the low down through the panhandles. Rich moisture being advected into the area on southeast surface winds brought dewpoints in the mid to upper 60s through the southern and central plains and up to 70 degrees into Kansas. All the moisture and heating coupled with steep lapse rates led to mixed layer cape values in the extreme range from 3 to 4 thousand j/kg.
500 MB
Synoptic
Surface Obs/DP
MLCAPE
With these conditions in place, agitated cumulus began to develop along the dryline and north of the surface low, and by mid afternoon storms were firing in eastern Colorado and northwest Kansas.
21Z Visible Satellite
A shortwave ejecting over the panhandles and Kansas by mid to late afternoon along with strong heating along the dryline helped convection overcome the strong cap and develop further south along the dryline. By 7 to 8 pm, deep layer shear had reached 40 to 50 knots along a corridor from northeast Colorado to west central Kansas. Low level storm relative helicity also ramped up with the strengthening low level jet, reaching 200 m2/sec2. The combination of adequate deep layer shear and storm relative helicity combined with extreme instability led to supercells capable of producing tornadoes.
500 MB Shortwave Trough
23Z Satellite
0-6km Shear
0-1km SRH
My initial target was the vicinity of Ashland in far south Kansas. After noting where development was occurring along the dryline, I moved up to southwest of Greensburg and waited for convection along this section of the dryline to take off. I followed a cell that finally started to strengthen southeast of Spearville. And it eventually produced two tornadoes near Rozell and Sanford.
20Z Satellite
01Z Satellite
Video documentary of the chase.
Overnight spot south of McCook Nebraska (1300Z)
After car camping for the night, south of McCook Nebraska, I made my way south through Kansas, toward my initial target near the Oklahoma border. Along the way, I took advantage of a few photo opportunities. As I drove down one farm road, looking for a secluded spot to brush my teeth, wash my face and do a Clark Kent clothing swap—because I’m Super that way—and I ran across this blaze of yellow flowers beneath a series of wind turbines. It’s hard to capture how striking that was in a photograph, but here you go:
Turbines and flowers near Cimmaron, Kansas (1700Z)
Skies were clearing the further south I went, and really priming the atmosphere for storms later in the afternoon. As I cruised along the dryline from Ashland towards Greensburg, towers started going up. And then dying...leaving behind a bunch of sad orphan anvils that were drifting away in disappointment.
The past couple days, I had been working on being conscious of foreground elements to complement the sky in any photographs. It’s so easy to see this awesome sky and shoot with a bland, flat foreground that you don’t notice how boring it is until later when you’re processing images. So: mailboxes, wind turbines, farmsteads, any given stand of trees...I took them where I could get them. (Doesn’t mean my heat-of-the-moment tornado & funnel photos always benefited from decent composition...see down the page.)
Convection developing along the dryline (2045Z)
Mailboxes and dryline convection (2052Z)
Little House on the Dryline (2057Z)
Finally a cell managed to outwit the cap near Spearville and the chase was on.
Developing supercell near Spearville, Kansas (2205Z)
As I made my way east of Kinsley, the cell started to get rooted into the boundary layer. And now we finally had a nice looking supercell with structure that really started to beef up. It had a bit of the mothership flavor to it. The way I see it, this is a Star Trek (The Next Generation) model dropping down out of the clouds. And because after the J. J. Abrams’ reboot, Federation Starships goof around in the atmosphere these days like it weren’t nothin’ but a thing.
Panoramas of the supercell near Offerle, Kansas (2310-2318Z)
I was working the dirt roads as much as possible, which turned out pretty nice as long as I was paralleling the storms. (I didn’t get too comfy with those roads though when things were more inbound.) As I was driving north on 50th Avenue, about 4 miles west of Kinsley, I was surprised to see a little shear funnel up in the vault. It was very persistent and lasted several minutes.
Shear funnel in the vault (2326Z)
As I jogged along, north and east, trying to stay a bit ahead of the storm, I drove past what looked like the Storm Rider crew with their contingent.
Storm Riders crew (2342Z)
RFD was making various attempts at nudging into the base when another cell popped up and started encroaching from the south. I wasn’t sure if it was going to wreck the leading cell or which base to focus on. So I split the difference and got a bit behind the lead cell I was originally pacing.
Cell merger under way (2345Z)
The lead cell ended up eating the trailing cell, and then it really took off. The RFD started making a major push and digging a deep pocket into the rain free base. Rotation started ramping up behind the clear slot and it was looking pretty imminent.
Rotating wall cloud south of Rozel, Kansas (0021Z)
About 5 miles southwest of Rozel, it started winding up a funnel that gradually made its way to the ground and grew into a sturdy, long-lived tornado spinning away behind a remarkably clear RFD slot.
Developing condensation funnel (0025Z)
Rozel tornado fully condenses (0029Z)
Rozel tornado (0032-0033Z)
After photographing and filming it for several minutes, it started to dissipate. So, I moved up to keep pace, and noticed a new funnel condensing and then roping back out. This was actually still the original circulation, which was apparently still on the ground, and more of a last, condensational hurrah.
Rozel tornado ropes out (0050Z)
I made my way further east on L Road, another hefty funnel appeared to my northeast, near Sanford. Light was starting to fade and it was backed by its forward flank. So contrast was low, and camera noise was high. I sampled some frames from the video where lightning helped silhouette the tornado. It was interesting to watch the axis of the tornado move counterclockwise around the larger meso circulation. So it was drifting westward for a while before running its cycloid pattern back eastward.
Sanford tornado (0102-0104Z)
Sanford tornado panorama (0107Z)
It eventually started to rope out and bend back way to the west, lit by purple, turquoise and orange twilight colors. There’s so much going on—I wish I’d have popped the camera on a tripod and gotten a decent low-ISO exposure. As it is, still lots of high-ISO noise so I could go hand-held.
Weakening tornadic funnel drifts west of Sanford, Kansas (0110Z)
Just when I thought it was done, I called my wife to see how things were going and talk about everything I had just seen. While talking on the phone, this floating earthworm of a funnel suddenly popped into view, off to the northwest. Just this cool little disembodied funnel twisting around, way west of its parent storm. Circulation was still on the ground as it drifted westward before finally winking out.
Sanford tornado ropeout
Sunset cloudscape over Sanford, Kansas
Unfortunately, a home and a couple farm buildings were damaged by the tornadoes; thankfully however, there were no injuries. It was an amazing spectacle. Slow storm speeds. Clear RFD. Incredible structure and an assortment of tornado morphologies. If only the next two days had worked out that way...
On Thursday night, May 20, we took I-40 from Flagstaff to Albuquerque and then headed north on I-25. We grabbed sleep at rest stops and off ramps along the way. By noon, we were bogged down in traffic in the heart of Denver (what a mess). I figure we lost about an hour trying to pierce the heart of the city instead of taking one of the outside routes.
North of the city, we had a bite to eat at Wendy's while strongly sheared cumulus tried to pierce the CAP along the front range. The tough part was trying to decide where initiation would take off. Decent CAPE, shear, and a frontal boundary were setting up in southeast Wyoming, so we got back on I-25 and headed north. As we approached Cheyenne, Wyoming, radar showed cells getting healthy along I-25, further north near Wheatland. One cell pulled its act together and started peeling away to the east-northeast. In an attempt to parallel and get ahead from the south, we broke northeast on Hwy 85 toward Torrington and Lingle.
As we approached Torrington, the supercell dominated the sky to the north like a great hen roosting over her clutch with features gradually resolving along the base.
As we entered Torrington and headed toward Lingle on US-85, trees and buildings demolished our view, however, upon clearing some trees about 00Z, we got a sudden and stunning view of a wall cloud and what appeared to be a funnel silhouetted to the northwest. When in silhouette, it's not possible to determine rotation, so at the time, all we could do was film it and see if we could catch up.
Video frame grabs:
The SPC report later confirmed two tornado touchdowns northwest of Lingle at 23:55Z and 00:01Z. So I'm confident that the feature we saw was indeed a funnel--whether it was a tornado at the time we saw and filmed it, I couldn't say.
We took US-85 north of Lingle, and caught fractured glimpses of the disintegrating wall cloud between otherwise stunning, hilly terrain. When we finally caught up to it, the wall cloud was gone, although the base was still slowly rotating. A deep, turquoise light emerged from within.
Road options were seriously limited, so we couldn't follow this one as it tracked to the northeast. So we continued north on US-85 as other storms erupted.
North of Lusk on US-85, we drove beneath an enormous, beautifully lit shelf cloud.
This time lapse video shows motion of the shelf cloud and lowered inflow base:
Illumination beneath this storm was surreal and bathed the Wyoming landscape with a dream-like light.
After nightfall, we spent some time in Lusk, looking for a good place to stay the night and getting pelted with nickel and some quarter sized hail. Every room in Lusk was taken, so we drove on to Chadron, Nebraska and tried to rest up for our next day in South Dakota.
