Reports & Pictures Chase Day 10

[Paul Sherman]

Well what can I say about Tour 1's last Chase Day. Incredible, Amazing, Awe Inspiring!

We took a massive gamble today and played the Stalled Warm Front. We waited and waited just east of Great Bend, some of the guys literally had given up and then an MD Was Issued for our area, saw some great Agitated Cu to our East and off we blasted. Went east of Interstate 235 and then looked West at a Developing Supercell, in fact the only Isolated Supercell to form along the warm front, we were 15 Miles from the Core developing to our North West. Went North and then East and got some Insane Lightning shots. Then the fun began, this Supercell became a Right Mover and rode the Warm Front, quickly it became Tornadic and we witnessed the Hope Tornado that occured at 852pm! We are going through Video and Pictures, but we all definately saw the Cone Tornado out to our North East. This storm then took on a Surreal Barber Pole Updraught as we followed it east to just north of Emporia. We broke off the chase at 1130pm and booked the Hotel.

Some pictures and to follow some Pictures from the others who all are very happy!

Picture Credit to James Menzies as his put mine to shame!

- Just East of Mcpherson (Ks)

- Supercell starting to crank up!

- Wall Cloud dragging the Ground

- Same Time Stamp as Hope Tornado (Arron also has Video)

- Insane Supercell!

- Awesome!

- Jaw Dropping

- Moving away now

- Having a Bud at the Tripod

- Cg

Paul S & Team

[John Hanrahan]

Awesome Chase!!!!!!!

Hard to believe this was the start.....

Edited May 7, 2010 by John Hanrahan

[Roger J Smith]

Congrats on picking that up, it has been quite a tour for the first group.

Tonight's activity threatens to blow up big-time later on Friday in IL, IN and OH.

[multi cellular thunderstorm]

Excellent photos, looks like it was well worth the wait.

[Harry]

What an absolutely phenomenal thunderstorm - amazing end to a great tour!!

Enjoy the pics - all of which were of the lonely supercell thunderstorm

EDIT - Here's a little bio of how the day went...

Today was an absolutely phenomenal end to a fantastic holiday. What was looking marginal for storms this morning ended up being the best storm I have ever seen in my life!

Started off this morning in Wichita, Kansas as we knew if anything happened it would be in that general area. After looking at the everchanging models, we headed West towards Pratt (the next town West was Greensburg, wiped off the map 3 years ago this Tuesday gone by a 2 mile wide tornado, the town after called Hooker, haha).

At Pratt we decided to head North towards Great Bend which was bang central for any development. We mulled around for well over an hour a topped up the tans (temperatures around 30C). Little happening we popped to Wal Mart down the road to get some food! As we came out little else happening. Headed 20 miles or so East again as some little clouds were focussing there, and waited for another hour or so. The little clouds were clumping together further East so raced off for about another 30 odd miles and milled around a country lane. Then a dilemma hit - the clouds which started to rapidly develop into thunderstorm cumulonimbus fell apart! About 5 mins before this I snapped a nice wavy but dark cloud towards the West of which the sun was beginning to set behind.

As the clouds further East continued to collapse, we noticed the nice wavy dark cloud back to our West started to look ominous - so we headed back West a bit to watch the sun set behind it. As the sun slowly started to sink under the cloud to create a fantastic skyline - it began...

The once nice black wavy cloud began to start looking ominous, and the radar began to pick up the first signs of precipitation. After about another 15 minutes, booom! It was off...

We raced West for about 10 miles, watching the cloud explode up in to the atmosphere, with the rain curtains beneath getting denser and denser - then the lightning started. We found the road North and as we turned round, the cloud was exploding further like an atomic mushroom cloud. The radar system (called Barons) showed the hail was already 1.5" thick...within (no word of a lie) 5 minutes it indicated the hail was up to FOUR INCHES thick - approaching baseball size. The clouds beneath were beginning to look intensively aqua/green, the sign that there is a lot of hail. The setting sun showing the white hail curtains falling, while at the same time the lightning was quickly becoming more frequent.

We hit an Easterly road, pulled over and got all of our camera equipment (tripods etc) out. The cloud was exploding upwards and outwards so fast, you could see it smouldering. This is when I got my first ever lightning picture this very irritating drunk who owned an adjacent farm pestered us before we took off East and chased the storm for about 75-100 miles East towards the Missouri border. Along the way, tornado warnings were issued on the storm, with several possible tornadoes illuminated by lightning along the way. Two towns along the route were hit by strong winds of some description (hard to tell exactly what in the dark) but both were without power (as we bearly noticed them moving through).

Amazingly, after our 3rd stop, German chasers we met last Saturday in Memphis came up to us and said they saw our cars go past them. After chatting for a while and all lining up to take shots, they decided they wanted to keep chasing the storm, so we gave our farewells. We decided that it was after midnight and suddenly getting very cold from the outflow of the storm and headed to Emporia, Kansas where we are staying tonight.

Sadly, cold front (which has now raced through and causing very strong winds outside) is clearing the humid air Eastwards, creating a tornado and severe storm risk too far North for us to chase (Illinois, Ohio and Indiana in the firing line, including Chicago - could make the news) and already clearing Oklahoma and most of Texas by tomorrow.

We head back to Norman, Oklahoma tomorrow for our last night, and to have a meal and have a bowling rematch (and to celebrate Michael's birthday which is now today - amazing way to see it in chasing a supercell)...then come Saturday it's down to Dallas for our flight home.

It's been an amazing trip, and have had the time of my life. Visited seven states, seen 6 supercells, at least two tornadoes and seen more of the country I could have dreamed of!

Again, immense credit must go to Paul, as he has got us on EVERY possible supercell going over the course of Tour 1, and where there were multiple, I kid you not, he got us on the BEST cells of the day!! People were posting on some of the most reputable storm chasing sites in the world this afternoon, that "there'll be no storms in Kansas today" - his determination however proved the sceptics (including good ol' pessimistic me at some points of the day) spectacularly wrong! Also huge credit must go to Tom for his great forecasting and GPS trickery along with John and his techno wizardry (am sure you've all been enjoying the streaming at home)

Anyway, its 4am, I'm boll**ksed and need some shut eye before the long drive to Norman tomorrow. Will do a far more comprehensive post holiday review afterwards

Night all - hope you all enjoy everyones piccies and accounts.

Edited May 7, 2010 by Harry

[ian cameron]

guys what a great way to end the tour with a great storm some awsome pictures there as well glad to hear the bud was out as well lol just about to leave for the airport now myself to join up with you see you all soon

Ian

[Tom Lynch]

guys what a great way to end the tour with a great storm some awsome pictures there as well glad to hear the bud was out as well lol just about to leave for the airport now myself to join up with you see you all soon

Ian

OK old chap

See you in Dallas.

Tom

[AudMun]

Beautiful! Absolutely stunning photos and hearty congrats on being stubborn enough to stick it out and pick up a wee beauty from it.

[Gorky]

Woo! Good going guys... Big risk but it paid off. I'd have been chasing the mush up on the KS/NE border, so props for sticking with your instincts. So happy the guys got one more chase in before the trip home, and possibly the best day of the tour looking at the images. Who needs High risks when you can chase 2% Tor slight risks and get such amazing results

I'm on the train right now heading down to Heathrow. I'll be in Texas by the end of the night. These shots don't do anything to ease my SDS

[NL]

As midnight came and went (UK time) i thought that this was gonna be a 'bust' then in the space of 20-30 mins that cell grew from nothing to over 40.000ft and producing huge hail. Great call in chasing around the warm front as this really paid off as shown in those fantastic night-time lightning images. Bet the guests on tour 1 wish they were staying out for what looks to be an awsome next few days with monday being a 'significant severe weather event' with the possibility of strong tornadoes.

Edited May 7, 2010 by NL

[pottyprof]

Absolutely beautiful photos there. Goes to show that you have to be patient to get the best shots most of the time.

Congratulations on the team for getting where the action was once again..

[Pete the Britt]

Hey y'all this was our first chase day after landing yesterday evening & scoffing steak at the cow camp in Decatur. We left Decatur Tx this morning by 10am & headed up through Oklahoma & into Kansas, Our initial target area was Dodge city but that soon changed & we headed towards Witicha. We was aware it wsa going to be a late show & had an eye on the Baron as well as the developing cu. Moisture didnt seem to be as abundant as we'd hoped & agreed to get some food & a room at a motel in Junction City & hope we caught something after sunset & hope for some lightning. We'd just checked in & off to our south west a huge cell bubbled up in no time & headed straight for us. It was huge with evidence of rotation clearly shown on the Baron & as it got darker lightning became more visible. The next hour was amazing & was the best lightning i've seen for 4-5 years. We could see some sign of striations when the lightning flashed but not clearly, it was only when i viewed my images we can clearly see structure & some intersting shapes that went straight over the top of us. Couple of down days now & looking forward to Sunday & onto Monday which will no doubt end up being a pile of rubbish with all the hype it's getting so early on lol.

Regards

Peter Scott

Pete@chasethestorm.com

www.chasethestorm.com

www.ukstorm.net

[gpspete]

brilliant photos incredible lightning shots,

I want some of the same and hopefully dare i mention it a good daylight tornado photograph i will be well pleased on tour 2

[Craigers]

all these photos are so beautiful! lightning and the view of the super cell really does capture the beauty! looking forward to next weeks footage already!

[Nick F]

Fantastic photos guys and nice seeing the good accounts, glad it didn't end up a bust and you were within reach of the lone supercell which exploded, was difficult set-up to target the right place as it was unpredictible to where any storms would initiate with a very dymamic situation.

[stevestorms]

Fantastic photos guys and nice seeing the good accounts, glad it didn't end up a bust and you were within reach of the lone supercell which exploded, was difficult set-up to target the right place as it was unpredictible to where any storms would initiate with a very dymamic situation.

Hey Nick it was a excellent find, Pete as you see got some blinding shots, tornado reported about 12miles away from us, quite glad in some way we didnt get in the Big Hail as we had no shelter for our car :-) today we head to OKC meeting up with a friend for beer and steak tonight, nothing to be had till Sunday night so shopping and chilling till then.

Edited May 7, 2010 by stevestorms

[SteveB]

Excellent photos guy's, glad you got some action after a quiet few day's

[Tom Lynch]

Hey Nick it was a excellent find, Pete as you see got some blinding shots, tornado reported about 12miles away from us, quite glad in some way we didnt get in the Big Hail as we had no shelter for our car :-) today we head to OKC meeting up with a friend for beer and steak tonight, nothing to be had till Sunday night so shopping and chilling till then.

Hi Steve

Nice to hear you got up here and got some nice shots. We tried to guess where you were from the live footage. We are heading towards Oke for the night ,. Will hope to meet up at some point. Say hi to the lads.

Tom

[Andy Bown]

Thank you to all on tour 1 for your reports/photos.

Are there any videos of that supercell from last night? Would love to see that in 'action' because the photos are awesome!

[Tornado Researcher]

That was definitely an awesome supercell last night and the pics back that up nicely

Big congrats on waiting the choce to wait it out for that one as it proved well worth it and as a few others have said already, it's been the icing on the cake for what looked to be an awesome tour

For those of you travelling back to the UK, I hope you all have a safe and speedy flight home

Roll on Monday for Tour No. 2

[BlueHedgehog074]

Cheers for posting those pictures. The cloud structures, the light and dark shades around the stormy clouds, the motion, the presence of the storm and all the other aspects make for some seriously cool images. Nice one.

Does sound like you are having a great time with the storm hunting.

- Jaw Dropping

Paul S & Team

Jaw dropping indeed.

Edited May 7, 2010 by Rainbow Snow

[Marcus_surfer]

Insane photos!

[nuthatch]

Have followed this chase and found it enthralling.

Lucky me flies out to Oklahoma City on May 16 to go Storm Chasing with Silver Lining Tours...volcanic ash cloud permitting.

Never been before and I am so excited

I have gleaned a lot of helpful tips off this forum so thanks a lot.

[craig1uk]

Congrats to all of tour 1 and the team for a very succsessful time in the alley, great accounts, pics n vids and the live streaming has been awsome, wish tour 2 more of the same and the best action for tour 3 - mine

[Tom Lynch]

Hi all

It was a fantastic chase and was nice watching the birth of a supercell. It went from a pretty sunset into a supercell in no time at all. I will put a short video clip on once we get to Oklahoma City. Not the best quality but I hope it is watchable.

Yes we want to put the samee effort into tour 2 .and tour 3 and tour 4

Tom

Edited May 7, 2010 by Tom Lynch