5/31/13 El Reno, OK EF-5 Tornado

It was looking like a big day for several days out. Upper level dynamics were coming together to spread strong divergence over much of central OK with a cap that would actually hold off storm development until 21-22z timeframe (unlike past days). What was very alarming was the very impressive moisture present (75F+ dewpoints!!), expected backing surface winds, and strong low level jet that would kick in around 00z. All of these occurred and a very violent tornado developed near El Reno and tragically took the lives of 18 people. Three of these were storm chasers that were well known in the chaser community. I am glad I got the chance to meet one of them and get to know him a bit before this ordeal. Tim was a very, very smart man who had my utmost respect and I am greatly saddened that the scientific community will no longer have his contributions. My thoughts and prayers go out to all those affected and hopefully something like this never happens again.

The following are some images from the chase as well as some radar images, etc. Everything is in sequential order (well, should be anyway).

Towers began to fire along the dryline around 21z.

Just after, storms began to organize visually and on radar. One of the main ingredients was visible on radar as well, backing surface winds and horizontal convective rolls that were running parallel with the winds. This signified enhanced streamwise vorticity available to the storms if they push east of the dryline.

Eventually the storm south of I-40 began to organize and we moved NW into position and saw a very mature and distinct base.

The storm was strengthening very fast and many, many intense cloud-to-ground lightning was occurring near it.

At about 15 min till 23z, the storm really started looking good with a very large base evident.

The mesocyclone moved just to our north and took on very rapid and broad rotation before our very eyes. The white clouds are the outer edge and closest to us moving from left to right, while the darker clouds (lower in appearance) were the inflow condensing with air parcels moving from right to left.

Then at just about 23z we had first touchdown to our north.

From this point, things escalated quickly. The tornado immediately grew to a multi-vortex tornado. We drove north towards it and to our good paved road east option.

We came to about a mile from it and went east. It was moving at a pretty good clip and had numerous condensation funnels that made it a wonder to see in person.

From here the tornado took a turn to the south and became wrapped in rain. You can barely make out the edges looking west into the rain curtains. This is when things got a bit tense as the strong RFD winds were wrapping in front of us and trees were leaning pretty good. My guess is we were encountering winds near 70mph.

Now the last image was taken at about 23:17z so the tornado has been on the ground for a little less than 20 minutes and has become an absolute monster, likely a mile wide in the above image. Just after that image, approximately 5 minutes later, it appeared as if the tornado had broken away from the main updraft and surged to the east and eventually north becoming extremely wide (to 2.6 miles wide) and reached speeds in excess of 295mph (EF-5 strength). The following picture shows the disconnect either due to the RFD or the tornado making it's own environment.

From this point we realized the tornado was moving north and away from us so we held tight and took video and stills for awhile until the RFD caught up to us. This tornado was amazingly large. No doubt the largest I have seen to date and the motions were insane. Here is a final shot of the tor, likely still at EF-5 strength.

Here is the video of the chase to this point. The movement of the multiple vorticies were absolutely insane!

[Correction, it appears this "second" circulation was indeed a anticyclonic that formed off the southern side of the RFD from the El Reno tornado] A second circulation developed on the western side of the supercell and tracked over nearly the same exact area. We were very close to it and observed a quick spin up tornado from a very large wall cloud. Here is the condensation funnel reaching the ground.

Though there wasn't a condensation funnel a few seconds later, it was obviously still on the ground as we observed power flashes.

After that, a third circulation [really the second], weaker than the previous two nearly over ran us and definitely put us in a hard place as we were trying to bail on the storm. Traffic was a mess because the TV meteorologist for a particular station had told people to get in their car and flee south. DON'T EVER DO THAT! Always shelter in place and put as many walls between you and the outside. These people not only put their lives at risk, but ours too! It was worse than rush hour in any large city, at 8pm at night!

All in all, a good chase day for us. We had one motto going into the day, "always, always stay in front of other chasers and be a step ahead!" We stuck to it and it benefited us greatly because we were safe and avoided possible massive chaser convergence. It is too bad people had to be killed in this tornado and definitely took the fun out of this day. As I mentioned earlier, the loss in the chaser community on this day is tragic and will never be forgotten.

As for me, I don't see any changes needed in how I chase. We did it smart and safe. We stayed far enough from the tornado and were never in imminent danger. The traffic is a third concept that we thought of originally with other chasers, but never considered on a magnitude of 1000s fleeing the city. Therefore, I must say, I will not be chasing in Oklahoma anytime soon, but I will be chasing again, very soon most likely as the northern Plains should pick up in activity!

Stay safe everyone!

Chip

4/22/13 Let it snow...and snow...and snow...and heck, snow a bit more

Well, snow is all the action we are getting in Rapid City. In fact, a whole seasons worth in April alone. With dreams of supercells in my head, I decided to crawl out of bed and hike in the snow. I took some shots of the foot of snow we received overnight while I was out and a'boot. Here are some shots!

This was the biggest break I have had from my thesis in a long, long time. I was supposed to defend today, but as you can see that didn't happen thanks to these frozen hydrometeors... Hopefully the next post will be more of the summer variety with lightning and convection!

Thanks for stopping by and sharing!

Chip

3/29/13 Nebraska Supercell

Well, it started as a drive to dinner in Paxton, NE turned much more eventful than we thought. We were watching a weak supercell pulse in strength (hours after watching it develop from nothing) and slowly drift to the east/northeast and decided to check it out before grabbing some food. We headed east on Highway 30 out of North Platte and saw a fairly impressive base and rainshaft with the now severe warned storm. I was shooting towards the downdraft trying to get a lightning shot.

The storm definitely was getting its act together as the downdraft became more robust.

Getting bored with the cell of interest, I shot northeast for a bit and got a glimpse of some leaders emerging from the clouds.

Sitting just north of Hershey, NE, looking in the opposite direction, the storm was developing a prominent rear flank downdraft. This image is looking west into the hook of the supercell with the RFD to the left and the forward flank downdraft to the right. This image was taken at 1802 CDT, the exact time of a confirmed tornado. Cloud bases are way to high here for a tornado so it must've been a gustnado or something of the such.

Sitting in the same location, looking south-southwest, this is the view of the RFD cutting through the base of the storm. There are a few lowerings as the RFD begins to turn back to the north and in our direction, but no defined meso was able to develop.

Looking back to the northwest, we could hear a roar and a clear defined forward flank was coming in our direction as the storm had turned to the south. The roar was nickel to dime size hail hitting the ground.

The storm finally moved over us and dropped a good amount of hail on us and pushed off to the east/southeast. We moved a bit farther south to avoid any large hail and decided the storm wasn't worth pursing to the east. This is the view to the east as the FFD had moved off. A few hailstones are still falling in the foreground.

A great little impromptu chase! Definitely didn't expect anything today and was just looking for a few lightning strikes. Still not to sure about a tornado as cloud bases were quite high. Winds weren't very strong either. Even being hit by the RFD, winds weren't gusty, so the chances of a gustnado don't seem likely either. Anywho, there were multiple people claiming to see a tornado. People always see what they want to. I wouldn't of minded a weak tornado and guess I was just in the wrong place (in perfect position though!).

Great start to the season and my expectations are definitely raised for the season!

Chip

2/15/13 Bald eagle sighting!

After months of searching and waiting, I finally got sight of the bald eagle today at sunset! He perched on a tree at Canyon Lake and eventually flew off into the sunset. Here are three shots I got of the little bugger. I plan to go out in the morning to see if he is out and about again!

Thanks for checking my blog out!

Chip

2/11/13 It has been awhile...here's some winter/night scenes!

First the most recent. Here are some shots of a crescent moon setting tonight!

Going back about a week or two, I shot a timelapse in the Black Hills at a bonfire we had near Hisega. The moon rose around 11pm and the span of the video goes the entirety of the night, ending as soon as the sun began to rise. Here is the video.

Going back another week or so, I hiked Buzzards Roost with the pretty lady and a friend hoping to see a great sunset and moonrise. We were treated with a awesome halo around the sun with alot of high clouds. The downside was it ruined the sunset. The moon was a full one and when it rose, it was magnificent over Rapid City. I got a timelapse of both the moonrise and sunset!

Here are a few additional shots that I got with the full moon over Rapid City before we hiked in the dark back to our cars.

Kathy Jo is shining bright creating a halo around herself (and the sun)!!!

A week or two before the previous, I hiked alone (and had a long hike back alone in the dark) to Buzzards Roost to shoot what I thought would be a quality sunset. You tell me what you think...

And a few days before that, I shot this sunset in Rapid City!

 
Finally, for a bit of a change of pace, Thanksgiving night, I spent some time in the freezing cold Badlands and got this timelapse/startrails shot that I played with. It is only an hour...

 Finally I will leave you with a sunset from the end of December from east of Rapid City, SD.

I plan to take all the videos and timelapses I have accumulated over the past year and make one entire video. It shouldn't take too long, but is time my thesis just doesn't give me at the moment. So, hold tight and wait for my next blog post! :)

Thanks for stopping by and share with your friends!

Chip

11/15/12 A few shots...

I am still alive! I am currently trying to get all my photos in one place with the addition of a new laptop and slowly putting my old one out of commission (its cord still doesn't like to make a good connection to the laptop). School is also taking over my life slowly but surely. Anywho, I am still taking pictures! Here are a few of my most recent shots!

Here is the moon tonight. A beautiful crescent, by far my favorite moon phase! The earth glow lights up the rest of the moon that is often hard to see with the naked eye! Pretty!

Here are a few shots from earlier this week (hint, I am going back in time) from a few hours I spent at Pactola Lake in the Black Hills.

Milky way

And here is a sunset timelapse I did that evening before these star shots. Image flashes due to me adjusting settings to retain visibility with the changing light.


At the end of October, I traveled with the Rocky Mountain Incident Management Type 2 Team C to the Wetmore Fire in Colorado. Here are a few shots I took during the travel from Rapid City to there (shots from the incident are coming in a later post most likely).

Hot air balloon at sunrise in central Colorado

A windmill in Wyoming during the windy drive home

A mere day before the call-up, here is the sunset from Rapid City...

A week or so earlier, I traveled to North Platte to visit a friend. On the way, I saw my first snow of the season and stopped to take this picture of a dozer line from the Region 23 Complex. A very serious fire that burned near Chadron, NE in early September this year. To the right of the dozer line, note the burned out terrain as opposed to the unburned on the left. Amazing how a line and a burn out operation can halt a fire!

Well, that is all for now! Hope ya'll enjoyed! Visit back occasionally! Also keep a look out for the SDSMT Weather Association calendar for 2013! Two of my photos are featured in it!

Chip