June 7, 2001 Northeastern Colorado tornadic supercell
This was a typical severe weather day in Northeastern Colorado, a region that is no stranger to significant severe thunderstorms. Over the years, a few souls have been very fortunate to photograph several large, dramatic tornadoes over this region, making it a favorite target for storm chasers. In fact, the peak of the tornado season here is typically the first week of June and we don't hesitate to chase here when conditions warrant. Beginning the chase at Sterling, Colorado we ended up being surrounded by many storm chasers at a gas station on the outskirts of town while we sat inside downloading data for several hours. Eventually, a storm developed to our south near Akron and we moved to intercept. Heading south on Highway 63 we moved back and forth on various unpaved county roads to get close to the storm as it moved south through rural Washington County.
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| Storm updraft base/wall cloud over rural Washington County southwest of Akron. We moved west from Hwy 63 on CR 36 to get this view. | The hail core of the storm eventually overtook us and we had to drive back east towards Hwy 63. Here you can see golfball-sized hail accumulating on CR 36 about 1.5 miles west of the highway. | Moving south on Hwy 63, we tried dinking west on various county roads eventually deciding on CR 23 south of Elba for our farthest westward penetration towards this storm. Here we are looking northwest from near the intersection of CR 23 and CR Y at an ominous wall cloud. | Here is a zoomed in shot underneath the wall cloud shown in the previous picture. I've purposely darkened the image in the hopes of bringing out the column of dust whirling beneath the wall cloud. This is a weak tornado occurring about 1.5 miles south of Rago, CO. |