What an awesome day!!!! We started the day out in Oklahoma City and headed north towards the triple point in southwest Kansas. We intercepted an incredible supercell in eastern Ford county and it moved into Edwards county. This storm had 60 mph inflow winds and awesome structure. It produced several tornadoes, of which we saw 4 of them. The first tube formed in the inflow region in the notch of this beast. The second, third and fourth tornadoes formed in the hook area of supercell. We eventually blew the storm off as it approached Greensberg and took on drastic HP features. We dropped south for the next cell, only to find out later that our first cell later produced the Pratt wedge. Moral of the story: Never blow off your storm!!!!
April 18th, 2002 McPherson County, KS Monster Supercell & Tornadoes
April 18 was my favorite chase day of the year. A dryline/front intersection (triple point) was the focus for intense convection this day. I arrived north of Wichita in time for the first cb to go up. It died quickly as other towers also tried in vain to break the cap. Finally by late afternoon a storm broke the cap and went on the be the most scenic supercell of the year. It moved slowly across McPherson county, Kansas as it became a gorgeous “upside down wedding cake” with intense cg, hail and a couple of tornadoes.
August 23rd, 2001 Russell/Lincoln Counties, KS Supercells & Tornadoes
What a pleasant surprise this chase was!! An impressive vort max and stacked low were over northeast Colorado moving into western Kansas. By 10 am, storms were firing to the east of the vort max. I decided to blast out of Denver to get in front of this vort center and hopefully find a rotating storm. I found much more than that!!! First, a tornado occurred in Gove county, Kansas near the Castle R o ck state park. Nice small landspout. Next a rather large supercell exploded in the unstable air over Russell county, Kansas as I blasted east on I-70. Another landspout occurred near I-70 in Ellis county, Kansas. As I arrived on the now confirmed tornadic supercell, I saw a huge hail core that contained baseball sized hail. I headed east to get in front of it and southeast of the updraft. As I did a rather large stovepipe tornado formed under the rotating meso. Secondly, another smaller white tornado formed on the east side of the meso as the storm entered Lincoln county, Kansas near the town of Sylvan Grove. The storm soon went HP as I headed east towards Salina to get in front of it and watch the shelf cloud mature. But not before I was pummeled with golf ball sized hail and 70 mph winds. It was a beautiful sight!!! Please enjoy the video stills below.
May 27th, 2001 Barber County, KS Weak Tornado & Supercell
May 27 was a potentially violent day for the plains. A frontal boundary was draped across southern Kansas, and elevated severe storms developed north of this boundary. We decided to wait for any surface based convection to develop south of the front, and finally we were treated to a very violent, hail producing supercell that eventually went upscale into an incredible MCS that blasted Oklahoma that night. Pics of the supercell, weak tornado near Sitka, and incredible “outer space” shelf cloud are shown below.
June 3rd, 1999 Almena, Kansas Tornado
My encounter with a gorgeous F3 tornado and associated supercell near Almena, Kansas on June 3, 1999 was my favorite chase of the year. The setup was a simple forecast to nail. A dryline was evident based on surface obs in western Kansas. An east/west outflow boundary was in place from previous night’s convection. By noon the dryline was surging east as is typical with the dryline. About 3 PM a line of towering cu were seen on visible satellite and from my position. A dryline bulge formed across west central Kansas, so I decided to get into position to the northeast of the dryline bulge where it intersected the outflow boundary, and the results are shown below. A rather isolated supercell formed and produced a very photogenic slow moving F3 tornado!!!!! Beautiful storm. These pics first show the development of the supercell. Then there are a series of 12 photos that show the development, maturity and dissipation of the 1/4 mile tornado.
