May 16th, Southeast Missouri Tornadofest

May 16th was advertised by SPC with a MODERATE RISK across the MS/OH river areas. It did not disappoint! Strong shear, high moisture and instability, and a slowly advancing front set the stage for what would be the most significant severe weather outbreak of the year so far. We started in Springfield, IL and blasted towards Sikeston, MO, which was my target. Storms formed west along the front and moved east and intensified. We decided to push west a bit and meet them as they came out of the Ozarks (a nearly impossible area to chase in!). As is often the case, we targeted the tail end storm, which typically gets the best feed of moisture, as it moved just north of Poplar Bluff. It had a great hook echo on radar and showed a strong velocity couplet. As it emerged onto the flat terrain, a truncated cone tornado formed and went on to be on the ground over 15 miles. It caused significant damage and was rated EF3. Another tornado formed just east of the first, a long slender elephant trunk shaped tornado, and ended up getting rated EF1. The supercell moved east across the Mississippi and Ohio rivers west of Paducah, and due to terrain and poor road networks, we couldn’t stay up with it.

More storms formed back west into southeast Missouri, so we pursued them. We caught up to them just west of Morley. An elephant trunk shaped funnel descended and touched down just west of town causing EF1 damage. Soon another EF1 tornado formed just to out northeast and eventually dissipated as it crossed the river. Numerous tornadoes occurred across this area during this event, causing extensive damage and unfortunately even loss of life. Our heartfelt sympathy goes out to those who suffered, including a tornado that directly hit St Louis. Please take the time to donate to local charities to help those impacted by these tornadoes and supercell thunderstorms.

May 14th Hershey, Nebraska Tornadoes

Wasn’t expecting a lot on May 14th. Moisture was lacking, but shear and lift were good. We chased a high based supercell north of McCook, NE and stayed with it as it moved north. It eventually dissipated as a wind shift boundary west of North Platte generated numerous severe thunderstorms. We approached North Platte as a landspout tornado formed south of Hershey. It persisted for several minutes before roping out. Soon a second tornado formed and became quite pretty! It lasted over 10 minutes before diminishing. Not long after that another tornado formed. It morphed into a slender elephant trunk shaped tornado and also lasted over 10 minutes. Finally we decided to head west on I-80 to the storm, now a formidable supercell. Decent structure and huge hail greeted us north of Hershey, and we decided to head back east as it rapidly weakened when it came off the boundary. A lot of fun today. Great lightning, nice tornadoes and good storm structure! Enjoy the photos!

May 1st Westway, Texas Tornado Warned Supercell

May 1st set up was far from ideal. Limited moisture was present moving into the upslope play of northeast New Mexico. Shear was great, as was lift. However, limited moisture also meant limited instability. Despite all that, severe storms formed south near Logan, NM as moved east. The tail end storm latched onto the old frontal boundary draped across the region and started spinning hard. As the storm crossed the Texas border, it became tornado warned. The structure was amazing! As it churned southeast along the boundary, it produced hail tennisball sized and had numerous lowering over time. Headin into the Hereford area, the hail became intense so we chose to push ahead and northeast of it and get out of its way. For a day that wasn’t advertised, a bit of panhandle magic certainly became the story of the day! Enjoy the pics!

April 26th Roswell, New Mexico Tornadic Supercell

April 26th featured an upslope/dryline play in eastern New Mexico. Storms formed along and north of an outflow boundary. We intercepted the triple point storm that developed just northeast of town and kept back building at the triple point until it got so strong it moved southeast along the boundary. It didn’t take long in the highly sheared environment for it to start rotating strongly. Inflow winds of 50 mph fed the storm. There was so much dirt being sucked into the updraft at times, you could see the dirt cloud rise into the updraft base. Eventually the low levels started rotating as a very obvious mesocyclone formed. A clear slot wrapped around the meso and a long snaking elephant trunk shaped funnel, then tornado descended from cloud base. Dirt partially obscured it from time to time and it dissipated after about 5 minutes. The storm was a prolific hailer as ell we 3-4 inch stones reported. We stay with it until dark when it weakened. A fun day and a major powerful supercell was incredible to experience from birth to death. Enjoy the pics!

April 23rd, 2025 Southwest Kansas Tornado Warned Supercells

April 23rd took me to southwest Kansas. A surface low and triple point was southeast of Goodland. Models showed supercells developing on the dryline and interacting with the warm front as they moved northeast and were forecast to spin hard there. That’s exactly what happened. I intercepted one supercell near Healy, Kansas that attached itself to the warm front in an environment of high theta-e air and it became tornado warned. I had to drive through copious amounts of golfball sized hail to get to the hook and what a beauty it was!! Low bowl shaped wall cloud with rain/hail wrapping around it as it spun HARD. It tried to cone up a couple times but couldn’t maintain it’s tight rotation to get a tornado down. Eventually it moved into colder air north of the warm front and weakened. I dropped south to catch another developing supercell west of Kalvesta, Kansas. a massive bowl shaped lowering was spinning hard. It produced a tapered funnel halfway to the ground, but never did contact it. Structure was nice with that classic backward “C” shape to the RFD eroded updraft. It also crossed into colder air and weakened. By then it was almost dark and time to head to the hotel for the night. Fun day and enjoy the pics!

April 19, 2025 Mertzon, Texas Tornado

April 19th was a long drive. Up at 4am to hit the road, we blasted nearly 700 miles, only to miss the best tornado of the day by 20 minutes. Talk about frustration! Models/NWS/SPC stated the tornado threat wouldn’t ramp up until after 6pm when the low level jet kicked in. All were wrong! Before 4pm a supercell hit the boundary and became tornadic. By the time we arrived, that storm had weakened so we targeted another supercell west/northwest of San Angelo. It also became briefly tornadic as the main meso wrapped up and dropped a cone funnel to the ground! It was only down a couple of minutes before lifting back up. A long drive, but we at least were able to capture a tornado!

Late July/August Desert Thunder Tours

Every year we run our lightning tours. This year was an AMAZING period in Arizona while we were there! Of the 15 days we chased there, we had storms, often severe, on 14 of those days. From incredible lightning west of Tucson to phenomenal lighting over the Grand Canyon, this year’s images are some of my favorites! There are many features in Arizona that are incredibly beautiful when a storm, lighting and rainbows are present. The saguaro cactus and other cactus varieties are amazing to photograph. Red rock canyons abound, and storms form usually over the higher terrain before thunderstorm outflows push onto the desert floors and generate more storms due to lifting warm and moist air upward. We hope you enjoy these images as much as we did witnessing them firsthand! You can join us too on these incredible adventures. Word or caution, these tours sell out FAST! Enjoy!

June 27th Amidon, North Dakota Tornado Warned Supercell

June 27th had a lot going for it. An approaching shortwave trough, an outflow boundary along with a dryline, as well as decent moisture with dewpoints in the 60s and moderate CAPE around 2500 j/kg would set the stage for severe weather in Montana, North Dakota and South Dakota. We originally targeted the area around Buffalo, South Dakota, but as moisture mixed out, we knew we’d have to venture a bit further north into southwest North Dakota. A supercell formed near Beach and became tornado warned. An hour later another supercell formed northwest of Amidon and also became tornado warned. We pushed north to get in position to watch it and as we did a couple of weak funnels formed under it and were reported to the NWS. The storm was anchored along a boundary and slowly back built. Numerous times there were rotating lowerings under the southwest portion of the updraft, as golfball sized hail fell from the vault region. Eventually the cell turned southeast and moved off the boundary. However, it moved into more stable air and slowly weakened but not before becoming tornado warned one last time! We stayed with it over beautiful canola fields and stopped for some photography. A fun day, and some amazing scenery!!!

June 23rd Neptune, Saskatchewan Tornado Warned Supercell

June 23rd was the first day of Photo Tour #2. Models showed a triple point low over southern Saskatchewan, with a cold front/dry line extending south into northern Montana. We had a LONG was to go starting from Denver, with close to a 10-12 hour drive! So, we departed at sunrise and blasted north. We arrived in Wolf Point, Montana late afternoon as cumulus towers formed west toward Glasgow. Storms were already severe and tornado warned in Canada, with Environment Canada issuing a PDS (Particularly Dangerous Situation) tornado watch for parts of Saskatchewan. Knowing we still would have another 2-3 hour drive to make it up there, we decided to see what the Montana developing storms would do. SPC issued an MD for Montana talking about a couple supercells forming. We hedged our bets for Montana. Soon it became clear that was the wrong choice as storms formed as left moving supercells, so we crossed the border into Saskatchewan north of Plentywood, MT and blasted north towards the tornado warned supercell. We got within about 10 miles of it as the sun was setting so we stopped for photography. Structure was gorgeous and so were the pale blue and orange colors of the storms! We stayed with it the best we could and at one point a very dark, large “v” shaped lowering occurred although we could not tell whether it was a wall cloud or broad cone shaped funnel due to the distance we were from the storm. Having to get back to our border crossing, which closed at midnight, we waved goodbye and back tracked to get back into the US. A 1060 mile day that resulted in a stunning supercell near Neptune, Saskatchewan was well worth the drive! Enjoy the pics!

June 18th Kalvesta, Kansas Tornadoes

June 18th featured a stationary boundary draped across southwest Kansas. Dewpoints in the 60s and temps in the 90s, as well as the wind shift along the boundary would set the stage for not only landspout tornadoes, but also supercells forming and anchoring along the boundary. We intercepted one such storm that produced a landspout in its formation stage, followed by a legitimate supercell with a strong velocity couplet that lead to a 10 minute long tornado. The structure became quite nice and the storm was incredibly electrified! At one point a lightning strike produced a fire on wheat fields that were ready to be harvested. A very unfortunate incident for the local farmers. We then dropped south to just north of Cimarron where we encountered another strongly developing mesocyclone that produced a tapered cone funnel with a brief circulation. Many thanks to our guest, Leann Yamanaka for the pics of that funnel/circulation from beside the van! Finally, south of Liberal, Kansas a very photogenic supercell emerged from a cluster of cells at sunset and produced absolutely gorgeous mammatus clouds. Enjoy the pics!

Check out this cool video from that day!

https://youtu.be/mef65EQuBMs

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