May 8th featured a set up that was out of phase. Better moisture and instability was in Oklahoma, however better shear was in Kansas. We tried to find the best overlap of both, which looked like the Kansas/Oklahoma border area. A nice supercell formed late afternoon near Protection and tracked along a boundary until the cap strength increased, thus killing the storm.
May 6th East Central New Mexico Supercell
Wasn’t expecting much this day with low 50s dewpoints and modest shear, but ended up catching a decent supercell that lasted several hours. It had fairly good structure, produced a pretty gustnado and quite a bit of lightning near dark.
May 7th Central Kansas Supercells
May 7th had that typical early May feel in Kansas, with one exception, lack of moisture. Shear was fantastic, as well as a boundary for storms to fire on. By late afternoon one supercell formed that would be the storm of the day. It survived for about 7 hours and produced insanely beautiful structure, great lightning and copious amounts of hail. Had the dewpoints been in the 60s instead of mid 50s, it would likely have become violently tornadic. A fun chase and one of the prettiest storms of 2013 for me!
April 26th Western Oklahoma Supercell
April 26th was a surprise day for me. I wasn’t figuring on much happening, however nature gave us a pretty supercell west of Clinton that had decent structure, hail and was tornado warned, despite limited moisture and shear. Here’s a few shots of it.
April 22nd Leedey, Oklahoma Beautiful Supercell
April 22nd took me to northwest Oklahoma to play a dryline/cold front intersection. A couple of intense supercells formed near Enid and northward across the Kansas border, but we waited till the dryline storms formed by early evening. A magnificent supercell formed southwest of Woodard, and turned moving southeast towards Leedey. The structure of the storm was simply stunning, with the best photography occurring just as dusk as intercloud lightning illuminated the highly striated updraft!
April 8th Eastern Colorado Supercell and Weak Tornado
April 8th took me to the I-70 corridor near Flagler and then northeast to north of Burlington, Colorado. A high based supercell formed in a high shear low CAPE environment and struggled as it moved northeast, often coming close to dissipating before restrengthening again. Storm structure was decent and eventually the storm produced a brief, weak tornado north of Burlington.
July 16th/17th SD Supercell/WY Fire
July 16th took us to central South Dakota for a marginal set up. Decent flow aloft, limited moisture and decent instability allowed a cluster of storms to form. The tail end storm became a gorgeous supercell and was very electrified. The next day on the way back to Denver, we passed the Sawmill Canyon, Wyoming fire. It was raging out of control and had consumed 13,000 acres.
June 26th Parkbeg, Saskatchewan, Canada Strong Tornadoes
June 25th and 26th took us across the border to chase in Alberta and Saskatchewan. The trip resulted in my first ever Canadian tornado intercept. On June 25th we intercepted an HP supercell near Kindersly that had an amazing sunset under the gusted out storm. June 26th was the day to remember. An outflow boundary set up from southwest to south central Saskatchewan and become the focus for intense supercell development by late afternoon. The storm struggled at first and then spun like a top producing 2 photogenic tornadoes, with the 2nd one less than a mile from us and very strong. Amazing surface obs feeding the storm (82/77 with east winds at 20 mph) helped the base lower and ingest every bit of energy available. Check out the photos below. The first photo is from June 25th sunset. The rest are of the tornadic supercell on the 26th.
June 22nd Nebraska Briefly Tornadic Supercell
June 22nd had some great potential. A warm front lay across the NE/SD border, with a dryline extending south from it. I have to admit, my target that day was the warm front/dry line intersection near Lusk, then eastward as storms could potentially ride the warm front. Indeed, the storm of the day did just that and we missed it due to the this being the final day of the tour and our tendency to lean south towards the Cheyenne ridge, which was also a viable target. We intercepted a supercell near Sidney, NE that rode eastward and became a very nice supercell. It produced a brief, 2 minute tornado, before becoming extremely photogenic.
June 12th New Mexico Supercell
June 12th featured good upslope flow into eastern New Mexico. Dewpoints in the 50s to near 60, CAPE to 3000 j/kg, good directional and speed shear, would set the stage for supercell development across that region. A cluster of supercells developed southwest of Hobbs, but we stayed put near Santa Rosa and were rewarded with a very pretty, nearly tornadic supercell. The storm was high based to begin, and then as evening approached and dew points also rose, the base came down and was tornado warned. The night time CG barrage was quite impressive as the updraft was lit up constantly.
