Tornado at 6000 feet

Good evening from the Best Western here in Clayton, New Mexico. Today was our final chase day of the trip, and as it turned out, ending up being the most successful day of the trip. We began the day in La Junta, Colorado, and after a short lunch at the Copper Kitchen Cafe headed southward along Highway 109, passing by many local mesas/canyons. We intersected Highway 160 west of Springfield, Colorado, and traveled westward toward Trinidad, Colorado to intercept storms that had developed across the Sangre de Cristo mountains and were now pushing eastward and intensifying, becoming supercellular. Shortly before arriving at the intersection of Highway 160, a low-hanging blocky wall cloud came into view, and the wall cloud became more impressive as we traveled westward. We pulled over to watch the storm approximately 10 miles NE of Branson, CO, and were soon treated to an impressive atmospheric show. A substantial RFD cut developed into the wall cloud, followed quickly by a cone-shaped lowering, which then descended further into a high-contrast cone/stovepipe tornado. Depsite being a substantial distance away from the tornado, it still appeared quite large, and was likely fairly wide from a closer vantage point. The tornado remained on the ground for 15-20 minutes, slowly becoming obscured somewhat in rain, but coming out of the rain at times. After the tornado ended, the parent circulation associated with our tornado moved northward into rain-cooled air and died, with the parent thunderstorm merging into an outflow-dominant line, signaling the end of its life cycle (at least for what we're interested in seeing).

Chases like today are rare, and mark the pinnacle of storm chasing; observing a high contrast tornado from birth until death in good terrain. I've chased in southeast Colorado 3 or 4 times in my life, and 3 times I've seen tornadoes here, two of which were high-contrast and visually impressive tornadoes (today's storm, and my personal favorite tornado that I've seen, Campo, Colorado, May 2010). For whatever reason (likely a result of enhanced low-level shear due to the lay of the terrain and wind flow around it), storms really seem to overachieve in Eastern Colorado (granted, today's ambient storm environment was very favorable for supercells, and decent enough for tornadoes). I'll be adding some tornado photos tomorrow, as well as some excellent video that Renee took. Quite amazing to have observed an impressive tornado at above 6000 feet (elevation of the area we chased in ranged from 6000-6500 feet).

We then dropped southward into New Mexico toward Folsom to observe to 2 additional supercells near Raton, and another near Springer. It became apparent that the southern storm (Springer storm) was the more intense of the two, so we pressed southward to Des Moines, and then westward toward the Capulin volcano to observe the approaching storm. As the storm began to become clearer on the horizon, it was apparent that the storm was initially an LP (low precipitation) supercell, and then gradually over time began to develop more precipitation, taking on more of a classic supercell appearance. After observing for a while near Capulin, we moved back toward Des Moines to stay ahead of the storm. Around this time the storm began to rapidly develop a low-hanging wall cloud and a cone shaped lowering. Precipitation and terrain (local peak "Sierra Grande", 8400 feet) unfortunately began to obscure our view, and as the area of interest was hidden by the Sierra Grande, a tornado was reported by trained local spotters. Once emerging east of the blocking terrain, we observed several additional lowerings/wall clouds, and one fairly impressive funnel cloud just as the storm began to die.

We then pushed eastward Clayton, stopping at the Love's Travel Center parking lot for 30 minutes or so to decide our course of action. During our stop, intense winds developed (likely due to a dying thunderstorm nearby), and produced a brief dust-storm in town. Dust remains a continuing theme on this trip. After dropping the idea of traveling eastward into the Texas panhandle to chase new thunderstorms with tornado potential (much too far away), we dropped southwestward and eventually ended up on Highway 102, a desolate, remote, but very peaceful/serene stretch of road where modern society remains largely absent. It was here that we were treated to a beautiful LP supercell off in the distance to the west, while undulating mammatus clouds hung to the east behind crisp updrafts along the western edge of a thunderstorm complex. A double rainbow even appeared for a short time to add to the visual feast available from today's atmospheric buffet.

The final chase day appropriately closed with a virga-filled sky, laden with warm, pastel colours as the sun set over the mesas on the horizon, all the while our LP supercell slowly weakened and faded into obscurity. Some find their moments of peace, relaxtion, and reflection on hikes in the mountains, canoe trips down the river, or reclining in a chair on the beach. For myself, the High Plains on a day like today elicit the same feelings and emotions. Goodnight.

Success in Eastern Colorado

Good morning from La Junta (pronounced "Hoonta"), Colorado. Yesterday was certainly the most successful day of our entire trip so far, observing a long-lived cyclic supercell that survived for roughly 9 hours after its birth just north of Castle Rock, CO. During the life cycle of the storm, we observed 4 or 5 different landspout tornadoes, including 1 long-lived and photogenic landspout, countless gustandoes, and 1-2 possible mesocyclone tornadoes.

As you may recall, we began the day in Ogallala, Nebraska, then traveled southwestward into Colorado, stopping for lunch/coffee/chat with an interesting coffee shop owner in Brush, Colorado, then preceded southward to Limon, Colorado. Upon reaching Limon, we took Highway 24 southwestward where the entire storm came into great view. The storm began as a high-precipitation supercell, with several surges of big, dusty RFD winds hitting us as we headed eastward down local county roads. We observed the first 2 or 3 landspouts that this storm produced approximately 5-6 miles NW of Punkin Center, Colorado, including the tall, high-constrast, tube-like landspout that developed on the northeastern edge of the RFD gust front. All the while, period RFD cuts/clear slots and wall clouds would develop further back on the southwestern flank of the storm. We continued to stairstep southward and eastward over the next few hours to stay ahead of the storm, watching it continue to cycle, developing an intense surge of RFD, attempting to tornado, occluding, and then repeating the process.

We eventually headed south of Highway 71 to Highway 96 which ran northeastward toward the town of Haswell, CO. Approximately halfway to Haswell, the storm intensified, developing one of the lowest wall clouds it had produced with rotation tightening in the cloud base. Shortly after, a dust whirl was seen underneath the wall cloud, and this was the first of two potential mesocyclone tornadoes. With the storm now paralleling us, we got east to near Haswell then pushed southward, as a new updraft south of the storm was beginning to feed in and merge with the original storm. Shortly after the merger, the storm rapidly intensified once again, developing a significant wall cloud which was draped with a mean-looking collar cloud. Often times, the presence of a collar cloud like the one we observed would often signal tornadogenesis. Around the time of the collar cloud development, cloud-base rotation became very intense/rapid, with a cone shaped lowering developing. Substantial dust then kicked up underneath the lowering, separate from the left to right moving dust to the west associated with the RFD. This was likely mesocyclone tornado #2 of the storm, but a small hill in the distance and the amount of dust associated with the storm made it slightly difficult to confirm a tornado 100%. At the very least, another landspout occurred, but given the magnitude of rotation and presence of the collar cloud, we are quite confident a mesocyclone tornado developed.

We continued to stay ahead of the storm, now pushing eastward along Highway 50 toward Lamar. A tornado was reported (and made it into the offical reports list) during this time, but seemed to only be very low-hanging and rising scud, as rapid rotation/sustained wall cloud had ended. Later reports/pictures indicate that softball to grapefruit size hail fell along Highway 50 near Hasty, CO as we observed the storm from a truck stop on the west side of the Lamar. Around dark, the storm began to shrink and become an LP supercell, with lots of the precipitation beginning to vanish, and the structure becoming more laminar/striated. Nick stopped for a few long exposure shots after dark, then we called it a day.

Target for today is not 100% certain, but will likely be in close proximity to where w

e are now, in the vicinity of SE CO, NW OK, or NW TX. Adios for now!

Supercells and Possible Brief Tornado?

Greetings from everyone's favorite town of Ogallala once again, this time from the Comfort Inn, a substantial upgrade on the Super 8 across the street. Very little time to write tonight as it's already 1:51am local time, and we need to be leaving by 9:00-10:00 am tomorrow morning. Anyhow, observed several supercells in E WY and W NE, one of which tried very hard to, and may have produced a brief tornado/landspout just north of the city of Lusk, Wyoming. Certainly the best day of the trip so far, with 3 or 4 supercells observed, 1 possible tornado (we'll post photos), and some excellent structure. If I have time tomorrow, I'll try and elaborate on the Lusk storm a bit more. Adios for now. Initial target of just east of Castle Rock, CO tomorrow.

Frustration

Best regards from Sidney, Nebraska, where frustration and a feeling of underachievement is currently the main fixture of the evening. We departed Ogallala around midday, traveling down I-80 to North Platte where we stopped for lunch. At this time, our main idea was to monitor a warm front across northern Kansas, moving northward, and an outflow boundary across north-central Nebraska (originating from thunderstorms near the Nebraska/South Dakota border). We felt the boundaries would merge early in the afternoon, eventually becoming one "effective" warm front, which would serve as a focus for thunderstorm development later in the day as an upper-level shortwave trough ejected eastward out of the Rockies. By mid-afternoon, these boundaries had indeed merged and had aligned themselves across central Nebraska. Several thunderstorms had begun to develop along or just north of the boundary north and east of Broken Bow. It was uncertain at the current time whether these storms would remained elevated (based higher up in the atmosphere, with little threat to produce a tornado) north of the warm front, or become rooted in the boundary layer (based in the lowest few thousand feet of the atmosphere, with a much greater chance of producing a tornado). The environment right along the warm front exhibited very high-levels of wind shear in the lower portions of the atmosphere, which was very conducive to tornado development if the storm was indeed based in the boundary layer. We continued to travel eastward and northward out of Broken Bow, trying to get a better glimpse at the now rapidly-intensifying supercell to the north, but substantial low clouds in the vicinity of the warm front made it hard to see much. Around this time, the storm became tornado-warned, with a few confirmed tornado reports beginning to trickle in north of Ord, NE and west of Greeley, NE. We continued to chug eastward as quickly as safely possible, attempting to get east of the storm to look back into the storm's "notch" and try and get a glance at the strong circulation/possible tornado that was likely embedded deep in the rain/precipitation of the now extremely High-Precipitation Supercell. This was not meant to be, however, as an extreme amount of storm chase traffic slowed our progression eastward down Highway 22. Additionally, we began to take very heavy rainfall and strong winds from the Rear-Flank Downdraft of the storm, making it impossible to see virtually anything. As we continued eastward along Highway 22, still caught in the intense rainfall/wind of the very wet RFD, I began to grow concerned that a new circulation could potentially develop south and east of the current one to the north. If this occurred, we could be a bit too close for comfort, and given the rain/wind and lack of any real visibility into the business end of the storm, we decided to turn around. We then abandoned our original storm, and observed one additional supercell northeast of Lexington, NE. This storm tried its hardest to do something interesting for us as it crossed the warm front, briefly developing some fairly decent low-mid level rotation. The storm then quickly weakened after crossing the warm front as it was quickly undercut by dense cold air and began to die, but not before affording us some decent structure photos and a good lightning display.

All in all, today was quite frustrating, as really only one storm in the entire state of Nebraska managed to consistently produce tornadoes on what looked to be a better day for tornadoes. Had we arrived roughly 5-10 minutes earlier to our initial storm, we may have observed one of the tornadoes it produced, but it wasn't to be. Chasing along warm fronts in very moisture-laden environments is not one of my favorite things to do, as I prefer High Plains/Front Range upslope storms much more due to their chaser-friendly nature, and dryline storms due to their propensity to become beasts, but also maintain good visibility of the storm thanks to their often isolated nature. All in all, a very frustrating day.

We're currently holed up at "Sleep For Less" in Sidney, Nebraska, a rather quaint local mom and pop motel just north of I-80 with clean rooms and low rates. Early target area for tomorrow will be NW Nebraska and SW South Dakota as upslope flow develops during the afternoon hours and moisture streams back into the High Plains and toward the Black Hills. Tornado potential doesn't look overly high for tomorrow, but photogenic supercells may be in the works. Goodnight for now. Pictures from today to be uploaded tomorrow.

Interocean Boulevard (Holyoke, CO)

Good evening from the Super 8 here in Ogallala, Nebraska. In 2006, my good friend Neil Garrett and I spent approximately 48 hours broken down in this town, as my 1997 red Jeep Cherokee decided to develop substantial problems on nearby I-80, effectively rendering the car undriveable. The exact cause of the problem at the time was unknown to us, so we sought the help of a local mechanic, a grizzled 60 year old man named Dan who had clearly lived a life of substantial excess, and was now displaying the aftereffects. After several consultations, Dan suggested we run a can of "Sea Foam" through the vehicle. Amazingly enough, the Sea Foam masked the underlying problem long enough to allow Neil and I to miraculously travel 1500 miles back to our then home just outside of Washington DC. Within a week of returning to the DC area, the Jeep's problem recurred, eventually turning out to be a bad oxygen sensor which my father replaced a short time later. Anyhow, today marks my 4th or 5th visit to Ogallala, far more than anyone should ever make in their lifetime. There are plenty of Plains towns of which I have fond memories of, but this place is definitely not high on that list.

You're probably wondering why today's blog entry has begun with a fairly boring recount of car trouble years ago? Well, that's because absolutely nothing happened today. Zero. We drove, ate, sat parked for a long time, drove some more, then ate again. That sums up the day. The general idea of the day was to hope that upslope flow developing into the Cheyenne Ridge of Northeast Colorado would spark off an isolated storm or two as moisture slowly streamed back into the region. Several attempts at thunderstorms occurred for much of the afternoon and evening, but a sustained updraft was never able to get going. I'll add one or two relatively uninteresting photos later of a "muffin cloud" as it was dubbed, that was about as close as we came to an actual sustained storm today. 

Tuesday will likely be the best overall chase setup of the trip, and should have a high potential for intense supercells and several tornadoes across southern or central Nebraska in the vicinity of a warm frontal/dryline intersection. Our plan is to head east toward North Platte tomorrow, or wherever the intersection ends up aligning itself. Goodnight for now.

Dust Bowl 2014

Greetings from La Ciudad de Jardin, or Garden City, Kansas for those following along in English. Our initial ideas today were to target an outflow boundary emanating from a morning thunderstorm complex across central Nebraska. The outflow boundary had pushed southward to very near the Kansas/Nebraska border by early afternoon, and we positioned ourself along the boundary after lunch in McCook, NE. Any thunderstorms developing later in the day along this boundary would in theory have a reasonable chance of becoming intense, and possibly producing a tornado or two. Unfortunately, the vast majority of storms that ending up developing along this boundary were unable to maintain their intensity and become dominant supercells. A combination of too many storms, and some subsidence (sinking motion in the atmosphere) likely played a role in these storms struggling.

After ditching the storms near the outflow boundary, we preceded further south toward Wakeeney, Kansas where we would attempt to intercept several storms spreading eastward from near Oakley. Kansas. These storms were much better organized, and several were supercells. Unfortunately, the further south we would travel, conditions would become less and less favorable for tornadoes, primarily due to lesser low-level wind shear, and more significantly, due to higher cloud bases (at the same relative humidity, a cloud will have a lower base at a cooler temperature than a hotter one). Temperatures in this part of Kansas had pushed into the lower 90s, and odds for any tornadoes were very slim. What we lacked in tornadoes, however, we more than made up for in dust. Epic amounts of dust approaching haboob-esque levels were being kicked up by the rear-flank downdraft winds of the approaching storms, with visibility dropping to near zero for brief moments along Highway 183. Multiple gustnadoes (dust devil-like circulations near the ground) were observed, with the erratic outflow winds blowing extreme amounts of dust all over the place from a variety of directions.

The final storm we observed on the day was the most organized, and had the best overall supercell structure (most reminiscent visually of a High-Precipitation Supercell, but dust replaced much of the heavy precipitation). Shortly after observing this final storm, we called it a day and headed to Dodge City, Kansas for dinner at "Tacos Jalisco". Great amusement was had at dinner as I watched two native Wisconsinites struggle mightily while attempting to eat truly authentic and spicy Mexican food.

Tomorrow's target will either be eastern Colorado as moisture streams back westward toward the Front Range in the post-frontal regime, or in western Oklahoma along the stalled frontal boundary. Tomorrow's chase potential will be substantially dependent on a strong "cap" in place, which could nullify any storms whatsoever. Prospects for the remainder of the week look very promising however, with Tuesday a potential "big day". Pictures to follow from today. Adios.