GoBoB Chasing

Chased 486 Miles Wednesday with Robert and Karen Hall and didn’t see squat. At 4:50AM on Thursday the 13th a Tornadic storm misses their house by a couple of miles. Most of Tulsa sleeps through the event or does not hear warning sirens.

I bought another NOAA All Hazards Radio tonight so I can have one that only warns on Tulsa and Creek counties and one that warns on all of Eastern, OK that I can unplug. Unplug is what I did at 4:00AM (STUPID) and I slept through the whole thing. Thankfully no one was badly hurt, but these overnight events are typically the ones that have high death tolls as no one seeks shelter because they are asleep. Please heed this warning and get a NOAA All Hazards Radio with SAME encoding and program it for your county and maybe one to the south and west as an early tripwire.

Monday was an interesting chase day. Steve Miller and I spoke about 9:15 and both remarked how it did not “feel” like an outbreak day based on the cool dreary weather we both had. We however both had faith in the models and our forecasts that it would be a big day. As the clouds burned off in western Oklahoma and the Gulf moisture surged with the strong southern winds the day continued to look more dire as it became apparent we were in as loaded gun as you can get and storms were going to affect populated places.

My target was a Guthrie, OK to Perry, OK corridor with chase partners Robert and Karen Hall along for the first chase of the season. We had a nice lowering at the intersection of 35 and 412. A tornado was reported, but I went back through the video and did not see one. The inflow winds were incredible between 75 and 85 mph. We could barely stand without being literally blown off our feet. Eventually our cell ran away and we tried several secondary targets, but everything was moving too fast. 245 miles of chasing and the standard banquet of pizza rolls and a strong Martini both courtesy of Karen Hall (thanks mom) finished a great day.

My good friend and former chase partner Steve Miller who now lives in Moore, OK had a significant impact at his residence. Fortunately Andrea was safe in the below ground shelter and the damage isn’t too bad. There is no worse feeling in this world than when you realize a storm is going to affect loved ones and you aren’t there. Please dust off you home safety plan and make sure everyone know where to go and hopefully has a safe place to go. I’ll harp one more time and say GET a NOAA ALL HAZARDS RADIO!!! Lastly, my thoughts go out to everyone who lost possessions and loved ones today. While we chasers do hope for tornadoes, we never want to see them in populated places.

As often seems to happen, the computer models that we use to develop chase targets get the details right, but completely miss the timing of the event. Our collective target today was Ardmore, OK. We stuck with Ardmore several hours than we should have, but not long enough. We were very aware of the storms that fired and ran over Edmond, OK (the tornado appears to have been about ½ miles from Hans’ home and family). The models and initial reports of these storms indicated they were higher based with less potential to produce tornadoes. Obviously any tornado that is on the ground for ten minutes in a populated place is significant and noteworthy.

TORNADO LASTED APPROXIMATELY 10 MINUTES. TORNADO WAS CONFIRMED BY BROADCAST MEDIA. TORNADO APPEARED TO TRAVEL THROUGH THE NW SIDES OF EDMOND. RECEIVED DAMAGE REPORTS ON (OUN)

We are getting reports of a wide large violent long track deadly tornado that went over Ardmore, OK about six hours later than projected. Nighttime reports are always a bit suspect, but based on radar this is believable.

Normally this kind of a bust really ticks me off as I burned a vacation day and will need to get caught up at work. I actually had a great chase day and enjoyed myself. It really helps to have three very experienced chasers working together to share the work load. I was chasing with backup systems as most of my gear is permanently mounted or configured to go in the Jeep (we chased in Hans’ expedition for the roomy comfort) and everything worked well.

Watching the 10:00 PM Oklahoma City, OK News.

One week ago Steve Miller (OK) and I chased hurricane Ike. While I don’t have an actual “bucket list” there are some things I do want to experience before my time on this planet is up. This was the first hurricane either of us has ever experienced. We left Moore, Ok well provisioned with 18 extra gallons of gasoline, 10 gallons of fresh water, and about seven days worth of nonperishable food and snacks.

The biggest disappoints were that the storm changed in trajectory and timing. It is hard to shoot compelling imagery at 2:30 in the morning when all of the power has gone out. Additionally the track continued northward confounding our efforts to intercept in a more manageable location like Corpus Christi. After surveying some local tree damage, we bugged out Saturday morning. I can’t say the experience was particularly profound and it is pretty much what you would expect: WINDY and RAINY.

Having spent 12 days in December without power because of an ice storm, I can relate to how this is probably beginning to drag on the mental state of people. We had running water throughout and gasoline stations were on generators within 24 hours. Houston has been blessed with uncharacteristic cool dry air this past week. I might chase another hurricane, but it is no longer a must do. If I lived within 25 miles of the coast, I doubt that I would evacuate, but I would be well provisioned to ride out an the extended aftermath.

Steve Miller (OK) and I are hunkered down in Wharton, TX. After carefully surveying north of Port Lavaca, TX to south of Freeport, TX all morning and afternoon we could not find a suitable location to ride out a likely cat 3 hurricane in the middle of the night. We strongly considered Lake Jackson, but discretion (and fear of eminent death) suggested Wharton might be a better choice. For security reasons, I can’t disclose our exact location at this time. There will ultimately be photos and video that will vindicate our choice.

Reference Map

Bob Sunset

Steve Sunset

As we were surveying costal locations we just missed the evacuation of Surfside as the road had flooded to make it completely impassible. A quick check of the maps showed we were at six feet above sea level. Here is a quick video of the flooding it is denoted as point “1” on this map (this was shot at 2:00 PM CDT). For point of reference we also considered Freeport “2” and Clute “3”. There were substantial media interests camped out in Clute, but our maps showed about 12 feet of elevation.

Thursday was interesting to say the least. Warm moist air from the Gulf streamed into Oklahoma and Kansas like a race car. April was the wettest on record in parts of OK and surely the evaporation of some of this moisture contributed to the increasing dew points and offset some of the mixing that would normally dry the atmosphere out. This was a classic chase problem day with a very strong warm dry layer of air aloft that acts as a capping layer. Think of this as a lid on a pressure cooker, so long as it holds nothing can really happen. The question was fairly simple, can we add enough sunshine, moisture, and a forcing mechanism to blow the lid.

Most chasers were negative, but with the opportunity to chase within 125 miles of home, I had to take the chance. I hit the road with chase partner Aaron Cunningham and we decided to head for Bartlesville, OK and then possibly the KS state line if necessary. As we ventured north, there was some favorable bubbling cumulus that is usually a good sign. Aaron spotted a tower going up near Sedan, KS. We danced with this storm for the next three hours. It was a beautiful storm. We were able to avoid the hail and stay under the rain free base. It came very close to wrapping up a tornado several times, but the Rear Flank Downdraft winds seemed too cold as we were continually greeted with cool inflow air just as the storm was showing the best shear/rotation.

In all, it was a 261 mile trip that has go down in the grade book as no worse than B-. We were in cell phone hell, so once again streaming was not all I hopped for. About 8:00 PM we met some other chasers from Norman, OK, they mentioned storms had fired in Oklahoma. The models and synoptic data analysis did NOT indicate that storms would be likely in OK. As Aaron and I crossed the Oklahoma border, these relatively long track impressive storms immediately died. I watched the news on Friday evening, and was amazed at the nice video some of the local chasers got. I have to leave the state of Oklahoma for anything interesting to happen.

Wednesday May 7th is looking interesting across Kansas.

I apologize for the lack of timely updates. Yeah… I know you have heard it before. I do have a really good reason though. It has been my desire to stream live video while chasing for the past several years. I have pursued several schemes that seemed promising and yet did not come to fruition. Sprint wireless broadband is pretty remarkable in the speed that EVDO can deliver. Working with a small consortium, I am pleased to report that we have this working moderately well. Wednesday the 23rd was my first day to use this technology in the field on a chase.

This was to be another Texas chase; initially I was thinking a Lubbock to Childress line. My plan was to get to Altus, where I knew I could get data and then commit to a final target. We settled on Stamford, TX as a target. If we had gone just a bit farther south to Abilene a tad earlier, what a different tale we would have to tell. Instead we were chased eastward through Lueders, Breckenridge, Palo Pinto, and Mineral Wells by a massive storm that was throwing golf ball hail at its very periphery an likely tennis ball size near the Bears cage.

I was a little surprised at the destruction in Breckenridge from the April 9th storms as we passed through. There were houses missing roofs and plenty of large snapped trees. When it looked as though we may have gone far enough east to make a southward track, a new cell to the east of this storm and south of us was quickly building. This cell would eventually go over Palo Pinto, Mineral Wells and eventually the Dallas Metroplex. We evaded this storm and made the turn for home in Fort Worth. We were away from the storms for several hours which was a joy, but engaged another strong but not severe storms on the Turner turnpike between Oklahoma City and Tulsa. This was a long 868 mile chase with partners Robert and Karen Hall.

Checking with coworkers on Thursday, the streaming apparently worked very well until I hit the TX border and signal became an issue. I have purchased a high gain amplifier and antenna for this setup, so we’ll see if we have this fixed.

Wednesday represents the first Texas chase of the 2008 Season. Target was Abilene, TX. Chase partners were Robert and Karen Hall with a total chase day of 902 miles. We arrived in Abilene as the initial storm was starting to fire and patiently waited for it to build at the Dr. Pepper bottling plant parking lot (no time for a free tour today.)

This was looking to be a great day with the main fly being the overabundance of moisture and what could lead to a “grungfest.” We went a little north of Abilene and saw a nice rotating wall cloud, and had to retreat south a little as the storm continued to build. A poor road choice by me put us behind and it seemed like we were playing catch-up / avoid being munched all day.

We were very close to the storm as it approached Breckenridge, TX. We were slightly ahead of it and the city was not yet hit as we were just to the east when the Tornado went through Breckenridge. Observation was impeded by hills, limited road network, and tremendous amount of precipitation associated with the storm.

This storm was a beast and we stayed with it as best we could for the next several hours. Several times we saw the aftermath as evidenced by debris. Large trees down across the road, several missing roofs, strewn corrugated tin, and widespread power outages.

This was miserable driving in all the rain and horrible visibility even after we disengaged to return home to Tulsa. Special thanks to my Father for the incredible driving.

I had put two new tires on the chase Jeep in early March; the run-in in Atoka meant it was time to buy two more. I did not plan on chasing Monday as I was skeptical of sufficient moisture return. I knew that many of my friends were out chasing and hoped they would do well, but I was more fixated on the storms that would be forthcoming on Wednesday/Thursday. I had a staff meeting where I was getting recognized for five years of service so I could not leave work before 3:00 PM. When the Storm Prediction Center issued their afternoon outlook, I was a bit surprised to say the least. The SPC had ratcheted up to a very tight moderate risk and they issued a Particularly Dangerous Situation (PDS) tornado watch that was centered on Lawton, OK. PDS watches are relatively rare with only five to ten being issued most years. Knowing that a PDS is is only three hours away is just too tempting. I left work about 3:45 P.M., loaded up the Jeep, and picked up the parents.

We watched radar and saw the storms firing across the Red River that would produce the tornado in Electra, TX. It looked as though Wichita Fall, TX would take a direct damaging hit by a nasty storm. The moisture tongue that held dew points in excess of 60° F was small and the storm outran the moisture as it approached Wichita Falls. The models had Lawton pegged as a great target. Several small storms went up as we approached, but none became anything. We got fuel just outside of Lawton and ran into Justin Teague’s chase team at the Loves gas station.

With about one hour of daylight left, it did not look particularly promising so we headed back to Tulsa. This 376 mile trip was the shortest so far this year, but still a little disappointing.

Attention now turns to Wednesday April 9th.