GoBoB Chasing

The team of Miller/Hall both got stuck with deliverables and meetings that we could not get out of on Monday. After the early convection worked over the atmosphere, I resided myself to the fact this was complicated and we’d need a lot of luck. If we had had the time, we would have been in Kingfisher County, but we did not. Steve and I talked about 4:30 and agreed on a gentlemen’s chase. As we hit the road about 5:35 we saw the storm going up to the west of Mannford and decide to go get it. We would chase this storm through Tulsa, Owasso and on to Catoosa. It wrapped up several times and tried to get going, but never really produced any funnels that I saw. It looked pretty impressive as it moved of Tulsa’s downtown. Glad to see that a lot of friends got stuff out west and southwest. The vehicle tracking worked perfectly and NWS Tulsa was able to a track on us.

http://www.findu.com/cgi-bin/find.cgi?call=wx5sky&terra=4&radar=***

The previous two shots are outside Mannford, OKOutside Sandsprings, OK
Downtown Tulsa, OK
Photographers note: The images were shot with an extreme wide angle that introduces some distortion. I was attempting to capture the amazing storm structure.

Sent several clips to KTUL that aired:
Early convection shot at Citiplex towers in Tulsa
Wind and rain halfway between Owasso and Collinsville
Flooding halfway between Owasso and Collinsville

04-24-06

SPC …REGIONAL SEVERE WEATHER OUTBREAK EXPECTED THIS AFTERNOON AND EVENING OVER PARTS OF KS/OK…

And I’m stuck in meetings…

The streak ended. Justin Teague, Matt Patterson and I intercepted a large tornadic storm today in HD and with a vx2100. The video aired on several major networks (CNN, Weather Channel, and ABC Good Morning America as well as several local affiliates. It was a great chase with some of the best guys in the business. I am very lucky in that I get to chase with experienced people. It really helps when you can split the costs as well. A full chase account was written by Matt Patterson. I’m placing it below as there is little I could do to improve it.

We started out in St Joseph and decided to head west towards Marysville KS to get a better idea of how far we wanted to go, do to the moisture situation. We sat there for a couple of hours and waited for initiation. Some stuff started popping by Grand Island NE. We went north after seeing some towers go up. We watched 2 or 3 storms go by, waiting on one to deviate and root. Finally the plan panned out, and the storm which had gorilla hail started moving toward us on the East side of Beatrice. The initial wall cloud was huge and fairly high based. It started to lower in and the low level rotation was very strong. The tornado lasted about 3.5 minutes. The storm became very rain wrapped and started moving right towards us. We pulled up to a little farm house and prepared for the RFD. This was the scariest part of the day. There was Debris and road gravel being thrown around everywhere. Our windows were pulsing and the back end of the 4 runner was trying to lift off the ground. We then tried to get next to a large barn, figuring that it would shield us from the flying debris. At this point we all were starting to really worry as to whether we were in another tornado, which seemed possible because the meso that occluded from the original tornado moved right over us. Bob then stated that we had “2 options, we are either going to die or we are not going to die.” For some reason that made us feel a lot better, knowing that we had no control over the situation. Bob will post all the HD video and audio of the situation later. Anyway after 4 minutes of shear terror, we moved on. We looked at a couple of storms after that and everything looked to be outrunning the instability we then preceded back to St. Joseph and intercepted the storm that had a tornado about 5 min before we got there. All in all it was one hell of a chase.

Tomorrow marks the first day of the chase season on Bob’s calendar which runs until June 15th. During my chase season, pretty much everything else is preemptable to some degree. Mother Nature is getting ready to give us a show and we are going to have to work for it, but I will be chasing in the highest risk area. SPC has painted a pretty small target for a day two outlook and a 45% hatch. I’ll try to keep this site updated as the events unfold.

Most of the non-chaser readers of this blog probably find the very act of trying to find and pursue atmospheric fury a bleeding edge activity. In my personal life, I want my technology to be not just cutting edge, but rather bleeding from an artery edge. The same technology stack should progressively deprecate as resources become more scarce. A bit later in the season, I will reveal more of the unique chase technology I have designed, built, and installed in the Jeep with the help of friends and family. The first public piece to have undergone full integration testing is APRS that will allow anyone to track me via the Internet. Every 3 minutes I transmit my exact position .

http://www.findu.com/cgi-bin/find.cgi?call=wx5sky&terra=4&radar=***

or

http://webaugur.com/gaprs/WX5SKY

For those considering this an opportunity to steal anything from the chase vehicle, consider that the alarm system is also wired into this via a special micro controller and an email to my Blackberry and an emergency packet will be sent to thousands of amateur operators immediately upon breaching the vehicle. This is the best alarm/LoJack system in the world. There is nothing in the Jeep worth getting shot over.

Chase parents; I mean partners were Bob and Karen Hall. I had originally planned to head to Nowata, OK and camp. I got some additional forecast guidance and opted to head to Bartlesville, OK and wait. About 45 minutes after we got there, the morning precip was beginning to clear. Ate some McLunch in BVO and tried to learn more features on the new Ham radio. I think APRS is working, but not getting digipeated to an I-net gateway so you can’t see it on the internet yet.
I get an update that suggests we head west. We are going to the junction of 412 and 77. Suddenly there is a storm on radar in Pawnee County. I get a couple of much appreciated phone calls pointing this out and the chase is on. We had a good east option were able to thread the needle through these two storm. Initially we were targeting the northern one but road option allowed us an opportunity to have either one. A quick call from Steve Miller confirmed the southern one looked better and eventually punch on the southern one. It had a nice defined wall cloud that was clearly attached for about 15 seconds. Lots of “scary” looking scud. It got away because of road options in Osage county (how many times have you heard that).
Intercepted Hans Schroeder by accident and pursued the stuff that was over Skiatook into the Osage Hills north of Tulsa. Again more cool looking scud, but nothing worth reporting in my book. We would eventually try to get the last storm that ran over Broken Arrow, but alas too fast storm motion and poor road options ended the chase day.
I watched the news and said “that’s a funnel? WTF!!!” For those keeping track 22 consecutive chases without a tornado. It sure was a pleasure to have these storms to ourselves. We only encountered 3 other chasers all day. Saturday, we had close to a hundred once the storm got cranking. Total chase miles = 403.
We got to intercept four different cells that were tornado warned in 7 or 8 counties while we were on them. Not a bad day. Thanks to Dad for the great driving and to Mom for constantly scanning the sky and pointing out Hangy Downy Things (HDT) as Steve Bluford has suggested as a replacement term for scud. Thanks to Justin Teague for validating my initial target. The $750 in vehicle repairs have fixed the shimmy and handling problems. A trip to the salvage yard yielded a replacement for the melted power point saving 150 off the factory part. Lots of work to do this weekend to complete all of system integration in the vehicle.

It is going to be a bad day

I dread what the forecast predicts. Here is my current assesment.

I’m Driving to St. Joe , MO first thing in the morning.

I swung by Steve Miller’s (OK) house around 10:00AM and we picked up some sausage rolls. We ate as we developed a chase plan. Andrea, Steve, and I decide to head to Elk City, OK. We link up with Hans in Edmond and head to Elk City. We get a call from Joel Genung offering to Nowcast from NWS Tulsa (and the MIC is on duty till 7:00PM.) When I chased on Thursday, I had a similar luxury as Joel was giving me guidance. To non-chasers it is hard to explain how valuable this is, it is the equivalent of having kind of support that Air Force One gets. Data gets scarcer and scarcer the further west you go. We had some power issues, but were able to cobble together a solution that gave us GPS, Radar, and sporadic Internet. T-Mobile sucks as soon as you get out of metro areas. We kill time in Elk City, OK after eating a horrible meal at McDonalds. This is the second culinary misadventure in this city. Joel keeps us up-to-date and gives us advanced notice of discussions and watches/warnings. After washing the car we decide to head towards south to Sayre, OK

At about 4:35 PM we are 11 due east of Willow, OK and have a picturesque view of the storm and get an update from Joel that the center of rotation about 8 miles to our west and the storm is really starting to “crank.” The radar capture bears this out as well. We would chase and be chased by this storm for the next 7 hours all the way back to Tulsa, OK. We are all rolling video tape and shooting pictures and ready to relay a tornado report any minute via NWS Tulsa (ask me about the irony of this). To this point we have seen only two other chasers and are in the absolute best spot. As we reposition later we find about 100 chasers have joined us on this storm. The Dry line never kicked in, dew points were about 3 degrees less than projected and mid level shear was marginal.

This storm never dropped a tornado, but it had a good enough chance to warrant an extremely dangerous situation watch from the SPC. Total mileage from Steve’s house to mine at the end of the day was exactly 550 miles (kind of weird). For those keeping track this is the 21st consecutive chase of mine without a Tornado. This is still less frustrating than contract bridge (ask me sometime), and cooler than skydiving (ask me sometime). To some this would represent an absolute failure, but post chase analysis has bore out the major chase decisions and reasoning. Fortunately the next 2 weeks look to be an active weather pattern with events every 2 to 3 days. We need the rain.

Our chase “family” had the day well covered. Steve Miller (TX) playing the Childress/Red River storms, Charles Allison had the Woodward/Kansas state line covered. This chase diversity would have assured that a “family” member got a tornado any other day. I know several other “made” men from our “social club” were also out there, but have not checked in.

Special props to Joel for the amazing Red Carpet VIP Presidential Now Casting. I’ve got-to-go sacrifice a chicken to appease the chase Gods. Is there a Witch Doctor in town? If you didn’t click on the tornado link, you need to. This is the Bob Hall orchestra working on our creepy Xylophone chase theme.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=ssqnK6SXWF8 April Fools!!!!

Spelling and grammar

The official spelling is Daylight Saving Time, not Daylight SavingS Time.

Saving is used here as a verbal adjective (a participle). It modifies time and tells us more about its nature; namely, that it is characterized by the activity of saving daylight. It is a saving daylight kind of time. Similar examples would be dog walking time or book reading time. Since saving is a verb describing a single type of activity, the form is singular.

Nevertheless, many people feel the word savings (with an ’s’) flows more mellifluously off the tongue. Daylight Savings Time is also in common usage, and can be found in dictionaries.

Adding to the confusion is that the phrase Daylight Saving Time is inaccurate, since no daylight is actually saved. Daylight Shifting Time would be better, but it is not as politically desirable.

2007 March 11–November 4
2008 March 9—November 2
2009 March 8—November 1

Lifted from http://webexhibits.org/daylightsaving/