I really don't know how to start this one off. It was one of the most amazing days of chasing I've experienced (like half the chase days this year). The storms were moving slow, and had amazing structure and motion. However, the amasingness of this day was just about ruined when a bad move was made after dark on an HP Supercell.
(Hadn't something like this just happened a month earlier?)
For my part, I think this chasing thing has made me a little arrogant. This is one of the ways God smacked me (at least me) upside the head and demonstrated how little I actually know.
Regardless of the reasons God allowed this to happen I know that I have been arrogant (at least in heart ) and the night time "near death" experience humiliated me considerably. That and the High Risk Bust I experienced with Justin during one of the fallowing chase days.
Comparing my (our) "Amateur Chaser Mistake" to what I would consider "New Diver Mistakes" I have this to say:
God was extremely gracious to all of us and spared our lives and any kind of damage to vehicle and equipment just like he was merciful when I pulled into oncoming traffic as a new driver, or many of the other "new driver" mistakes I've made (still make).
So to begin:
Chased with Justin Terveen and James Langford.
I remember this being a very complicated set up. In the days prior to this chase I had been shifting my target from basically West Central Oklahoma to the Oklahoma/Kansas boarder. The reason for the latter target would be more favorable shear profiles and what I thought would be closer to any upper level lifting mechanisms that might be present in the jet stream flow aloft.
I remember distinctly the short range models firing storms in southern Oklahoma, but I really didn't want to bite on that due to the best shear parameters being further north and I didn't fully trust their initiation. But even so I knew that there would be enough shear down there for at least HP Supercells, but figured the trip further north would be more worth it.
So, what I wound up with was a target of northwest Oklahoma, basically anywhere north of I 40 and west of I 35. My two starting possibilities were Enid and Clinton. Even by chase day I hadn't really decided. I figured that call could be made once we reached OKC.
Well as we shot north on I 40 supercells began to blow up all along the dry line south of I 40 around 2pm. Some were practically to the Red River. That at least knocked my target down to Clinton along I 40. However, the storms near I 40 began to lose surface rooting and began to drift more north than east (an unhealthy sign with cyclonic supercells). By the time we had driven some distance west on I 40 it became evident that we would either have to drive way north to see anything from the storms up there which were not healthy, or drive outside my target area towards the healthy looking HP mess to the south. I caved and decided to go for the HP mess to the south (which turned out to be the best choice made for the day).
Basically wound up taking Highway 54 out of Weatherford down to the Wichita Mountains and the wind farm. The first storm we observed was a very classic, typical, and murky, HP Supercell.
(That is classic HP, not classic classic supercell... never mind).
It had a tremendously large, powerful, and rain filled RFD area with a pronounced "cow catcher" shelf on its leading edge. The storm also had some significant bands in the mid-levels indicating a strong mesocyclone was present. Rotation to the north of the RFD area was pretty well defined and persistent. However, for any of this to be seen we had to let the storm get fairly close since the haze was just awful. We actually had hailstones falling on us from the anvil overhead due to them being blown well downstream of the mesocyclone.
At one of the interesections we encountered one of the Dominators and Discovery Channel crew. They took a road north (I believe highway 58) from our intersection on 19 and we continued on 19 to the east. They apparently witnessed a tornado in the large inflow notch of this amazing storm.
The eerie light filtering through the heavy RFD precipitation was incredible! Some of the freakiest lighting I had seen in a good while.
We allowed this first cell to pass us to the north while we took 58 back to the southeast to intercept another rapidly developing cell along this storms flank. The new storm quickly became another HP Supercell with strong rotation. We were actually in a kind of hairy situation at this point as our viewing position was very close to the Whichita mountains and the storm was coming right over them. Also, the immense size of the storm made it slightly difficult to discern where the mesocyclone was and adjacent RFD. The mesocyclone wound up wrapping up about a mile or less to our west (giving us a great view of very rapid rotation) and a new one developed just to our northeast. When the rotation first popped over the ridge it was very strong and it looked like we would have a tornado any second just to the left of the wind mills. However, it quickly dissipated due to the strength of the RFD.
I managed to grab another shot before we left of a chaser group with the new meso in the background.
When we attempted to reposition for this storm we made the very bad choice of taking a road north into the core rather than dropping to the south and east to escape. Given our road options had we continued north, we would've been forced to drive straight east to get out under the meso, which would've taken us under what could've been a developing tornado.
We quickly realized our mistake and flipped around to head southeast, punching the RFD on the way and picking up a few larger than quarter sized hail stones.
We successfully escaped as the RFD precip cleared out quickly as one went south. We then dropped down to an RV park near Lake Lawtonka. I didn't bother to shoot pictures with James and Justin for some reason or other.
At this point we could've called it quites but, just as one of the models had shown, there was a very impressive storm right on the Red River west-northwest of Whichita Falls Texas. After a quick supper of some Burger King fried imitation chicken (yum) we dropped south on the tollway out of Lawton Oklahoma to try and catch this last storm.
The last storm was really the most incredible in my mind. Like the last two cells this one had very strong rotation. It also had more "classic" supercell structure when we drove up to it (though we didn't stop to photograph the mid-level stacked plates). The inflow into this storm had to of been in the 40 -50mph range at least. We had blowing dust, and it was difficult to keep the cameras and tripods steady enough to produce sharp images in the fading light.
Some of my all time favorite storm clouds were seen from this storm. The sky had this eerie brown color due to the sun's very low angle on the horizon behind it, and some of the gust front formations were just wiled. Also noted several gustnadoes as we sat and photographed for about a half hour in front of the storm.
This lowering had some decent rotation to it at one point. But the storm was fighting its own RFD to put down anything in this area. However, something may have been going on back in the inflow notch of this storm way off to the right of this image and out of sight.
At this point we were being hit with strong cold outflow. It was kind of crazy to see cars emerging from the blackness of the storm up ahead. The main area of rotation and core were actually going to pass to the north of us... but we still thought it best to get a move on.
I have not mentioned the radar issues at this point but I guess now I should since it played a large roll in the mistake that we made next.
Radar data this entire trip had been very sketchy due to a poor Sprint and AT&T network. So, while we had decent data close to the interstates, any time we left them our data would be gone and radar would not update.
When we made our next move we assumed a few things about the storm (or at least I did):
1: The storm was becoming more outflow dominate than it had been already.
2: The storm continued to be nearly stationary or drift slightly east.
3: We were far enough out in front of the storm.
Looking back these were quite dangerous assumptions. The storm appears to have actually:
1: Redeveloped a strong mesocyclone and positioned it further south than the previous one.
2: Speed up to the east at around 20 - 25mph. Which leads to:
3: We were NOT far enough out in front of the storm.
A lot of this is still speculation since I have not been able to grab archived radar data from this event yet. And really this wouldn't have been too big of a deal except for item #1 (although very strong outflow can be pretty nasty when caught out in it).
We were eager to shoot lightning so we drove north out of Grandfield Oklahoma on highway 36. We set up about three to four miles north of Grandfield and got to work on the lightning. Due to the lack of light I couldn't get my camera to focus on anything, so I walked about 100 feet away from the vehicle so that I could use its light to get an infinity focus setting.
I had just finished focusing and had begun my first exposure when I heard a shout from James. I thought he was simply trying to point out something kind of neat or perhaps was mearlly asking why I had set up so far back from the car. Either way, I didn't note anything particularly distressing in his voice. By the time I had entered my 4th exposure I had noticed that the core of the storm had come very close and we were about to get blasted by heavy rain and strong outflow. So, I began to pack up.
After that lengthy process when I was about 50 feet from the vehicle I heard a strange hissing sound that got steadily louder. Of to the northwest of the vehicle there was a dust cloud that appeared to be rotating. By the time I had made it to the vehicle the dust cloud had too. I've never stood in winds that strong before and hope I never do again unless it is in some kind of controlled experiment or something. I had no sooner thrown my tripod into the back seat when I was wiped around Justin (who was also throwing his gear into the back) and began to stumble to the south of the vehicle as the winds pushed me in that direction.
The entire interior of the vehicle was filled with dust and those of us caught outside (Justin and I primarily) were more or less sand blasted. It probably took a good 20 seconds for all of this to occur though it is hard to tell or even remember much of the details.
Afterwards everyone was able to get back into the vehicle before the rain hit. The funny thing was that despite what could easily have been 60 mph winds in the rain it seemed fairly calm compared to what had just happened earlier.
The question then for the evening was "What in the world just happened?"
The dust cloud had some clear rotation, but it looked like it still could've been on the leading edge of a larger dusty area on the outflow. This kind of lends itself more to the gustnado. But when we examined later photographs it is apparent that there was at least rotation overhead in the storm base and perhaps a small funnel. It still could've been a gustnado as there will never be completely conclusive evidence for one or the other. And I think I may leave that discussion up for a later post as this one is long enough as it is.
Here at least are a couple images that I created from one of my own.
Arrows kind of outlining some of the cloud bands I see in this photo that were also confirmed in James' and Justin's photos. The area of rotation lines up very nicely with the debris cloud that formed as well, and the small cone funnel that seems to be evident in a couple of images taken by James and Justin.
In the end it really doesn't matter so much whether or not it was a tornado. (Tornado just sounds so much more dramatic doesn't it?) Gustnadoes and weak tornadoes can be nearly identical in the amount of damage they can do. Regardless there really appears to me to be strong evidence of rotation and a quick glance at radar that evening (once we got data again) seems to indicate strong rotation in this area. A stronger tornado could've formed without us knowing it and we would all be dead right now.
It was a dumb mistake to try and shoot lightning under the base at night without data. In fact, being this close to a storm that is known to be a supercell of some form or other at night regardless of radar data is dumb. The only excuse I could possibly make for doing it again is if the storm is KNOWN to be rooted above the boundary layer (not surface based and therefore not able to produce tornadoes and probably not damaging winds). In the past when we had shot lightning from these kinds of storms we would be 10 miles or so from the core, and generally far enough away to capture the amazing anvil lightning that is so common with these supercells.
I think this and the previous event show just how overly confidant we have grown in our approach of these storms at night. And HPs are especially dangerous at night.
I went ahead and called the Norman office with the report of a tornado/possible gustnado in my shaky/squeaky voice while leaving out the part about the impact. Since the event was 20 minutes old by the time I alerted them I doubt it did them much good.
In the end we all simply thank God that our over-eagerness didn't get us killed.
If I ever get around to a more in depth study of this event and the other near miss I will post my findings. It really bugs me that I don't know for certain what was actually going on in either case.
