Chase Today!

I am currently sitting east of Springfield, IL in the small town of Riverton awaiting initiation of robust convection along the outflow boundary from this morning thunderstorms in northern Illinois.

Supercells appear possible given the strong shear and added turning the OFB can provide. Should be another hour or so before we have severe thunderstorms across the area.

Witnessed four tornadoes over the evening in western Kansas around the Grainfield, Collyer and WaKeeney area.

Here are two videos and several photos from the chase.

First rope tornado near Grainfield, and then the dusty large tornado near Collyer.



Fourth intercept, near WaKeeney at dusk.

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Tornado near grainfield

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Wall cloud south of amy

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Heading west to intercept supercell near garden city

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Heading south on hwy 40 to ness city kansas. If we dont see tornadoes today, i quit.

Photos / Forecast

Chased around eastern Colorado for an appetizer chase and got about what we expected. Elevated supercells and plenty of hail. Unfortunately a strong cap kept storms from hanging around too long. We did manage to get hailed on a couple times, and capture a wall cloud near dusk.

Here are a couple photos from yesterday.





As for today, prospects look a lot better. I'm afraid to get TOO excited because of a couple things. One being the early precip being shown on the models, combined with not as favorable shear profiles early in the day a bit further north in the target area. I fear this could lead to an overall messy situation with a lot of storms covering the area interacting with each other in a negative way. I guess we'll just have to see how the situation plays out. If things can hold off a little bit longer and we get more discrete activity I'll have higher hopes in seeing a couple violently rotating columns of air making contact with the ground.

For now Mark and I remain in the storm chaser packed Super 8 in Goodland, Kansas. Kind of funny to look down the parking lot at all the antenna and probe covered cars. We'll likely play west central Kansas today, but have yet to pick a target.

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Storm forming near yuma colordo

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Initiation south of our location in sterling

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Crossing into colorado now, with a target of sterling at the moment. Landspouts today?

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Loading up in lincolin nebraska, should be on the road shortly!

Heading to Fort Morgan, Colorado

Mark Sefried and I arrived in Lincoln Nebraska last night for our several day expedition on this major trough digging in over the Rockies. He may remain out here for some time, but I'll be out today through Saturday, likely using Saturday as a day to drive back home unless something local develops.

Just a quick update as we're pressed for time right now and need to get on the road, but we're heading towards Fort Morgan Colorado right now to play for high based supercells. Will update more from the field as I can.