HP intercept

Turned a bummer day into a pretty interesting one by getting out ahead of the line in north-central Illinois this evening. Things looked pretty bleak, but I noticed some isolated cells erupting ahead of the line west of La Salle, IL. I quickly made my way towards Interstate 39 and dropped south. I recalled that the outflow boundary from morning storms was draped along Interstate 80 and made my way that way in hopes something could root to this and remain discrete. The line more or less congealed, but I noticed one storm that was an obvious embedded HP supercell. I made this my play, getting ahead of it and stopped on the west side of Oglesby to watch it come in.

Witnessed a good circulation in the "notch" region of the HP which passed almost directly over head. Noted very strong *inflow* blowing into the mesocyclone as the circulation passed -just- to my south right over town before everything got blown over by the main core and straight line winds. Thought maybe I'd get a brief touch down right near me, but it wasn't to be. Pretty darn fun core, no less.

Made my way back up towards DeKalb detouring around a blown over semi thanks to a heads up from Scott Weberpal. Tia and I then enjoyed some Italian Beef sandwiches and a big chocolate shake at Portillo's up here under a big yellow mammatus filled sky.

Not a bad chase at all, albeit tornado-less.

Wall cloud passing just south: