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May. 24th, 2004 11:55 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
mirajeIt has been a long ass day. I drove for 12 hours straight, only to end up right where I started. Now that I've finished my bowl of cereal, the only thing I've eaten since a salad almost 24 hours ago unless you count the 5 or 6 Cheez-Its and 2 cans of pop today, I suppose I can write a little bit about my day.
The Storm Prediction Center put out a high risk area for severe weather in northwestern Missouri and northeastern Kansas today. From the way that SPC made it sound, today was supposed to be some kind of major outbreak of tornadoes, so I decided I'd try like hell to find a ride. Did I? No. Of course not. Why would my luck ever be so good? So Elise and I sat in the map room for a bit and talked about how neither of us had a ride and that we wanted to go. Well, I was going to be pissed if I was the only person stuck in Iowa while everyone else could potentially see multiple tornadoes. I told Elise that I could probably drive if I had help with gas money. After a bit more discussion, we finally decided to do it. Jose came with us, too, so that made three of us in my car. Then the dilemma arose of where to go. Des Moines has two major interstates running through it; I-35 goes straight north-south and I-80 goes straight east-west. The action was expected to be to our southwest. The two options were to either take 80 to Omaha, and then take I-29 south to southeast Nebraska, or to take 35 south into northwest Missouri. From the way the conditions looked, Jeremy, Jose, and Elise all thought it would probably be best to take 80 west to Nebraska. The entire time these discussions were going on, I kept getting bells going off in my head that I should take 35 instead. Northwestern Missouri just seemed like the place to be for me. I was afraid that we'd be too far north when the storms fired, and if they builded to the south, we'd never be able to catch them...not to mention that we'd be on the wrong side of the supercells if we found one to chase. The general concern with taking 35 was that we'd be too far east of the initial cells that went up to be able to chase them. Majority won, so we headed out on 80 west to Omaha. About halfway there, Jeremy called me and basically told me I had to get south, so I took an exit onto some county highway in western Adair county and headed south toward Clarinda. Jeremy called me off and on to give me radar updates and locations before he had to go to work, but we were pretty much on our own after that for awhile. He had told me in a couple of his last calls to me that there was a huge cell developing near Falls City. We both kind of agreed that it would be the cell worth chasing since it seemed to be getting the best inflow and could even potentially block inflow for other storms in the area. The problem with the Falls City cell was that we were north of it, and this thing was massive. It had a tornado reported to be on the ground at that time, so I didn't feel comfortable punching right through the heaviest rain and hail to get to the south side of it. Instead, we went around it. What a fucking joke that was. We turned onto these tiny paved county backroads and tried to get to the southwest side of the storm. I had no idea what I was in for. These roads curve and twist and go over hills like you're on a fucking roller coaster. You have NO idea what is coming on the other side of the hill until you're there. I was flying down these roads trying to get to the other side of the storm, and I nearly went sailing off the road at one point. I was probably going 50 or 60, and as soon as I topped the hill, the road veered off to the right at a 90 degree angle about 20 or 30 yards in front of me. I slammed on my brakes and actually squealed the tires to a halt about two or three feet from the ditch. I nearly had a heart attack right there. I went a lot slower after that, but that meant that we'd never get around the storm before the tornado would dissipate. It seemed to take AGES for us to finally get to a marked and decently straight highway. Once we got to the highway, we headed east toward the storm, but at that point, the storm was noticibly weakening. It wasn't worth chasing anymore. We ended up heading generally towards Marysville kind of waiting for something else to develop. We were a few miles east of Marysville heading east on 136 since we saw a little bit of darkening in that direction. At that point, a tornado warning was issued for our county, and about ten minutes later, a spotter report came over the radio that a very large and dangerous tornado was on the ground 3 miles west of Albany heading east along highway 136 at 25 miles an hour. We were 25 miles west of it on the same highway. Elise called Jeremiah (her boyfriend...fellow meteorologist) for a radar update, and he told us to take a county road he saw on the map for a shortcut. So we took it...and ended up right back in the damned hills-hiding-sharp-turns shit. I probably averaged about 50 miles an hour on that road considering all the times I had to slam on my breaks to turn. We finally got off of it at a closer point on highway 136 and started heading east again. I don't think it saved us much time, but meh. I'm speeding as fast as I can down this highway to catch up to this tornado...or at least get close enough to where we could see it in the distance. We got to Albany, and at that point it was probably between 10 and 15 miles in front of us, painfully close to being able to see it. We were stopped dead in our tracks at Albany, though. The tornado went right through the town. Debris was everywhere, and the cops closed off a section of 136 on the east side of town due to extreme damage. Everyone and their dog from the Albany area was out driving around at 20 miles per hour gawking at every tree limb that was out of place, and it really seemed at that point that they were all lining up right in front of us on the road. We tried to turn around and go south through the town, but the southern edge of town was also blocked off because of debris. The damage was kind of intense to see, but we just wanted to get through this town and get out of the people's way who were trying to assess the extent of the damage. We ended up having to go north down another windy ass county blacktop up to Allendale. Somewhere around there my low fuel light came on, so we stopped to get gas in Grant City. There was a cell coming from the west-northwest at us, but it wasn't tornadic at that point and only had a severe thunderstorm warning out for it. We decided to head back east toward I-35, and then when we got there, we would decide what to do. Well, we got barely 10 miles east of Grant City when that cell went tornadic. We were in kind of a precarious situation at that point, because once again, we were on a windy ass county blacktop, and this storm was racing to the east straight at us at 50 miles per hour. We could see the wall cloud in the distance straight to our west and knew we'd be fucked if that thing formed a tornado. So I hauled ASS down that stupid curvy road to try and put some distance between us and that storm. It was just going too fast, though. By the time we got to Eagleville, it was almost right on top of us. As it got closer, though, I realized that it wasn't actually part of the main wall cloud to the south of us. It was more of a shelf/roll cloud associated with the high wind and rain. It looked pretty damn ominous, though. We took shelter at the truck stop on the interstate for a few minutes to get our bearings and decide on a course of action. I called Daryl (Elise gave me the number..we'd been in contact with him on and off for an hour or two by that point), and he told us we should head south on 35 if we were going to see anything and if we wanted to get out of the heavy rain. So we did. I've never seen a sky before like the one I saw when finally broke out of the rain. The most likely location for tornado formation was very near where we were according to a National Weather Service statement, and the sky definitely proved that to me. There was scud and low hanging clouds all along the horizon to our south, and the clouds were just moving all over the place above us. To our west was the main mesocyclone, and we actually got a pretty good view of it in Pattonsburg. I didn't feel safe at all. We were barely ahead of the main line of severe weather, so we couldn't stop for any length of time without it catching up to us. That mesocyclone was heading southeast, and 35 was heading southwest at that point, so we were basically on a collision course with it. It was getting dark at that point and it was starting to get hard to make out much detail in the clouds. We finally decided to just stop near Cameron at a truck stop and let the damn line of storms go by us. After it did, we just turned around and headed back home. None of us were in any mood to chase after dark, and I think we were ready to leave anyway. That last storm never did elicit any reports of tornadoes.
So, final tally for the day:
We saw 0 tornadoes.
We saw a few wall clouds.
We saw one decent shelf cloud.
We saw extensive tornado damage and debris.
We saw lots of awesome cloud-to-ground and cloud crawling lightning.
I have no pictures of anything because my camera sucks.
I almost wrecked my car twice on the backroads.
I almost hit a deer twice on the backroads (not the same deer).
I almost hit a squirrel on the backroads.
I drove through areas of high water flooding on the backroads despite how incredibly bad that is.
My car got hailed on twice.
My car came within probably 50 feet of getting struck by lightning while we were in it.
My car guzzled $70 worth of gas for the trip, $40 of which I was reimbursed for by my chase mates.
The Storm Prediction Center put out a high risk area for severe weather in northwestern Missouri and northeastern Kansas today. From the way that SPC made it sound, today was supposed to be some kind of major outbreak of tornadoes, so I decided I'd try like hell to find a ride. Did I? No. Of course not. Why would my luck ever be so good? So Elise and I sat in the map room for a bit and talked about how neither of us had a ride and that we wanted to go. Well, I was going to be pissed if I was the only person stuck in Iowa while everyone else could potentially see multiple tornadoes. I told Elise that I could probably drive if I had help with gas money. After a bit more discussion, we finally decided to do it. Jose came with us, too, so that made three of us in my car. Then the dilemma arose of where to go. Des Moines has two major interstates running through it; I-35 goes straight north-south and I-80 goes straight east-west. The action was expected to be to our southwest. The two options were to either take 80 to Omaha, and then take I-29 south to southeast Nebraska, or to take 35 south into northwest Missouri. From the way the conditions looked, Jeremy, Jose, and Elise all thought it would probably be best to take 80 west to Nebraska. The entire time these discussions were going on, I kept getting bells going off in my head that I should take 35 instead. Northwestern Missouri just seemed like the place to be for me. I was afraid that we'd be too far north when the storms fired, and if they builded to the south, we'd never be able to catch them...not to mention that we'd be on the wrong side of the supercells if we found one to chase. The general concern with taking 35 was that we'd be too far east of the initial cells that went up to be able to chase them. Majority won, so we headed out on 80 west to Omaha. About halfway there, Jeremy called me and basically told me I had to get south, so I took an exit onto some county highway in western Adair county and headed south toward Clarinda. Jeremy called me off and on to give me radar updates and locations before he had to go to work, but we were pretty much on our own after that for awhile. He had told me in a couple of his last calls to me that there was a huge cell developing near Falls City. We both kind of agreed that it would be the cell worth chasing since it seemed to be getting the best inflow and could even potentially block inflow for other storms in the area. The problem with the Falls City cell was that we were north of it, and this thing was massive. It had a tornado reported to be on the ground at that time, so I didn't feel comfortable punching right through the heaviest rain and hail to get to the south side of it. Instead, we went around it. What a fucking joke that was. We turned onto these tiny paved county backroads and tried to get to the southwest side of the storm. I had no idea what I was in for. These roads curve and twist and go over hills like you're on a fucking roller coaster. You have NO idea what is coming on the other side of the hill until you're there. I was flying down these roads trying to get to the other side of the storm, and I nearly went sailing off the road at one point. I was probably going 50 or 60, and as soon as I topped the hill, the road veered off to the right at a 90 degree angle about 20 or 30 yards in front of me. I slammed on my brakes and actually squealed the tires to a halt about two or three feet from the ditch. I nearly had a heart attack right there. I went a lot slower after that, but that meant that we'd never get around the storm before the tornado would dissipate. It seemed to take AGES for us to finally get to a marked and decently straight highway. Once we got to the highway, we headed east toward the storm, but at that point, the storm was noticibly weakening. It wasn't worth chasing anymore. We ended up heading generally towards Marysville kind of waiting for something else to develop. We were a few miles east of Marysville heading east on 136 since we saw a little bit of darkening in that direction. At that point, a tornado warning was issued for our county, and about ten minutes later, a spotter report came over the radio that a very large and dangerous tornado was on the ground 3 miles west of Albany heading east along highway 136 at 25 miles an hour. We were 25 miles west of it on the same highway. Elise called Jeremiah (her boyfriend...fellow meteorologist) for a radar update, and he told us to take a county road he saw on the map for a shortcut. So we took it...and ended up right back in the damned hills-hiding-sharp-turns shit. I probably averaged about 50 miles an hour on that road considering all the times I had to slam on my breaks to turn. We finally got off of it at a closer point on highway 136 and started heading east again. I don't think it saved us much time, but meh. I'm speeding as fast as I can down this highway to catch up to this tornado...or at least get close enough to where we could see it in the distance. We got to Albany, and at that point it was probably between 10 and 15 miles in front of us, painfully close to being able to see it. We were stopped dead in our tracks at Albany, though. The tornado went right through the town. Debris was everywhere, and the cops closed off a section of 136 on the east side of town due to extreme damage. Everyone and their dog from the Albany area was out driving around at 20 miles per hour gawking at every tree limb that was out of place, and it really seemed at that point that they were all lining up right in front of us on the road. We tried to turn around and go south through the town, but the southern edge of town was also blocked off because of debris. The damage was kind of intense to see, but we just wanted to get through this town and get out of the people's way who were trying to assess the extent of the damage. We ended up having to go north down another windy ass county blacktop up to Allendale. Somewhere around there my low fuel light came on, so we stopped to get gas in Grant City. There was a cell coming from the west-northwest at us, but it wasn't tornadic at that point and only had a severe thunderstorm warning out for it. We decided to head back east toward I-35, and then when we got there, we would decide what to do. Well, we got barely 10 miles east of Grant City when that cell went tornadic. We were in kind of a precarious situation at that point, because once again, we were on a windy ass county blacktop, and this storm was racing to the east straight at us at 50 miles per hour. We could see the wall cloud in the distance straight to our west and knew we'd be fucked if that thing formed a tornado. So I hauled ASS down that stupid curvy road to try and put some distance between us and that storm. It was just going too fast, though. By the time we got to Eagleville, it was almost right on top of us. As it got closer, though, I realized that it wasn't actually part of the main wall cloud to the south of us. It was more of a shelf/roll cloud associated with the high wind and rain. It looked pretty damn ominous, though. We took shelter at the truck stop on the interstate for a few minutes to get our bearings and decide on a course of action. I called Daryl (Elise gave me the number..we'd been in contact with him on and off for an hour or two by that point), and he told us we should head south on 35 if we were going to see anything and if we wanted to get out of the heavy rain. So we did. I've never seen a sky before like the one I saw when finally broke out of the rain. The most likely location for tornado formation was very near where we were according to a National Weather Service statement, and the sky definitely proved that to me. There was scud and low hanging clouds all along the horizon to our south, and the clouds were just moving all over the place above us. To our west was the main mesocyclone, and we actually got a pretty good view of it in Pattonsburg. I didn't feel safe at all. We were barely ahead of the main line of severe weather, so we couldn't stop for any length of time without it catching up to us. That mesocyclone was heading southeast, and 35 was heading southwest at that point, so we were basically on a collision course with it. It was getting dark at that point and it was starting to get hard to make out much detail in the clouds. We finally decided to just stop near Cameron at a truck stop and let the damn line of storms go by us. After it did, we just turned around and headed back home. None of us were in any mood to chase after dark, and I think we were ready to leave anyway. That last storm never did elicit any reports of tornadoes.
So, final tally for the day:
We saw 0 tornadoes.
We saw a few wall clouds.
We saw one decent shelf cloud.
We saw extensive tornado damage and debris.
We saw lots of awesome cloud-to-ground and cloud crawling lightning.
I have no pictures of anything because my camera sucks.
I almost wrecked my car twice on the backroads.
I almost hit a deer twice on the backroads (not the same deer).
I almost hit a squirrel on the backroads.
I drove through areas of high water flooding on the backroads despite how incredibly bad that is.
My car got hailed on twice.
My car came within probably 50 feet of getting struck by lightning while we were in it.
My car guzzled $70 worth of gas for the trip, $40 of which I was reimbursed for by my chase mates.
