2018--day 4

Friday, 25 May 2018

Short night's sleep in Kearney.  Big decision to make: travel toward the northwest for a potential chase in Montana on Saturday (a long ass drive), or chase today in western Oklahoma where conditions look interesting (potential dryline/outflow boundary interaction, and less driving but not by much).  The second option won, so we left Nebraska at 8:30 local time and headed south toward Antarctica (I mean Oklahoma).

Drove through Hays, KS, but not long enough to patronize this fine establishment.



Cannot recommend highly enough the pre-packaged smoked turkey sub from the Cenex gas station in Greensburg, KS.  There are more choices at the attached Subway, but it was nearly a foot long, had more meat than a Subway sub, and cost a staggering $2.99.  Lesson learned.

After a pitch-dark pee stop, we set up shop in western OK (Arnett/Vici/Woodward, state #11) during the late afternoon in the hopes of catching storms developing near the intersecting boundaries.  Managed to catch a horseshoe vortex while waiting.



Took some time to launch a radiosonde; Gage, OK surface data tells us that it's 90 over 66, which in layman's terms means it sucks to do things outside like stand and breathe.

Amarillo's radar shows a good dryline signature.



Things came together very nicely later on that afternoon and evening, as we chased a slow-moving supercell moving southward through the eastern Texas (#12) Panhandle.  Another nice mammatus show and some interesting features (a small funnel cloud, a beautiful hail shaft (this hail shaft is a bad mother--shut yo' mouth), and a great horizontal vortex that I couldn't capture on electrons due to my driving down a long dirt road.  The hail was half-dollar sized (1.25") according to reports, but we didn't get to confirm that.  And the locals were friendly...perhaps we'll have them over for dinner someday.










































Had to give up on that cell (it'd weakened anyway), but then headed east on I40 through Shamrock where we got treated to a phenomenal supercell that pictures couldn't possibly get right (I did try, though).  Chased it for some time but it was getting dark, so we suspended operations for the day after watching the lightning.





The day ended around local midnight in Woodward, OK after a sumptuous feast at a local Scottish bistro.  Final tally: four states and 638 miles.  Boy does that bed look comfyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy

2018--day 5

Saturday, 26 May 2018

Somehow managed to wake up before the alarm, but it was a leisurely start, as today is a travel day.  It'll be a long travel day, as we're lighting out for eastern Colorado/Wyoming for potential upslope magic on Sunday.  While having breakfast with my friend, he told me that the mark of a good hotel is one that serves bacon for breakfast, as it's more expensive than sausage.  Bacon is bacon, even if it's thin enough to read through.

Our travels took us back to Greensburg, KS to visit the Big Well Museum.  It doubles as a exhibit for the 4 May 2007 tornado.  The original museum was destroyed by the EF-5 tornado, along with about 95% of the town.  It is simultaneously sickeningly stunning and somewhat funny, as some residents managed to keep their senses of humor in spite of losing everything except whatever they were wearing at the time.  It's also sad to think that the majority of people who died did so while doing exactly what they were supposed to be during a tornado (be underground or in the bathtub).  Sometimes it just doesn't matter, especially with a tornado that strong.  We learned that one of the fatalities was due to one intrepid Kansas resident that didn't believe in tornadoes.  Adding to the atmosphere of our visit was the fact that the town tests their tornado sirens on Saturday afternoons.  Fortunately the skies were basically clear, so the doomsday whistle was just a test.  On the night in question (see the clock), the siren sounded for 20 minutes.

While driving north through Liebenthal, KS (population 96) we spied a couple of thunderstorms to the east-northeast near St. Joseph, MO.  We estimated the distance to be around 250 miles (look closely at the horizon left of center).  Definitely not gonna catch those.

Our travels then took us on I70 west for about 63 hours on our way toward Denver, Colorado (state #13).  A nice reward for our efforts came once again around sunset.

As I said earlier today, this was a travel day, as we ended the night at long last in Cheyenne, Wyoming (#14!).  The day's total: four states, 836 miles.  Goodnight, farewell, and amen.

2018--day 3

Thursday, 24 May 2018

After a much-needed night's rest (and only one tick needing removal), we left Sioux Falls, SD around 9 am local time.  Contemplated why the highways in SD are often pink.  Much like yesterday, the pattern is rather anemic in that there are no strong signals saying 'Go here,' so we're thinking that west and south toward the high terrain of Kansas and Colorado will provide the best potential for fun.  Sadly that means a lot of driving and potential arrivals after any storms initiate.  To make matters even more interesting, a number of radars have decided to go on strike.  Here's to flying blind.

Via Nebraska (#9), we wound up in northwest Kansas (Hoxie/Norton/Selden) in the late afternoon and chased some storms that produced some incredible lightning and a small funnel cloud, raised some dust, and left us with a great sunset/rainbow/mammatus display.  Hopefully the pictures do it justice (stay tuned).  Oh yeah, we also helped a bird commit unintended suicide.

After watching the sunset stuff for about an hour at the side of a road, we trudged back toward Kearney, NE for the night.  The thought is that Friday will be a tracvel day toward Montana, but that's not set in stone.  Final tally: 10 states so far (Kansas is #10), 641 miles.