2026--Day 9

The long journey home begins today.  The weather isn't 'cooperating,' with no severe weather that we can get to easily within the next couple of days.  So the plan is to leave Peoria with a brief stop at Indiana Dunes State Park. 

Before that, one of the kids wanted to stop at a restaurant in Gary, IN.  That didn't go according to plan.  The home of the Jackson 5 (with signs pointing you to the actual house) was not what you would consider pleasant.  It had a bit of an East Saint Louis vibe without the charm.  After a brief search for this chicken joint (which we could not find, BTW), we abandoned all hope and fled.  We noticed that several of the stop lights weren't functioning; that could have been a consequence of the weather on Thursday, or it could simply be urban blight.  Either way, we weren't hanging around to investigate.  Even the more famous chicken joint was abandoned. 

The kids had a great but short time at the beach in Indiana Dunes State Park (aside from the one who was dive-bombed by a seagull, I assume), and now we're heading for Ohio.  While driving along the Indiana Toll Road, I kept seeing signs along the highway saying 'Emergency Parking: 2 Hours."  Be sure to keep your breakdowns efficient. 

This is as close to Chicago as we wanted to get:

While getting gas at a rest area on Ohio Turnpike (sorry, THE Ohio Turnpike), a couple of vans carrying groups of young tourists decided to have an escapade; evidently they'd never seen gas pumps before.  I think they were from Wisconsin, which might explain things.

Finally pulled into Elyria around 11, and had dinner at a well-known 24-7 restaurant, where the server was able to get 12 different orders to her customers correctly without writing a single thing down.

Crawled into bed shortly before 1.  It's going to be an early rollout this morning, as we want to get home in the early afternoon.  Cheryl, if you're reading this, I'm so sorry I couldn't visit.  Final tally: 462 miles (4,539 total).  Until tomorrow...

2026--Day 8

Welcome to the soup (77 over 72 before 10 am in Hannibal, MO).  Could be an ugly day, as there is already a bow echo just to our north, which is where we sort of wanna go.  

There is the potential for seriously severe thunderstorms following the bow echo, and some of it could be tornadic, but they will likely be very fast-moving and hard to catch, so being ahead of them is important.  This will require some delicate needle threading, or just accepting that we will have to engage with the bow echo, preferably on our terms.  Right now the plan is to head for Peoria, IL to make the best of the worst possible choices. 

Overnight thunderstorms resulted in over four inches of rain around us, which can make things complicated due to potential flooding, especially if there's more heavy rainfall today. 

Beautiful bookend vortex on the north end of the line. 

Saw some beautiful shelf clouds and structures with some of these storms.  Casey's expert driving got us to thread the needle on some of these intense storms.

Heading north towards the Quad Cities, it appears we've been struck by lightning. 

Geneseo, IL.  Our first McDonald's of the trip (thank God).  We're waiting for storms to fire.  One of the things people don't realize about storm chasing is the sheer magnitude of just hanging around one is forced to do.

Left Geneseo to travel generally southward to catch a tornadic storms in northeast Missouri, not far from Keokuk.

Macomb, IL (Western IL University)...tornado sirens.  Passed a Doppler on Wheels (DOW) truck on the way, which tells me we're on the right track. 

The great weather kahuna smiled on us after all, and we were blessed with some beautiful cloud structures (shelf clouds, wall clouds, etc.) associated with this supercell. 

This looked pretty real, but I'm guessing it was an amateur storm chaser with a sense of humor. 

Here's where it gets interesting.  We're near Ipava, IL:

Our first and only tornado of the trip.  It was small and most likely weak (EF-0 or EF-1), and while it was my 17th (out of seven chase trips), it was the students' first, and you can probably imagine their excitement.  The greenish tint on the horizon is likely sunlight being retracted through hailstones. 

From the radar image below, you can see how the gaps are being filled in between the discrete cells, and the system is undergoing upscale growth, turning into a mesoscale convective system (MCS), which turns the predator into prey.  The dangers posed by a typical MCS is strong wind and heavy rain, neither of which by themselves makes for pleasant travel, let alone both.  The chase was effectively over, and it was wise of us to get out of its way.  In the process, we ran into some modest hail, so the kids can mark that on their storm chase bingo card. 

Sometimes you're in the exact right place at the perfect time.  We drove to Peoria, IL (where a tornado had likely come through earlier in the day) and had dinner at a local restaurant known primarily by the pepper logo and annoying earworm jingle about ribs.  Upon finishing, we found ourselves treated to quite possibly the most fantastic mammatus display.  There were several people outside taking it in, and one of them even knew the proper name for these beautiful, eerie clouds.

If this wasn't the top chase day of my career, it will be tough to beat.  What a way to end the trip.  Tomorrow we start the arduous journey east, stopping along the way to visit a park or two.  

Here is a summary of today's severe events: 

Final tally: two states, 394 miles (4077 total, but only about 100 miles from where we started), and 12 deliriously happy meteorologists.  Thank you, Peoria, we love you!