False Alarm

We woke up yesterday in the panhandle of the Sooner State, bright and early. Our goal was to head for western Kansas and head into eastern Colorado at the furthest. We figured that with the highest chance of our trip yet for tornadoes, at 10%, that there would be many other chase groups, and of course yahoos. Yahoos, not the website, rather inexperienced and dangerous locals who roach, or follow experienced chasers towards storms, can be hazardous to not only us, but they can give us, the experienced or student chasers a bad rep.
As we left Oklahoma, we passed into Kansas and after eating lunch in Colby, near the northwestern corner, we stopped at a local motel and borrowed their wireless internet services. We sat there, hoping for storms to form to our west and come in our direction. The "cap" prevented this from happening. Unfortunately for us, storms did fire in Wyoming, and Vortex 2 spotted a decent tornado that lasted 24 minutes. The same cell was tracking east, and with little choices to make in Kansas, we decided to head north, after wasting a vast amount of precious time sitting in that motel parking lot. To intercept, we would have to travel over three hours and flirt with the time zone that separates the mountain and central zones. Coming up on 5 o'clock, we hadn’t seen a rain shaft, few clouds with little or no vertical development, and basically, nothing in favor of us chasing. The day looked like it was going to be a waste of gas, miles, and a huge bust. But, defying all odds against us, we tracked north to the supercells that had a history of producing tornadoes in hopes they might give us, as well as Vortex 2, a chance to see a tornado.
After crossing through 3 states and across the time zone boundary several times, we finally ended up near the southwestern Nebraska border, in Julesburg, CO. The cells were north and west of our position in Bridgeport, NE, moving slow to the east south east. For a day that looked to be the best day possibly of our trip, things were looking bleak. It was nearing 6 and we were just beginning the chase on a storm, for all that we knew could fizzle out and die as we approached from the south.

We decided that our best plan of action was to head for Oshkosh and wait for the storm to come to us, because the road network would limit us to just a few areas to intercept. WE headed down a hilly, and winding country road with the storm, also carrying with it a tornado warning, above and in front of us. The mammatus clouds were crazy compared to what we had seen earlier in the week, and the contrast on the horizon with the low level clouds was phenomenal. Just then, as we headed over some hills, both vans caught sight of an ominous wall cloud in the distance, against an orange sky. VIEW VIDEO:

Within seconds, the cloud appeared to drop a funnel, and the energy level in the van skyrocketed. It was hard to judge the ground level with the hills we were going through, but a cone shaped cloud dropped towards the ground only 15 miles to our north. I had been recording on the video camera the telecommunications department had loaned me, but I also quickly grabbed a hold of my other camera which had video capability and caught the reaction of the van I was in when the cloud appeared to stir up dust on the ground below it. I will take some of the blame for calling it a tornado, but the vast majority of us believed the same thing. There were also 2 other funnel shaped clouds nearby that were dropping out of the low cloud base. Could there be a tornado dropping, or even more than one? We rounded a corner and spotted another girl sitting in a gravel lot near a communications tower, and we parked near her, being it held a great viewpoint over Oshkosh and to where our funnel had just began to vanish, along with all of our hopes. After asking her if she had seen a tornado, she said, “No, but it definitely looked like a funnel perhaps.” It was slightly disheartening, but it was one step closer to our ultimate goal.

We snapped great photos and videos from our vantage point, and also caught a great lightning show. The Vortex group also drove by as well as numerous other chasing groups and individuals. When we finally left our storm, late last night, we passed it seemed, 100 other cars parked along the same road as us, just watching and hoping that the storm would produce, but it did not. We ate dinner at Subway, for the God knows what time this trip at a gas station off of I-80 at 11 last night. The Vortex team, a chase group from Texas Tech, and another DOW from NBC stopped to refuel and wind down at the same station. After dinner, we waited out for the remnants of our storm to move east and away from the highway, because at that time it was dropping softball sized hail. If we wouldn’t have waited, our trip would have been quickly ended with the destruction of our vans. We did not pull into our hotel until half past one this morning, and didn’t get to sleep until somewhere in the neighborhood of 2.

This morning we woke up a bit late, for obvious reasons, and headed out to Lincoln for lunch and now we are camped out at a Phillips 66 gas station waiting for storms to pop up in the area. Vincennes University and the National Severe Storms Laboratory are also here, as well as many other groups here in Nebraska City, just south and east of Lincoln near the border of Missouri and Iowa. I’m going to try to add more videos to this page and other earlier posts. I forgot that you could do this, so now you can enjoy some real storm chasing action. Comments are always appreciated, and you can contact me at btmaushart@bsu.edu. Thanks for reading.

Sightseeing on a Stormchasing Trip

Tis the end of yet another day here out on the Great Plains. As you might be able to see from the ever creative title, the weather at the time being is uncooperative to say the least. Basically, the weather is great for anyone other than a storm chaser. Some may get frustrated with what is going on, but as someone once said, when life gives you lemons, make lemonade, and that is what we have been trying to do.

Today, we woke up somewhat early for a non-chase day in Rapid City, South Dakota. It was quite chilly outside, so most of us chose to wear jeans and sweatshirts. After our daily briefing, which today centered around sightseeing, rather than storms, we headed for Rapid City’s Museum of Geology, not to be mistaken for geography. It was located on the campus of the South Dakota College of Mining in the south end of the city. When we entered we all got to take a good look at basically ancient skeletons of random dinosaurs, many other fossils, and other minerals. On top of all that they had molds of the largest golden nuggets ever found and a similar display for diamonds. Overall, since the admission was free, it was a worthwhile stop.

After leaving that, the sky began to clear, and temperatures began to rise. Our next stop was the one I had been looking forward to the whole trip, Mt. Rushmore. I was somewhat surprised when we arrived at the size of the monument. I was expecting it to be much bigger, but it was still a sight to behold. The most strange thing that occurred while visiting Mt. Rushmore was when we asked for some assistance from two strangers to take group pictures. The couple asked if we were all from Indiana, and we replied yes. They said that they were initially from Lawrenceburg, which meant that they lived 15 minutes away from me at the most. I told them that my home was in Guilford, and their eyes immediately lit up and they said that they also lived in Guilford. I found myself immediately intrigued. After further investigation, I found out that the two strangers I met over a thousand miles away from my hometown, turned out to live a ridge over from my own. It’s a small world after all.

After leaving the popular tourist destination featuring four of our founding fathers, we headed up the side of a mountain basically, and ended up on a lookout about 10 miles away from our previous stop. This led to one of the best photo shoots we have had yet, as a beautiful landscape had been laid out in front of our own eyes. Sometimes good weather isn’t so bad after all.

After descending off of the mountain, we made our way to Custer State Park, in Custer County, SD. This would bring about my first wild buffalo viewing. What were they thinking when they almost made these creatures go extinct. They are amazing to watch graze on a sunny afternoon, someone from Wisconsin even had an impromptu picnic outside of their van next to the field where the buffalo were roaming. After snapping a few pictures of them we met a roadblock, and not your usual signs and cones, rather a herd of donkeys. After stopping and meeting them, literally face to face, we drove on and made our way to the Crazy Horse Monument, in progress. Right now it is not a lot to see, but if they sculpt it like they have it depicted, it should be amazing to say the least.

Finally, we were on our way to Wyoming, Cheyenne to be specific, to stay the night. We crossed the border and after a few miles lost all cell phone reception. You haven’t been to the middle of nowhere until you see some places out here on the plains. We even passed a small ghost town of sorts named “Lost Springs,” whose sign read “Lost Springs - Pop. 1 - Elev. 4996.” According to online references, it is one of only four towns in the United States with only one inhabitant. But eventually we stopped to watch the sunset over the Laramie Range, north of Cheyenne, WY. After getting a few spectacular shots and video that I plan to time lapse, we drove into Cheyenne. Our first hotel was going to save us a bit on our budget down the road, but due to some negative circumstances including safety, and cleanliness, we made an emergency move to our second choice where I am typing this blog tonight. As I have said earlier, the weather is proving to be quite a disappointment recently. There are talks that there might be an outbreak on the plains in early June. Hopefully this will pan out and the last stretch of our trip will prove to be a thrill to say the least. As for tomorrow, I believe the plan is to jump down to Denver tomorrow and catch the afternoon Rockies game. After that or before it, who knows. I’ll try keeping you, the reader, updated on the chances of severe weather out here as well as other random trip happenings of course. I am open to comments, suggestions and whatnot. As always, thanks for reading.