South Dakota - " Under God the People Rule" - Part II

Today, we again woke up in beautiful, boring Murdo, South Dakota. Our goal for the day was to intercept storms on the eastern half of South Dakota, with a pinpoint somewhere near Aberdeen, South Dakota, which is near the north east corner. It would be a somewhat easy drive to get there, and we weren't expecting storms to fire up until the mid to late afternoon. We enjoyed a somewhat laid back breakfast and our daily weather briefing and map analysis. We decided we would first stop by in Pierre to see the capital building and other local sites before jetting north and east to our predetermined target location.

After stopping for a quick photo session in South Dakota's capital, we were heading east when we saw storms beginning to fire on our on board laptop near the Nebraska and South Dakota border. We continued east, checked out models, used forecasting tools and plotted a route to Miller, SD, where we could then stop for a quick lunch and make any further decisions about the remainder of chasing today. Upon arriving in Miller, we at at Dairy Queen, which was the local hot spot apparently, and again looked at what the storms appeared to be doing. Today would be the best day we have had thus far for many reasons.

We ate as quickly as possible and made for the eastern fourth of South Dakota to finally get our chance to intercept some cells that began to pop up on radar and satellite images. We had put ourselves in the perfect position for these storms. When we finally got into the war zone, we cranked up the radio in van 2 and played the chasing favorite, Child in Time, by Deep Purple. It really got us into the chasing mentality as we approached building cumulonimbus clouds. We stopped once in an area near a field to view the building of a strong cell to our north and east. It was very impressive, with heavy precipitation and decibel readings on the radar. Unfortunately, we couldn't see much other than the underside so we made the choice to shoot south down some rough country roads in hopes to see more separated cells that we could see the towering tops of. We got lucky and pulled off a second time to witness a strong thunderstorm building with a clearly visible inflow tail, which had apparently not been seen before by a Ball State storm chasing class, and also many heavy rain bands. Still, we saw no real severe weather, and the storms were all eventually dissipating as they headed further north. We made our way east and made an emergency decision stop at a small ice cream parlor in the middle of nowhere. The locals seemed to be stressed upon our arrival in rain gear and fast exits from the vans. Upon further investigation, we found out that a few years back, the nearest town had been hit pretty bad by a tornado, so upon seeing us in chase mode, they feared the worst. We reassured them they appeared to only be in for heavy rain, and they relaxed just a bit. The storms were also weakening in the area and formed a squall line of sorts, so we made our way east to Mitchell, which was off of interstate 90 to hopefully enter a warm sector of air in hopes of finding more strong storms.

We got off the interstate and stopped in a Sinclair gas station where we would decide our next move. The choices were head north to continue with the gradually weaker storm systems, or just call it a day with great video footage and photographs. We all had seen enough, and decided to head back west towards Rapid City to stay the night, because the next few days or so would most likely be spent as tourists rather than chasers, and if we spent several days and came within 30 miles of seeing Mt. Rushmore and never visiting, that would just not seem right. So before leaving Mitchell, SD, I convinced everyone that we should check out their world famous "Corn Palace," just because it sounded like a really strange tourist destination, so why not. We arrived in the midst of a downpour with pea sized hail from the storms we chased earlier, and got a few photographs before leaving.

We stopped for dinner at "Al's Oasis," where for the second day in a row I decided to have the buffalo burger. It, again, tasted much like any other burger, but it is what it is. We soon departed after hopping onto some ceramic buffalo statues out front and made the last trek to Rapid City, South Dakota. That is where I am writing this tonight. We are staying at a very nice hotel with an indoor pool/slide that we tested out earlier this evening. Tomorrows plans are still up in the air, although I know almost for a guarantee that we will be visiting Mt. Rushmore and the Crazy Horse monument in progress. After that, the possibilities are endless. I thank you for taking the time to read and follow our storm chasing trip. Feel free to make comments, suggestions for tourist ideas, and whatnot. Thank you.

Storm Chasing: Pre-departure

Its early on a thirsty-Thursday night, and I'm finishing my last minute packing and preparation that will go into tomorrows departure to the Great Plains of the United States of America, the home of farmland as far as the eye can see and most importantly Tornado Alley.

Right now, according to many models and analysis maps, our chances of finding anything highly organized or favorable to chase are minimal for a while. We have two ways to exit Indiana tomorrow, both of which are basically geographical opposites of one another. Behind door number one, we can take the northern route, and head towards the Dakotas and eastern Montana, but stopping for rest and sleep somewhere near Des Moines, Iowa. Behind door number two, we could be trekking in the direction of the Texas panhandle and east New Mexico, stopping for rest and shut eye in southern Missouri. There is one more option for lodging, which would be in Kansas City, MO, with the goal of basically splitting the distance between the two chase able regions, and in turn making more of an educated guess as to where to travel to over the weekend.

Either way, these are all new destinations for me and I cannot wait to visit and explore. Possibilities that await us, the chasers from both Ball State and Indiana University, if there is dry weather would include the Badlands Nat. Park and Mt. Rushmore in South Dakota, and the Alamo or even the Odessa Meteor Crater in Texas. We will have to take a vote or decide on what to do if this should happen. Usually, people ask for good weather on their travels, however, as storm chasers we would rather have our weather be a bit more on the wet side.

In other random side notes, the classroom portion for the most part is over. We had class on Thursday and Friday of last week and also the first two days of this week, closing out this Tuesday with an exam over what we had learned the past few days. I have been here in Muncie, IN since Monday morning, and it has had its ups and downs. The past couple of days have been rough, between finding ways of entertaining myself and living with some nice guys I have only known since late last week. But the pros have outweighed the cons, and departure is quickly arriving.

I will be taking a camera and video camcorder, which by the way, thanks to the telecommunications department here at Ball State for allowing me to do so. So in other words, you can expect to get daily photographs from sightseeing and hopefully some severe weather. The video might take a while to get online, as I don't know right now as it stands how to get it uploaded to my laptop from the camera. But there will be something on my facebook eventually.

It is looking better everyday for media coverage of our chase. Our professor leading the chase, Dr. Dave Call, notified us tonight that seven media sources had contacted him to get information on us and our adventures in the coming weeks. There might also be a possiblity that some local newspapers/television stations to myself will be doing a story on the trip. We will just have to wait and see. Sorry that this was such a long entry, and rather boring at that, but hopefully I will have some more exciting stories to tell, and pictures to share.

You can read up on the trip on this blog every night (hopefully), and view pictures and possibly videos on my facebook page. Thanks for reading.