Has storm chasing gone too far? Revisiting dangerous events in Oklahoma yesterday. May 31 2013

Yesterday a line of embedded supercells developed west of the OKC area, the setup was in place for dangerous and violent tornadoes. Many chasers from all over the country were staging in OKC for another chase day. Taking a look at this radar image you can see 3 supercells embedded within each other with 3 areas of rotation and 2 tornado warnings in place at the time. There was a lot of rain coming from each of their cores and the rain was then being ingested by the updrafts and mesocyclones of these supercells creating a rain wrapped tornado situations. These supercells were also moving quickly and erratically. Often supercells can take turns, usually to the right or more east and south. If you are trying to outrun a tornado to the south or east, it may be difficult if the cell makes a turn in that direction.

Damage in El Reno, OK and Union City, OK May 31st 2013 

All of the dots on this screen are individual chasers, as you can see chasing in Oklahoma can get very congested. More and more people are wanting to take part in this activity of chasing because its thrilling and the media glorifies the "sport". The weather channel and other outlets constantly reward chasers for taking risks to get amazing video. Just yesterday one of their own chasers Mike Bettes and the Tornado Hunt Crew got themselves in a dangerous situation by positioning themselves northeast of the tornado because of the low visibility in these rain ingested cells. They realized the tornado was moving quickly and decided to get out of there, the tornado turned right for their path and they took a direct hit. Their vehicle rolled 200 yards and they got lucky with cuts and bruises. 

RAW inside TWC tumbling vehicle

Ironically a couple of years ago Mike Bettes got on other chasers for taking risks and getting too close on his Open Mike series on the weather channel. 

Another chaser I know Brandon Sullivan who is very experienced and knowledgeable found himself in a dangerous situation yesterday in the outer circulation of the tornado. His video has been making rounds on CNN, TWC, and many other outlets. You can watch the videos for yourself to see how lucky they were to get away without injury. 

A lot of drama in the Storm Chasing community, stating that these chasers were really stupid for taking these risks, but they do it every chase. We are all in danger when we choose to drive around severe weather, I do find it funny that many of us are the pots calling the kettle black. I found myself shaking my head a bit but I also realize that I have been in similar unplanned situations. It seems when a lot of chasers dont get all the attention at the end of the day they like to make snide remarks about the others. All of us go for that video that will sell to all of the media outlets, and we all get as close as we feel comfortable but yesterday may be some lessons for everyone. 

Another situation yesterday that was a disaster was the residents of the Oklahoma City area "evacuating" from the city. The interstates and highways were congested with people driving away from the weather to avoid a situation like Moore almost a couple weeks ago. 

[Photo: Dick Mcgowan]

You can not do a Hurricane style evacuation during a tornado, there is simply not enough time. Not to mention that a vehicle is the worst place to be while getting hit by a tornado. People were killed in their vehicles because of this, including a mother and her baby in this car. 

5-31-13
RS

5-14-13 Rankin, TX High Precipitation Supercell

Rankin, TX High Precipitation Supercell May 14th 2013

Hail, CG lightning, and great colors on this storm. 

May 9th 2013 Snyder, OK Supercell

Waited a long time this afternoon for good storms to fire, it had a hard time trying to get going. So we messed around, petted some horses, got lunch, and finally late evening we found something worth while.

This storm popped up on radar and looked like it was organized. 

Then we saw the striations in this cell, and a wall cloud that was rotating. 

As it was getting pretty dark it re organized and created this really big bell meso, and we tried to capture some lightning with it for a while. This cell didnt move very fast and spent most of its time near Snyder, OK. 

May 9th 2013 Night Chase 1am CDT Leedey, OK

Went out on a late night chase to catch some lightning, these backside crawlers made a great show and some even better pictures. 

Getting excited about a possible chase in northern Colorado on the 7th and a possible even better chase on the 8th in Northern KS.

[Grab from Twisterdata Dewpoint GFS at 0000z May9th (May 8th 6pm) ]

With the impending snow I can only think about when our next storm chase is going to be. It has been very quiet with these crappy patterns we have had lately. I am scheduled to be driving on Roger Hill's tours this year at the times circled below. Around that I will chase good setups on my own. 

With a new chase computer, will be trying to live stream with the gopro this first week, if it doesnt look great the rest of the season I will stream with the DV Cam. 

Looking forward to doing some more timelapses on the DSLR

Silver Lining Tours Day 5

Its been a long week and a lot of driving but so far we have had one late evening in particular that was an amazing chase. I am a guide driver for Roger Hill on his Tour Company Silver Lining Tours, and Tuesday night we were in NM. We were really pushing all day for cumulus to push off of the higher terrain and get east into really favorable environment. We watched little cu fields turn into a massive cell later. At sunset it was a huge mothership, and it actually back lit the structure with amazing color. Something I have rarely seen is outer bands around this Meso with space between them, so it made like rings of Saturn around this storm LOL. The past few days its really been difficult to get storms going any early in the day at all, its tested a lot of our patience and boredom lol. Tuesday made this week of lots of driving a lot less painful with its amazing structure. Roger Hill was excited like he always is, just stunned at what the cell turned into. I have video of him saying wow probably 50 times. After dark this cell intensified even more, tiled even more, and structured even more. There were probably 6 Plates Tilted up to the Anvil on this storm and the lightning was insane. We drove through a town close by the hail core and found that up to Baseball fell on this little town in NM. This is my first time working with a tour company but I kinda like it, the people on the tour are smarter than one would think about weather, a lot of them have been chasing a few times on tours, and they are all enthusiastic and none of them are crazy this week lol. I am also producing a short film of this week, although not one of Roger's best weeks it may still be interesting. Its difficult to run multiple cameras, audio gear, and also drive all day. Possible chase today in Kansas, upper level flow sucks, blehhh. And one more chase tomorrow before I return home and then go back out for a few days for another secret project I have goin on.

Next week looks possibly interesting in CO for a few days with a trough coming in if it continues to show that.