4-29-10 Western IA Chase

Well to start off I swear God was telling me not to go out chasing but as the sinner I am I decided not to follow his signs. The final blow that was telling me not to go was when we were 20 miles away from home I got a call from my wife (Jill) saying that her car broke down in Sioux Falls, it over heated and the cooling fan wasn't running. I should have turned around then and there, but we pressed on knowing that the car will maintain a decent temp if you keep it moving and don't run the AC. The car did make it home where it sits in our garage waiting for me to fix it.

Ok, now with the chase, ugh what a deal! We took off at 3:00 with an initial target of Onawa, IA. We got to Onawa around 4:30 just as the SPC issued a tornado watch further south, so we pressed onto Missourri Valley, IA. We sat there, grabbed supper and then checked data, we noticed there was a cell SW of Sioux City, IA that we could easily get to with strong rotation. We didn't really want to risk going back north too bad as we knew if we went up north and this storm dies that would be the last of chasing for the night because it would be too late to get to the southern IA storms that were rolling in. We then got a call from a nowcasting EXWX team member saying... go go go, so we listened and took off North!

The whole drive up to this storm I was really nervous knowing that this could be a complete bust and die on us when it hits the Missourri River but if it survived past the river it would really take off and go crazy, it was a risk that we took. We got back up to Sloan, IA and watched the storm die off :( It's part of chasing, you bust sometimes so we weren't upset, just bummed. We met up with Marc Hicks and Brent Koops in Sioux City and shot the shit for a little bit before heading home. Here are the pictures right before the storm died.

4-23-10 SE Nebraska Chase

We took off from Sioux Center, IA at 7:00AM with a target of Marysville, KS. We arrived in Marysville, KS around noon, grabbed a bite to eat topped off our tanks and reviewed data. The SPC issued a torndao watch to our NW, even though I'm not one to chase "dots" after reviewing the data on the 18z model run we knew we had to run a little NW so we took off and ended up in Geneva, NE we were further south than most chasers, this gave us a great vantage point to see towers shooting up. We decided to head east and ended up in Crete, NE where we sat and watched the major storm to our SE develop. We sat there until it was SVR warned, when it went warned we took off to Lincoln, NE not too long after getting into Lincoln it became Tornado warned, we then flew to the updraft area by Waverly, NE. We did see a wall cloud and a ton of scud action. Overall it was a successful chase with us ending up on the strongest storm in SE NE. Here are some pictures of the event.

April 21-24 Outbreak?

It's happened, the Gulf has opened it's gates and we're back in business. Moisture is finally inching its way up to the plains and creating plenty of instability to go around. Today is going to be a precourser on what will happen Thursday and Friday.

Thursday, Childress, TX is the target for quite a few chasers and EXWX team members Marcus Hicks, and Derek Davis, The CAPE value is 2750+ which is on the verge of extreme instability this in turn could  cause a significant tornado outbreak.

Friday is the day for me though, this is looking like a northen plains chase day through and through.

We (meaning Brent Koops, Greg Rardin, Pete De Boer, & I ) will be meeting up with Marcus and Derek Friday in KS and start chasing the nothern edge of KS and follow the dryline up the the triple point for some possible warmfront action. Stay tuned for updates and be sure to watch our live stream at ChaserTV or Extreme Weather Chase Teams Website

First Chase 4-5-10

Well to start off there is nothing else to say but "dissapointment". Marc Hicks and I left Rock Valley, IA at noon with our initial target area of St. Joe, MO. We get down to St. Joe at around 4:00, top off the tank of gas, and check data. The surface plots were showing great dew points a little to the west of us so we figured why not and headed west to Hiawatha, KS where we meet up with some other chasers. After about an hour in Hiawatha watching some towers trying to bust the Cap  and get sheared off we checked data again and pretty much ruled that we might have a bust on our hands. The Cap was way too strong to do much with, so unless there was a definate sign we were going to head north towards home and stick our tail between our legs. We finally decided to call it and head towards home and maybe cut back into MO just incase there is a slim possibility of a tower busting the Cap (wishful thinking!!!). All would have gone to plan except there was an issue with the car, it wouldn't start, the battery was completly dead. Luckily Marc had a jumper pack and we got it jumped and headed north out of Hiawatha. 7 miles out of town the car died again, this happened a total of 4 times (thank goodness KS has great people that are willing to help). As we were heading home we saw to our south west a large line of towers going up that tempted us but we knew it was home or bust at this point.

We headed to hwy 75 where we knew Brent Koops and Justin Vink were and met up with them, we all got a little touch of the anvil that was forming and felt the dissapointment but we all knew we had to get home and work the next day so we pressed on. Leaving that storm really put a damper on the rest of the way home but at least we knew that we forecasted it correctly because the storm that we would have been on was the strongest around, and produced 2" hail. There was one tornado reported that day but that was east of St. Louis and that was middle afternoon. Our skills were put the the test and it truly did pay off except the car problems. Sorry to all of those who were going to watch our live stream, since the alternator went bad we couldn't run the inverter to power the laptop/camera equipment. There will be another day that will be glorious and everyone will be able to see what we see. For now here are some more pictures of the storm we had to abandon.