7-23-10 Herrick, SD Tornado

Well what a needle in the haystack find this was. We left Sioux Falls, SD at 3:30 and headed west on I90 towards Chamberlain. We arrived in Chamberlain around 6:00 and started watching the storms directly west of us and debated on crossing the river and staying on the East side but we could tell the storm was moving slow so we crossed the river and continued West, we got cored just East of Presho, SD (the national record hailstone fell approx 8 minutes before then in Vivian, SD from the same storm) and turned South on Hwy 183. Being on the backside of the storm while most other chasers were on the leading edge gave us an advantage to get the needle in the haystack. We stopped a couple time along Hwy 183 and watched the outflow/inflow areas with some great views of hail shafts and then we got to Hwy 46 and came up on the roation that was just forming. From there we chased it down to Hwy 18 towards Herrick, SD where we caught this beautiful tornado!

Inflow/Outflow Area

Wall Cloud by Winner, SD

Tornado by Herrick, SD

Spencer, NE area, leading edge of storm

Same as above

This storm was truely one of the most beautiful storms I have seen, the contrast and depth of colors were absolutly amazing!

This might have been the last "good" setup chase this year so it was a great way to possibly close out the year.

Season's coming to a close

It's July already!?!?! WOW, that's hard to believe, this year has flown by. Looking into this past severe season I am super proud of myself and the rest of the team/members that I've chased with and now-casted for.

I have my updated 2010 stats on the side of the home page and I am very happy with how 2010 turned out. By far the best chase day that I had was May 22nd in Bowdle, SD we witnessed 7 tornado's that day and one of those was a massive wedge that we were sitting no more than 1/4 mile from. Every other chase that I went on was  a CAP gamble but I never did have a blue sky bust. One was close and that was April 29th, we were on our way to the target south of Omaha but while we were eating in Missourri Valley there as a discrete cell SW of Sioux City, this cell had rotation well defined within it so we baled on the South target (oops bad mistake) by the time we intercepted the updraft was really struggling and as soon as it hit the Missourri River it completely died so being it was 7:30ish we packed up and went home.

2010 was also more than a big year for me it was a huge year for Extreme Weather Chase Team we have gained a ton of knowledge, intercepted over 20 tornado's this year and made national media! Marc Hicks deserves a huge pat on the back because he was super agressive this year and really got the team rolling. We are also associated with Black Cloud Media so we will most likely be making national media more often.

I just want to say thanks to everyone and especially Jill for supporting this hobby of mine. The rest of the year I'm planning on staying very local unless there is a great setup which I'm sure there will be one or maybe two more this year but I won't hold my breath. I will make an account later with all of this years greatest pics.

Thanks for following!
Joe