RydzBlog

On Monday we traveled south east from Amarillo, TX to Estelline, TX to intercept a super cell that was forming. Before the radars were able to deploy the storm dissipated and we began to look for a new target. We then moved onto a target that was to the north east. This time we arrived in time to at least get some of the radars setup on the storm, however, like the previous storm, it died soon after. This storm was very photogenic and rotation was evident. We then moved a few hours northwest in order to target another super cell that was forming. Once again, the storm dissipated upon our arrival. The running joke of the day was, “VORTEX2, saving lives, one storm at a time”, because of our ability to kill storms. We stayed in Childress, TX in anticipation of storms to our southeast on Tuesday.

On Tuesday, we targeted north central Texas. We waited most of the day for a storm to develop. A storm finally developed late in the day, however, the storm was moving towards the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex. This creates many issues for an armada as large as ours. The primary concern is traffic which will slow us down, or put us in a potentially dangerous situation if the storm begins to come towards us. Luckily for us, we noticed that the storm had begun to split, the right mover went towards the metroplex while the left mover went north of the city. We then decided to target the left mover in the open country. We begun to race towards the cell and noticed something odd, the left mover was thriving while the right mover had died. This is extremely odd, as the right mover usually survives and the left mover dies. This case will make an interesting study to see why this occurred. We deployed before the storm and began doing transects in our probe vehicles. We initially drove out of the precipitation, but on our return trip we headed back in. We picked up mostly pea-sized hail, but some reached ½ inch. It was pretty neat hearing all the pea sized hail hit the car, then every now and then you head a “thud”, and we all turn to each other and go “that was a little bigger than pea-sized”. Operations soon ended after the storm dissipated and darkness set in. By this time, we were really far from out hotel in Norman, OK and hungry. We wanted something quick so we decided to go to the only open restaurant in town, Jack in the Box. However, the main dining room was not open, only the drive thru. This presented a little issue because of the 13 foot mast on the front of our vehicles. We ended up walking through the drive thru, but only after pleading with the clerk to allow us to order, apparently it is against their policy. We arrived at our hotel at 1am in the morning, after a long day.

The following day was a travel day to Topeka, KS. We spent two nights here because of the inactive weather. This allowed time for us to prepare mission reports that will be presented during Saturday’s down time.

Once again, the weather pattern kept us out of our domain on Friday in an attempt to intercept any storm that popped up. We headed northwest out of Hot Springs, SD to scan a developing cell to the north of Hot Springs in the Black Hills. The cell looked promising, but we were unable to chase because of the road network and hilly terrain. The cell died soon after anyway as it passed into the valley. After un-deploying form that storm we moved east in attempt to intercept a storm leaving the Black Hills into the valley. The storm lived for a short time after, but soon died also. During the last deployment DOW 7 decided to park next to a bee farm, so it was very difficult to leave the vehicles. After missions for the day were complete, we went out and did a imax shoot with the TIV and Sean Casey. We did several shots driving down a dirt road in different formations. The final shot was the most interesting; we had gone down a dirt road on the open range. A bull was situated 7 feet from our probes; let’s just say that it didn’t like our presence. The bull began to buck up and down and then charged after the last vehicle after we sped off. It was quite interesting.

After chasing in the Black Hills on Friday, we decided that despite a similar threat on Saturday we would head towards Nebraska to maybe catch a storm in that area. As we headed south, we got a report of a police spotted tornado in a cell near North Platte, NE. This was out target location. We were too far away to target this storm so we decided to stay west of that storm and target a new storm that was forming in a similar air mass. We intercepted the storm just south of I-80 near Paxton, NE. Our probe vehicles began to do north-south transects on the east side of the storm. We did not encounter anything that interesting on our transects, just some moderate rain. We soon ended out mission for the day and headed to our hotel in North Platte, NE.

On Sunday we had a travel day to head to Amarillo, TX. After arriving in Amarillo we went to the Big Texan to have dinner. This restaurant is famous for their 72oz steak (4 pounds), which is free if you can finish it, a baked potato, salad, and shrimp. Two people attempted it (not from our group) while we were there, they both failed. The restaurant has very nice decorations, however, I forgot my camera so I don’t have any pictures .

Today was another down day due to the weather pattern, so we moved even farther north to southwestern South Dakota. After arriving at our hotel we decided to travel north to see Mt. Rushmore. It was a unique photo opportunity having the probe vehicles in front of the monument, too bad we didn’t take a DOW.

On Tuesday we intercepted a line of storms forming near the Nebraska-Colorado border. There was no chance of tornadoes so we were looking to study microbursts that were likely to form from the high cloud bases precipitating into the large column of dry air. The storms began to precipitate soon after deployment, but only weak microbusts were observed. Operations were called soon after. The major news of the day was the transmitter on DOW 6 died. The truck was immediately sent to Forth Worth, TX for repair. We hope to have DOW 6 back tomorrow.

On Wednesday we moved north towards Alliance, NE. We started intercepting a cell east of the city, however, it soon died and we returned to Alliance. On the trip back there was discussion on another cell that was forming about 15 miles north of the city. The latest radar returns showed weak strengthening so we decided to quickly deploy. The deployment was not that organized, however, good data was collected. A rotating wall cloud was observed along with pea sized hail. A few of the mobile mesonets encountered the RFD.

It has been a slow weekend weather wise, so we had two official down days and a travel day. Saturday we ventured north to Hays, KS stopping at Wakita, KS and Greensburg, KS. Wakita was the location where the movie Twister was filmed. We stopped at the Twister Museum and mingled with other storm chasers and museum staff. We had a unique photo opportunity with the movie prop Dorothy and a real tornado pod from our vehicle. After Wakita we traveled north to visit the recovering town of Greensburg. I am not going to go into any details now because I am leaving that stop for a separate entry. On Sunday and Monday we continued to debug weather instrument issues. We were finally able to fix all the vehicles in our group. I also helped install the weather instruments on TIV2, so I spent some quality time with the monster machine. The break was also a time to recharge our batteries after working long hours for the past week; We got some good rest and had time to do laundry.

On Friday we intercepted a squall line northwest of Enid, OK. The weather was not conducive to individual super cells so we were not optimistic for tornado formation. The cells merged after initiation into a squall line that raced east-southeast. The radars deployed in dual Doppler baseline and waited over an hour for the squall line to pass. There were two cyclonic shear zones along the leading edge of the gust front that sparked some interest, however, nothing became of those two shear zones. The passage of the squall line was mainly uneventful, only very small hail was reported and surface winds were light. The shelf cloud provided an impressive visual experience as it passed. We now have the most studied squall line ever.

Yesterday brought our second “go” day with more favorable weather conditions than the first day. We left Childress, TX moving northeast back towards Clinton, OK, grabbed lunch, and then continued towards Canton, OK. We waited at a school parking lot in Canton for convection to begin. Once it began we started to target a line of storms in Okeene. There was no dominating cell so we deployed a head of the line to allow the DOWs to scan. The DOWs detected some midlevel rotation to the south, so we un-deployed and headed towards Watonga. During this time a wall cloud developed with some rotation. Since the storm line kept changing, the new targeted required deployment in Binger, OK. The DOWs continued to detect midlevel rotation, but all VORTEX2 operations were ceased due to darkness. The disappointment of the night came about an hour later when a tornado was reported Southwest of Oklahoma City from the same cell we were tracking.

Today was a down day in Yukon, OK. DOW 7 received a drive shaft tune up and hydraulic work, while DOW 5 needed its generator repaired. The other team members worked to repair and modify tornado pods. Tomorrow appears to be a “go” day.

Also, some of you have been wondering about hotels. We have been lucky enough to be staying in some awesome hotels thanks to Dr. Josh Wurman’s wife and Logistics Coordinator Ling. I have included some pictures below of the room from the Country Inn and Suites.

I am closing with a panoramic shot of most of the VORTEX2 fleet in Canton, OK. (click for full resolution)

Today was our first “go” day, which means that severe weather was possible. Yesterday, we drove from Norman, OK to Clinton, OK to position the armada for a possible severe weather intercept today. We spent most of the day working on the vehicles, including getting the internet working on DOW 6 and sending DOW 7 for a drive shaft repair. This morning’s weather briefing was cut short in order for the armada to travel west for a target of Tulia, TX via Amarillo. The fleet staged in a parking lot in Tulia and then departed for a new target of Silverton. During this time, towering cumulus began to form along the dryline to our west and south. A sounding sent up in Tulia, showed 3000+ joules of CAPE, however, the CIN was large.

It was decided that there would not be a significant chance of a tornado developing today so everyone participated in a shakedown mission where the DOWs setup in dual doppler patterns and the probes dropped their pods. The mobile mesonets also practiced transects and encountered closed roads due to downed power lines from a microbust. After the gust front had passed we continued east to our hotel location. Upon arriving at the hotel, a developing cell to the south began to have a lowered cloud base and a hail shaft. The storm passed over the hotel bringing very strong windows and some pea sized hail. The storm exited with an excellent lightning show. Tomorrow looks like it might be a good day

Also, I was on the weather channel today discussing how the locals come out to visit when we are in parking lots.

We finally went mobile today! However, because of the unfavorable weather setup we moved from eastern Norman to western Norman. We used today to ensure that all the pods were working correctly and has a class on pod deployment. Some pictures from today:

Well, after 1,258 miles we are finally in Norman, OK. The trip was mainly uneventful, expect for a wakeup call from Mother Nature in Joplin, MO. We left State College around 7:15am yesterday and were able to make it to St. Louis for dinner. After dinner, we continued for a few more hours arriving in Joplin, MO around 12:30am. We had planned on leaving Joplin around 10am to make it to Norman, OK for a 2pm meeting, however, Mother Nature decided to wake us up at 7:30am with hail on the roof. The hail was followed by severe winds that were accompanied by a sky that had a noticeable green tint. Luckily, we appear to have missed the worst of the storm. Storm reports indicate that in other parts of town 1.75 inch hail fell and farther to the southeast a couple of tornadoes were reported. The greatest damage from winds were at television station KSNF that lost their broadcast tower, you can view pictures here. Our hotel had lost power after the storm so we decided to leave early and arrived in Norman, OK around 1:30pm, checked in to the hotel, and then headed to the National Severe Storm Laboratory where we toured the vehicle bay and had Mobile Mesonet training. Tomorrow brings CPR/First Aid training.