Chase 2018
Target: Great Bend, Kansas
This day started in Woodward, Oklahoma with some minor car repairs. In a busted forecast the previous day in the eastern Texas Panhandle I hit a deer along Highway 83 just south of Shamrock, Texas. The car was largely in tact and totally functional, so I took it out for a follow up chase on May 1 in the Great Bend area. Convection initiated in the early to mid afternoon and took quite a while to get going. Convection to our south provided some complications to the evolution of the storms because 1.) they were in a better, undisturbed environment and 2.) because they were shooting off left moving supercells into the main storm that was moving eastward along Highway 4. With at least one left split interference taking place I decided that at best the storm would survive the interaction, but take a while to regather its strength. At worst the left mover would kill the main storm. So I dropped southward toward Ellinwood across the Cheyenne Bottoms Refuge. However, as I was going south, I noted that the new storm to my south was not very healthy and would likely die soon. So, my last play of the day was to re-engage with the original main storm as it pushed toward Ellsworth. Using Highway 156 through Claflin and Holyrood I caught back up with the storm just north of Ellsworth. The storm at this point was rapidly restrengthening, and with the southern convection dying out was primed to have at least 2-3 hours of uninterrupted growth. Ultimately, as we approached the Tescott, Kansas area it produced a tornado, which grew rapidly in size. For about 5-10 minutes it was a wedge tornado that moved eastward through NC/NE Kansas before dissipating.
Wedge tornado near Tescott, Kansas
Target: Weatherford, Oklahoma
This day started in Salina, after the wedge tornado the previous day near Tescott, Kansas. Initially the chase commenced around Weatherford, Oklahoma, and continued eastward just south of I-40 through Eakley, Binger, and eventually Cogar. The chase terrain was not incredibly friendly and there were a lot of chasers present. The supercell and the area it traversed was pretty, but ultimately did not see a tornado. The chase ended in Minco. I headed north out of Minco toward I-40 for the trip home.
Supercell over Binger, Oklahoma