Tours 1 and 2 in 2025 were rather active, but the good times came to a screeching halt a couple of days into Tour 3, an 11-day tour. We had a couple of days (May 5 and 6) with storms starting off, but then the pattern went stale. During the 7-day stretch from the 7th to the 13th, we had four days which were complete down days, and two days with low expectations and with some weak convection, and one decent severe weather day, May 8 near Laredo.
Here are the particulars for May 7 to 13:
May 7/begin: Laredo/lunch: Danny’s Mexican in Laredo/End: Laredo/20 miles/total down day
May 8/begin: Laredo/lunch: Black Bear Diner in Laredo/end: Freer/303 miles/severe Laredo to Mirando, Guerra and then north to Freer
May 9/begin: Freer, TX/brunch: Liberty Cafe in Freer/End: Snyder, TX/450 miles/reposition north
May 10/begin: Snyder, TX/lunch: Briscoe Bites in Silverton/End: Perryton/308 miles/reposition north
May 11/begin: Perryton/lunch: Smokehouse in Perryton/End: Burlington, CO/310 miles/reposition north
May 12/begin: Burlington, CO/lunch: Handi’s in Stratton, CO/End: Burlington/80 miles/weak stuff near Flagler
May 13/begin: Burlington, CO/lunch: D & J Cafe in Julesburg, CO/end: Chadron/473 miles/struggling convection at dusk near Van Tassell, WY
Fortunately, the guests had a decent chase day near North Platte on the 14th. Their final chase day was a return-to-base drive to OKC on the 15th, as the risk area in MN and WI was too distant to consider.
Below are some stills from May 8, around Guerra and Freer, in south Texas. That storm north of Freer (last two images) was wrapped up rather nicely and looked like it was trying to produce a good-sized tornado towards dusk.
iPhone pics and radar grabs from May 8. I wandered up slightly north of Laredo to meet a storm out of Mexico, and a new updraft exploded near Laredo and turned southeast. We were out of position. We had to battle rush hour traffic, blast east and then south in order to get on front of the severe storm. It showed a little front-end structure and some occasional strong rotation and organization. From Guerra we went northward to cells approaching Freer.
Pics 1-6 below were south of Guerra, Pics 7-9 were north of Freer.
iPhone shots for May 9-13 below
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