May 17, 2012 Chase update

Hi all,

I’ll squeeze in another update this evening for y’all.  But first things first —

KINGS win AGAIN!  Up 3-0 against Phoenix, 11-1 in the playoffs so far —- absolutely unbelievable!  Storms in NW KS weakened an hour or two before sunset, and gave us time to get to the motel in Imperial, NE, at a reasonable hour.  Our group invaded the Brickstone Bar and Grill in Imperial for dinner, and they turned on the Kings game for us.  I was able to watch the last half of the game, and the Kings prevailed, 2-1.

My last update was a week ago in deep south TX, May 10.  The tour had two full chase days remaining.  On May 11, Friday, we targeted areas not too far north of our starting point of Hebronville, TX.  Some cells went up north of San Antonio and around Austin.  These were generally weakly organized and rather low-topped, near an upper-level low in north TX.  Better instability was towards Houston, but I wasn’t going deeper into southeast TX unless the tornado chances were excellent.  They were not, and we fumbled around with so-so junk in the traffic and congestion and general Friday afternoon mess along I-35.  YUCK.  We managed to see some okay low-level structure on what appeared to be a low-topped left-split weak supercell northwest of Austin.  A forgettable day.  We stayed at Copperas Cove for the night.

The upper low continued east and took the instability with it, leaving us with nothing to do on Saturday (May 12) except to continue north towards OKC for the end of the tour.  Tempest guide Jennifer Dunn gave us a tour of the NWS in Fort Worth (where she works) after our meal in downtown Fort Worth.  May 13th was an easy drive from Ardmore to OKC, with a stop at Norman to look at the radar domes.  That afternoon we performed the mundane routine of getting the vans cleaned and prepared for the next tour.

Ten-day Tour 3, with guides Bob Smith and Chris Gullikson, began on Monday, May 14.  The best air and severe storm chances were well to the southwest, near and south of I-10 in southwest TX.  This was too far to reach from OKC, so we headed west into the eastern TX Panhandle.  Despite north flow aloft and marginal moisture, a storm with some low-level organization was observed a little south of Shamrock.  This one didn’t last too long, but another one went up to its west, and actually moved or propagated to the west a little!  We stopped and watched it weaken.  it was better than a sharp stick in the eye, but not by much.  The new group was happy to see a few lightning bolts and to get the feel for a little chase.  We found a motel in Canyon (south of Amarillo) after doing a little sight-seeing in Palo Duro Canyon south of Claude.

The next few days on the Plains were characterized by pathetic moisture and weak flow, and we went into sight-seeing mode for the most part.  Tuesday, May 15, was sunny and dry in the Panhandles and for thousands of miles in all directions.  We went into Palo Duro Canyon for an hour or so.  The ground was still a bit muddy from the rainy Monday weather, so we hiked just a little bit and then went to the Big Texan in Amarillo for lunch.  I checked the group into a motel in town mid-afternoon and watched the Kings defeat Phoenix 4-0 in the breakfast room.  GREAT DAY!

On Wednesday (May 16) there would be some very high-based storms along the Front Range in Colorado.  This activity was not chaseworthy, and we scoffed at it.  We headed to Clayton, NM, for lunch, and then took an unpaved road from the Black Mesa area in extreme northeast NM through Sheep Pen Canyon to Kim, CO.  The scenery along this remote route is very nice, and we had the road to ourselves for about an hour!  From Kim we continued north to La Junta, and then to Limon.  Considerable cloudiness and virga were encountered upon reaching Lincoln County.  Limon was our home for the night.

Today, May 17, featured strong but dry southerly flow through the High Plains as upper-level energy moved through the Colorado Rockies.  We went up into the Genoa Tower to look at 6 states, and had lunch in Flagler.  High-based storms went up nearby along I-70, and we went east with them.  To make a long story short, we observed some mildly interesting high-based storms south, southeast, and east of Goodland from about Sharon Springs to Colby.  Lightning became somewhat frequent around Colby, but then the activity weakened.  We gave up east of Atwood, and headed northwest to Imperial.  A great double rainbow north of Atwood was a nice end to the chase, and the Kings victory was a great end to the day!

Images later.

By the way, we may get to chase in or around eastern NM/west TX on Sunday, where an annular eclipse will be in progress at sunset.  This could yield some fantastic photo ops!