April 9th, 2012 Chase Log

Ah, the red rock adventure.  Seeing that today was offering a good day to see some tornadoes in the panhandle, I departed Bartlesville, OK with a target of Enid.  Heading on 60 across the north central part of the state, a torando watch was posted just after 2 pm and I couldn't be happier:

 MESOSCALE DISCUSSION 0478
   NWS STORM PREDICTION CENTER NORMAN OK
   0154 PM CDT MON APR 09 2012
  
   AREAS AFFECTED...ERN PORTIONS OF THE TX/OK PANHANDLES/SWRN KS/WRN OK
  
   CONCERNING...SEVERE POTENTIAL...TORNADO WATCH LIKELY
  
   VALID 091854Z - 092030Z
  
   SLOWLY INCREASING SEVERE/TORNADO POTENTIAL ACROSS THE DISCUSSION
   AREA WILL LIKELY WARRANT TORNADO WATCH ISSUANCE IN THE NEXT HOUR OR
   SO.
  
   VISIBLE IMAGERY SHOWS CLEARING ACROSS THE ERN TX/OK PANHANDLES AND
   INTO WRN OK...WHILE A MID CLOUD DECK CONTINUES EXPANDING FARTHER TO
   THE W ACROSS THE TX PANHANDLE.  AS A RESULT...APPRECIABLE HEATING
   CONTINUES...WITH OBJECTIVE ANALYSES NOW INDICATING ROUGHLY 1500 J/KG
   MIXED-LAYER CAPE OVER THE ERN PANHANDLES AND ADJACENT WRN OK/SWRN KS
   E OF THE MOISTURE GRADIENT/WEAK DRYLINE. 

By 2:30pm CST, the watch was released.

TORNADO WATCH NUMBER 151
   NWS STORM PREDICTION CENTER NORMAN OK
   230 PM CDT MON APR 9 2012
  
   THE NWS STORM PREDICTION CENTER HAS ISSUED A
   TORNADO WATCH FOR PORTIONS OF
  
          SOUTH CENTRAL KANSAS
          NORTHWEST OKLAHOMA
  
   EFFECTIVE THIS MONDAY AFTERNOON AND EVENING FROM 230 PM UNTIL 900
   PM CDT.
  
   TORNADOES...HAIL TO 2.5 INCHES IN DIAMETER...THUNDERSTORM WIND
   GUSTS TO 70 MPH...AND DANGEROUS LIGHTNING ARE POSSIBLE IN THESE
   AREAS.
  
   THE TORNADO WATCH AREA IS APPROXIMATELY ALONG AND 50 STATUTE
   MILES EAST AND WEST OF A LINE FROM 30 MILES WEST NORTHWEST OF
   MEDICINE LODGE KANSAS TO 55 MILES SOUTHEAST OF GAGE OKLAHOMA.
   FOR A COMPLETE DEPICTION OF THE WATCH SEE THE ASSOCIATED WATCH
   OUTLINE UPDATE (WOUS64 KWNS WOU1).
  
   DISCUSSION...ISOLATED THUNDERSTORMS ARE EXPECTED TO FORM IN THE NEXT
   1-2 HOURS OVER EXTREME SOUTHERN KS AND NORTHWEST OK...NEAR WEAK
   SURFACE BOUNDARY.  MODERATE INSTABILITY AND BACKED LOW LEVEL WINDS
   IN VICINITY OF BOUNDARY WILL PROMOTE SUPERCELL STRUCTURES CAPABLE OF
   VERY LARGE HAIL...DAMAGING WINDS...AND A FEW TORNADOES.  THREAT
   SHOULD PERSIST FOR A FEW HOURS BEFORE CONVECTIVE MODE TRANSITIONS
   INTO MORE OF A HAIL/WIND THREAT.

So it was off leaving cloudy skies behind as the open road gave to sunshine and a mixture of Cumulus clouds on the way out to the panhandle.

By 4:30 pm arriving in Enid, I pulled down the latest weather discussion and reviewed the latest satellite images.  Even in Enid, I believed that I was still too far east to intercept during the daytime hours, so I departed northward heading towards the Woodward, OK area.  The clouds were beginning to overcast the sky leaving me to wonder if anything was possible.

So it was off leaving cloudy skies behind as the open road gave to sunshine and a mixture of Cumulus clouds on the way out to the panhandle.  But things changed quickly just after dinnertime as I pulled down the latest radar image from the Storm Prediction Center.

By 7 pm I finally arrived north of Woodward where a cell was already tornado warned.  I found that I had arrvied a little took late taking on the storm from the northeast where my view was obscured by rain.  I continued driving southward as fast as I could but the rain continued to make seeing difficult.

Once the rain let up, I caught the view below looking up at the perfectly structured HP Supercell. The striations or mid level bands, were beautiful. 

Although I watched the cell intently looking for indiction of the torando, it just wasn't gonna happened as these cells were on a southeast direction.  I tried to make up time, but was slowed down considerably by quarter size hail.  To my south near Sharon, the tornado continued to churn out what I later saw as spectacular tornadoes.  I felt like charlie brown on halloween night..chasers in position was given a beautiful tornado and I ended up with rocks from the sky! 

Giving up on the storms noting the time and the long drive ahead of me, I decided to call off the chase and head back on my 4 hour drive to home.  I was given quite a nice sunset through the broken rain.

Well, total round trip was over 460 miles to chase a cell that was tornado warned.  I miscalculated my position and time of arrival that cost me seeing the tornado. It would be a mistake I would not do again if I chased this far west in the future.  (See the specutacular result 5 days later on April 14th Chase!)