It Tried to Be a Supercell
Southeast Nebraska, 21 Mar 7
After a library data check and hearty Swedish dinner in Lindsborg KS, Elke and I cruised N on US 81 into NE, noticing some hints of deep convective development through the low-contrast murk. Thick high clouds that I didn’t recall noticing on visible imagery had overspread the immediate area and made viewing of the frontal zone region difficult from the S.
As we approached US 136 (SW of Hallam), we became certain that, indeed, storms were firing along the front to our N and NE. Tail-end Charlie looked rather soft, but had a pronounced backshear and intermittent overshoots. A line of somewhat stratified low clouds, later interspersed with growing convective towers, extended SW of the storm of interest.
Some zigzag maneuvering found us N of Clatonia, watching Tail-end Charlie, with a SEward extending short tail cloud and its weak attempts at wall clouds and clear slots (here’s a shot made with a zoom lens, looking NE and then wide angle in twilight). The storm moved N then NE of us in the twilight. It had a commendably large base and some visual evidence of rotation, but appeared to be battling against the process of undercutting on the part of the cold front. This storm did go on to yield estimates of 1.25-1.75 inch hail in Lancaster County soon after it left us.
With the vigorous backbuilding of deep towers going on to its SW, and light fading fast, we headed for our overnight lodging in HSI. We did stop once along the way to watch the distant in-cloud light show strobing through the now solid-looking squall line, with a new Tail-end Charlie somewhere to our S near the KS border.
Every storm observing trip worth its time has some sort of unique adventure or misadventure, and this was no exception. While letting the storm go, we turned on weather radio out of LNK and heard…
Old “Mr. Roboto” droning on and on about the dangers of inland flooding from tropical cyclones!
That foolishness went on for several minutes before the warnings for our storm and one other were repeated, followed by repeated discussion of tropical cyclone flooding and then some discourse about ice jams (?!?!?), followed in turn by the severe weather statement.
Why that misplaced mountain of verbiage was playing during a severe weather episode, in between warnings, is beyond me. It provided some bewildered amusement, but I hope that doesn’t happen when an even more life-threatening storm situation is present in the area.
One thing that was impressive: Listening on the 2 m frequencies, it was obvious that the spotter net of Lancaster County was well organized, with net control keeping careful track of the mileage and positioning of all spotters in what obviously was a true network, in the literal and idealistic sense. It’s a low-tech bit of sensible ingenuity that foretells the eventual use there (and hopefully, everywhere in the US) of the “Spotter Network” spotter and chaser tracking service, to perform a more systematic and nationally consistent networking of storm observers akin in principle to what Lancaster County is doing locally. Once I decide to spend the money on some kind of mobile Internet connectivity, I plan to sign up.