Unremarkable Colorado Storms
Northern CO
6 Jun 12
SHORT: Intercepted initially interesting but mostly nondescript convective junk in NE CO.
LONG: The decent storm potential in central and northern Montana had been too far away to reach on previous days without insane, all-night driving marathons. Furthermore, on the 4th, Elke and I had to replace a nearly-blown tire on our vehicle in Ogallala anyway, removing all temptation to bolt 600 miles NW and back again in three days. That turned out to be a blessing in disguise, for we found a cabin by the shores of Lake McConaughy in western Nebraska, and spontaneously reserved two nights there–relaxing, exploring the scenic, the powerful and the peculiar, and spending much-appreciated time together with moments like this–all while awaiting the chase potential forecast to be nearby on the 6th and 7th. We had been wanting to make more than passing time at the major High Plains reservoir for years, and finally did! It was well worthwhile. I’ll vouch for the good food at the Hill Top Inn, above the Dam. I also will vouch that if you swim in “Big Mac” in early June, as I did, the water’s still rather cold.
The 6th came, dawning brightly in the southern Sandhills, and we aimed our grille SW toward NE Colorado. A well-defined low was set up in the DEN area, with a convergence line arching N and NE toward the Pawnee National Grasslands. My forecast was for weak deep-layer shear during midday, improving through the afternoon, and marginal moisture. [Questionable moisture would be a meteorological problem that we would wrestle through virtually the entire vacation.] It looked like a decent setup for nonsupercell “landspout” action early in the convective cycle, then maybe a supercell by evening.
We timed it great for any early spout action–except there was none. We targeted the boundary between Wiggins and New Raymer, and got right under and next to the very first deep tower, following it NNE as it evolved into a Cb. The base seemed rather high and small even for a “Colorado landspout” day. It just couldn’t produce a tube before merging into a growing, semi-contiguous line of cells that evolved along the boundary. Only one of them showed any promising hints of possible supercell evolution before it, too, got gummed up with precip and outflow. The whole convective plume got very mushy and nondescript from every vantage we had. This was one of the very few chase days when I only shot a couple of photos, total, and that may have been two too many.
Seldom has a Colorado chase day with any storms at all yielded so little. Why do you think I offered you several photos from the lake? 🙂
Though a supercell later would form down there (shortly before dusk), nothing of note had evolved yet to our distant SSW, near the Palmer Ridge, by the time we decided to head N toward the next day’s play in the SE WY/SW NEb Panhandle area. Eating dinner at the Pine Bluffs Subway, we saw the Palmer Ridge supercell get cranking on radar, by now too distant to catch. One storm in the northern part of the line did move past our location with some marginal hail and nondescript structure, prompting a vanload of British-sounding tourists in the parking lot to snap photos in every direction.
We finished our sandwich dinner, then headed to an old motel on the edge of Kimball, at which we stayed before. Less than an hour after we checked in, the power went out to the whole town, and stayed out until sometime well past midnight. For a short while, in-cloud lightning flickered from two storm clusters to the N and W–including one MCS that dumped heavy rain on CYS. Hoping for some lightning shots to save the day, those didn’t even materialize–lots of low scud and precip precluded any photogenic lightning action. So we just went to bed, fairly early for us. At least we didn’t travel terribly far and did get a good night’s sleep!
The next day would prove to be far more adventuresome, in both frustrating and elating ways…
Early Father’s Day Gift…of Storms
May, OK
3 Jun 12
SHORT: Intercepted splitting, intermittently severe thunderstorms in NW OK.
LONG: This would be the inaugural day of Elke’s and my annual Great Plains vacation together, and as always, one brimming with hope and anticipation for two weeks of adventures across whatever lands the atmosphere lured us. The medium-range pattern suggested (ultimately correctly) that we would be spending a good deal of time in the Dakotas, Wyoming and western Nebraska. Until then, and along the way there, we had this risk for high-based but potentially severe and photogenic storms in northwest OK and southwest KS.
Overnight MCS action had left a morning outflow boundary from southwest AR through OKC to the northeastern TX Panhandle. A departing MCV aloft, followed in close order by a weak 500-mb shortwave trough, would yield only subtle shifts in the muddled large-scale support for convection over the area near the dryline-outflow intersection. Deep-layer flow was modest; so some storm-scale help would be needed to even get sustained rotation. Nonetheless, it was a chance for a scenic storm along the way to future days’ chase chances, and in the company of friends.
David Fogel’s dad Bob happened to be in OKC for a wedding the prior day, and joined him, Keith Brown and the two big dawgs for the afternoon to see firsthand this long-described phenomenon of storm observing on the Great Plains. It was a great pleasure to meet Bob at long last, and to share a chase day with him. We all headed out of OKC and up the Northwest Passage, stopping for automotive, human and canine fuel in Woodward as towers erupted to the NW. We intercepted what became the most interesting and persistent area of convection near May, a little bitty splitting updraft pumping out a great big anvil.
It was a rather easygoing and relaxing scene–a good one for Bob and DF to savor before they had to return to OKC for Bob’s flight the following morning. The dawgs seemed more interested in relaxing than in the storm, but they were well-behaved and apparently didn’t fart too much.
As for the storm, it drifted S, then split some, then propagated back NW, expanded, and dissipated, as we maneuvered around the May/Buffalo/Laverne area. When it became obvious the convection was falling apart, we bid farewell to the Fogel men, Fogel dawgs and Keith, and headed toward DDC to spend the night. Along the way, we found a line of utility poles apparently tilted by severe winds at some recent time, with replacements already in the ground.
Dinner and lodging (and even the faucet water) were lousy; so we made haste out of Dodge the next morning on the road northward to what proved to be a very enjoyable two-week sojourn over the blue highways of Middle America.