Spring Season Recap

Due to school and other responsibilities, it has been a long time since I've last posted an entry.  However, due to a brief lull in school activity, I was finally able to compile the stats from my springtime chases.

Chases: 7 (1/20, 1/23, 3/27, 4/2, 4/24*, 5/1**, 5/19*)
Successful Chases: 4 (3/27, 4/24, 5/1, 5/19)
Busts: 3 [1/20 (class), 1/23, 4/2]
Storms Intercepted: 8
Tornadoes: 5 [Strongest: EF4 (4/24), Weakest: EF0 (5/1)]
Funnels:4
Wall Clouds:10
Strongest Winds Encountered: ~80 mph
States Chased In: LA, AR, MS, TX, OK

*denotes days where tornadoes were observed
**denotes multiple tornadoes observed

As the overall pattern begins to change, I plan on being back out in the field later this fall for secondary severe weather season.  Look for my stream on www.chasertv.com when that time comes.

-JP

Late Night Severe Weather

Last night, a band of thunderstorms associated with a meso-low located in the NW Gulf of Mexico made its presence known along the coast of South Louisiana. This along with a conducive thermodynamic environment (temps ~73, dewpoints ~70, CAPE ~1800, decent lapse rates, and an LCL ~600m) allowed these thunderstorm's to flourish even with the absence of diurnal heating. One particular cell embedded in this band went supercellular around 1:35am prompting a tornado warning from the NWS office in Lake Charles. This continued a trend that was set earlier in the day when a discrete supercell apparently produced a tornado (not confirmed) in the Slidell CWA. This warning was allowed to expire, as the coupling never really got it's act together. However, tree and powerline damage was reported about two miles south of Kaplan along Highway 35.

Another Successful Chase

I departed Monroe, LA with Cooper, Clay and Legendre at 9:00am for another high risk chase in Dixie Alley. On this day, we anticipated that there would be another substantial severe weather outbreak across eastern Arkansas for the second day in a row. Our reasoning was due to a strong, slow moving upper level through, models showing a secondary surface low developing, and a capping inversion in the morning sounding from LZK that would control convection and allow the atmosphere to clear and destabilize throughout the day. With all of this in mind, we decided to initially target Stuttgart, Arkansas.

On our way to Stuttgart, we core punched two strengthening thunderstorms that formed in the weakly capped environment of extreme southeast Arkansas. These cells eventually went severe and were warned on by the NWS in Little Rock. Torrential rainfall and brief gusty winds were encountered, but nothing severe during the time of core punching. Shortly thereafter, skies cleared and we began to notice extensive convection taking place and quickly subsiding due to the strong shear aloft and the cap that was present.

This would be the trend for much of the afternoon. After spending most of the afternoon in Stuttgart meeting Randy “The Outlaw” Hicks (Member of the Outlaw Chasers) and watching additional chasers converge on the town via spotternetwork, we decided to adjust our game plan and move west to the small town of Humnoke. There, we met John Sibely, Brett Adair and Brandon Thomas; chasers associated with Severe Studios and Chaser TV.

Finally, at 6:00pm, things began to pop around the Arkansas/Louisiana border. Six o’clock magic at its finest. After quickly forming a game plan, my team, and our new friends decided to form a convoy and charge south down State Highway 13 toward Pine Bluff, AR to intercept rapidly developing storms. We intercepted two brief torndaoes on I-530 right outside of Pine Bluff Arkanasas. Later on in the chase, we intercepted a third brief tornado as it crossed the road on our convoy. Finally, as night fell across Arkansas, we chased the storm that eventually dropped a tornado on the northside of Memphis capturing dramatic videos of lightning and a lightning illuminated wall cloud associated with the storm before giving up the chase around Marvell, AR.

In all, we observed 3 brief tornadoes, 5 wall clouds, and an additional 3 funnel clouds, thus making this an extremely successful chase on a day that was technically a “high risk bust”.

Bittersweet Day

Departed Monroe, LA with Cooper at 9:30pm Friday to set up for what we anticipated was going to be a big day for supercells and tornadoes across northern Mississippi. We staged in Greenville, MS on Friday night and departed for our first high risk chase at 6am. At this particular time, convection was already occurring across northern LA into southeast AR but we decided to head east toward I-55 instead. At this point, storm initiation was occurring well the south of our location around the southeast LA/MS border and to our west along the I-20 corridor in LA. Taking this into consideration, we decided to drive south on I-55 toward Yazoo City where we staged and rested for a while.

After taking a look at the morning sounding from the NWS in Jackson, the latest RUC, and surface and upper air charts, we decided that it was best to reposition further north, therefore we began moving north on Hwy 49W toward Belzoni, a town with major road options in all directions. However, around 10:30AM, Cooper and I observed a pair of storms in Northeastern LA that we felt had potential to go severe. Therefore we decided to turn around and head south on 49W, before cutting across State Hwy 149 and 14 to get to US 61 in the town of Anguilla.

Around this time, the southernmost cell became supercellular and was warned on by the NWS in Jackson. We flew south on 61 in an attempt to get south of it, and managed to get to the town of Valley Park about 10 minutes before the tornado was forecasted to hit. Around this time, we experienced a complete failure of radar on the computer and I-Phone (GR Level 3 & Radarscope). After several intense minutes of contemplation, I decided to call several people for nowcasting. I was fortunate to get in touch with Christopher Barber, a fellow NELA Skywarn storm spotter. Using some exceptional nowcasting by him, as well as my own visual skill, Cooper and I managed to get about a mile south of the tornado’s path just as it approached the highway.

Around the same time we set up to observe the tornado, another chaser, Andy Pettis parked behind us and informed us that there was damage done in Eagle Bend, MS. Using the brief window of time we had before we were slammed by RFD, I managed to identify the tornado and captured several pictures of it crossing US-61. Afterward, I followed Eddie to the Eagle Bend community to assist with search and rescue efforts and to conduct damage surveys. This is how the rest of the day would be spent across northwest Mississippi.

Special thanks goes out to Christopher Barber for his excellent nowcasting while we were under the gun, Dylan Cooper for a good job navigating and nowcasting, and Don Wheeler for teaching me a lot of what I know about storm chasing. It took me roughly 13 months for me to catch my first tornado. I never thought it would be a historic EF-4 long track tornado on a high risk day in Mississippi. This tornado stayed on the ground for almost three hours and a total of 149.26 miles and was one of two EF-4 tornadoes on this day. There were total of 56 tornadoes across Dixie Alley on that day. Sadly, 12 lives were claimed by this powerful force of nature.

Long track supercell and tornado crossing US-61.

Going Mobile Today & Saturday

A significant weather situation is shaping up for today and tomorrow across the region. I will be mobile in the field this afternoon and early Saturday morning through the evening. Track me on the spotter network map located at the bottom of the home page. Also, tune into the live chasecam next to the spotter network map. As things begin to initiate, I will begin streaming video to the internet. You can also access streaming through my qik site at http://qik.com/kf5cnt and spotter network at http://www.spotternetwork.org/google.php.

Possible Chase(s) This Weekend

I am currently monitoring the progress of our next major weather maker. I will begin to assess and compare model runs tomorrow to begin making forecasts for a possible 2 day (Friday, Saturday) event across East Texas and Dixie Alley this weekend.

Here was the outlook discussion from the SPC this morning:

DAY 4-8 CONVECTIVE OUTLOOK CORR 1
NWS STORM PREDICTION CENTER NORMAN OK
0953 AM CDT TUE APR 20 2010

VALID 231200Z - 281200Z

CORRECTED FOR DATE ERROR

...DISCUSSION...
A LARGE UPPER STORM SYSTEM WILL CONTINUE MOVING SLOWLY EWD
INTO/ACROSS THE CENTRAL U.S. DURING THE FIRST TWO DAYS OF THE
PERIOD...AFTER WHICH THE SYSTEM IS EXPECTED TO BEGIN
WEAKENING/SHIFTING MORE NEWD TOWARD THE MIDWEST.  MODELS BEGIN TO
DIVERGE FAIRLY SUBSTANTIALLY DAY 6 AND BEYOND...BUT AGREEMENT IS
SUFFICIENT DAYS 4-5 /FRI. AND SAT. APR. 23-24/ TO BOOST CONFIDENCE
WITH RESPECT TO THE EVOLUTION OF SEVERE POTENTIAL.

IT APPEARS ATTM THAT A WIDESPREAD AREA OF FAIRLY SUBSTANTIAL SEVERE
THREAT WILL EXIST DAY 4 /FRI THE 23RD/...WITH THE GREATEST THREAT
APPARENT ATTM FROM SERN KS/SWRN MO SSWWD INTO SERN TX.  HERE...A
MOIST/UNSTABLE PRE-FRONTAL AIRMASS IS EXPECTED...AND WITH FAVORABLE
SHEAR -- INCLUDING MID-LEVEL FLOW IN EXCESS OF 50 KT -- ATOP THE
FRONTAL ZONE...THE OVERALL ENVIRONMENT APPEARS FAVORABLE FOR AN
ACTIVE SEVERE WEATHER EVENT.

ENHANCED SEVERE POTENTIAL SHOULD SPREAD EWD INTO THE MS VALLEY
REGION DAY 5 /SAT. THE 24TH/...WITH A SIMILARLY FAVORABLE KINEMATIC
AND THERMODYNAMIC ENVIRONMENT LIKELY NEAR/AHEAD OF THE ADVANCING
FRONT.  BOTH DAYS...LARGE HAIL AND DAMAGING WINDS WILL BE
POSSIBLE...WHILE THE MOIST BOUNDARY LAYER AND FAVORABLY-STRONG SHEAR
ARE ALSO INDICATIVE OF TORNADO POTENTIAL.

April 2, 2010 Bust

Departed Monroe, LA around 1:30pm with Wheeler and Ostarly, and met up with Cooper in SHV. After staging, we made our initial target area Longview, TX. On this day, we hoped to be in position to intercept severe thunderstorms before they went linear ahead of the cold front. However, stratus clouds plagued northeast Texas throughout the morning hours ahead of ongoing convection from the night before.

As we departed SHV, I observed a clearing in the low level clouds over our target area. As expected, temperatures increased rapidly and approached 80 degrees before a cluster of thunderstorms developed. These cells raced off to the northeast at 45mph making it impossible for us to get in position to intercept them. However, these cells never went severe and no reports were made by the plethora of chasers located along the I-30 corridor. This would turn out to be the only play of the day as stratus began to dominate the area once again effectively ending our chase as a BUST; the 2nd of the year for me (Jan 23 the other bust day).

The limiting factors on this particular day were the ongoing convection across North Central Texas, lingering stratus clouds that suppressed diurnal heating, strong meridional flow aloft, veering surface winds, the location of the main surface low (SE North Dakota), a weak secondary surface low (south central OK), and high LCL's (1700-1800m) further eastward into Louisiana. LCL height's of >1000m is considered ideal for tornadogenesis.

-JP

March 27, 2010 LP Supercell's

A year ago to this day, I went on my first storm chase with Don Wheeler and Dr. Bon Mills in northeast Texas. While that day looked promising initially, it turned out to be a bust. A year later, March 27 once again shaped up to be a potentially good day for severe storms including isolated supercells across central Arkansas. This would give me an opportunity to see how much I’ve learned over the past year.

I departed Monroe, LA around 12:30 PM for my initial target spot in Pine Bluff, Arkansas. On this particular day, I anticipated that there would be isolated severe thunderstorms forming around central Arkansas later in the afternoon. These cells were elevated and of the low precipitation variety due to surface dewpoints only reaching the upper 40’s in central Arkansas. The primary severe threat for these cells would be hail due to the cold pocket of air aloft that helped the atmosphere to destabilize. This threat would eventually shift to damaging winds as these cells congealed into a squall line as the evening progressed.

After staging in Pine Bluff, I decided to shift my target area northward toward Little Rock, as convection was ongoing at this time in northwest Arkansas along and north of the I-40 corridor. As I arrived in Little Rock, these cells began to go severe. After assessing the situation, I decided to move west on I-40 toward these storms.

As I moved west, I targeted several developing cells south of I-40 with potential to go severe moving northeast toward Conway County at 40 mph. I positioned myself just outside of the town of Menifee to intercept the southernmost of 2 LP supercells. These cells merged just to the north of my location and became prolific hail producers. I intercepted the southern edge of the storm and experienced pea sized hail, rain and several positive CG lightning strikes.

I then decided to charge east on I-40 as I targeted another LP supercell that formed southwest of my location in Garland County. This cell also moved northeast at 40 mph. I managed to outrun the core of the storm before pulling over on the Interstate to document it crossing the road in the town of Mayflower. I was treated with a nice sunset in the process.

Once the sun set, I decided to drive east into the delta area to get ahead of these storms as they began to go linear. I managed to do so before driving south on Hwy 63. I intercepted the squall line about 4 miles outside of Stuttgart, AR just as it began to bow out. I experienced severe straight line winds in excess of 60+ mph. However, I did not witness any damage around my intercept location. Once the line passed through, I enjoyed some of the anvil lightning before heading back to Monroe.

-JP

December 24, 2009 SW Louisiana Tornado Outbreak

I departed New Iberia, LA around 4:30 AM for my initial target spot at Iowa, LA targeting the leading edge of a rapidly developing squall line that was located just to the west of the Texas/Louisiana border. I anticipated discrete low topped HP supercells with the potential to produce tornadoes along the I-10 corridor as the line moved east.

After a short time accessing the developing situation in Iowa, I decided to take Hwy 165 NE to Kinder where I got on Hwy 190 to go back east. At 7 AM, things began to take shape with three HP supercells developing ahead of the main squall line; one to the northeast of Eunice and two south of I-10 between the towns of Welsh and Crowley. Being out of position for the cell northeast of Eunice, I targeted the cell south of Crowley.

Around this time, I went through multiple data gaps, which caused me to adjust my strategy and move north toward Ville Platte in order to reposition myself about three miles northeast of Ville Platte to allow the storm to come to me rather than going south after it. At approximately 8:22 AM the NWS (LCH) issued a tornado warning right on top of my location.

A few minutes later, the heavy precipitation associated with the core of the cell decreased; and, I spotted the rotating wall cloud associated with the storm. I quickly chased the wall cloud northeast and watched as it became rain wrapped once again. Shortly after, I experienced strong RFD winds about nine miles Southwest of Bunkie.

I then traveled south on Hwy 71 dissecting the squall line before moving east again on Hwy 190 to get ahead of the it for another chance at intercepting any discrete cells; but, mother nature failed to produce any. My chase ended shortly after noon as I intercepted the squall line in the parking lot of a gas station in Hammond, LA.

In all, there were 12 confirmed tornadoes across southwest Louisiana, including three EF2’s, thus making this event the largest tornado outbreak since May 15, 2008. There were numerous reports of damage across the region and only four injuries. Sadly, there was one fatality in Scott, LA due to a tree falling onto a house. Special thanks to Don Wheeler (LA Delta CC) for his excellent nowcasting during my periods of data gaps and to Matt Clay (NWS SCEP) for handling my reports. This helped make my first planned chase on my own a success.

My location relative to the area of interest on radar at the time of the wall cloud sighting. Photo courtesy of Don Wheeler (LDCC).

-JP