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June 22nd 2015. Edgington, Illinois Tornado……..
It was a Wed morning SPC Day 1 Outlook was enhanced risk for Southern Wisconsin Northern Illinois, Drake L and Mike E left northern Indiana around 7a.m. heading northwest too northern Illinois, our target was the Illinois/Wisconsin state line near Rockford Illinois. Once we made it to I-39 heading northbound around noon to our surprise we ran into a wicked looking roll cloud pushing southeast that setup a coldpool for our original target area, As we made it too the town Rochelle that was hit with a ef4 tornado in april we drove thru too see damage path from months earlier thinking the day was set too be a bust, finally storms started to fire way west in Iowa near Des Moines, so we decided to drop back south and head west into iowa to take a chance and play eastern Iowa near Davenport, Mike was wanting to push more west after cells that was tornado warned still a few hrs away, I was watching a cell developing near iowa city, and decided to go after that one that was not any warning with, when we finally made it too the storm it had a nice inflow notch going into it and started to see a bit of rotation, shes was really looking good so we stayed with it, as it crossed the Mississippi river into Illinois near Edgington, A large wedge appeared out of the heavy rain it was 400yrds wide winds 120mph and on the ground for 4.2 miles. We were on the perfect east road right next too this beauty driving next to a tornado half a mile away and rode with it till it lifted back in the sky. it was 1 of many tornadoes that produced that day in liinois and was the 2nd biggest of the day on a outbreak in Illinois. This was my favorite tornado of the 2015 season
3rd June 2014 was certainly an interesting day for my chase career, I was on my 3rd month in the states after coming over from the UK. 3 days prior to the 3rd I was examining forecast models as I do and could see the likelihood of a breakout in Nebraska on the forecast runs for the next couple of days. This was something I didn’t want to miss but funds were so low and would have been a slightly long drive from where I was staying in Kansas. The only thing I could think of is asking around for someone to sponsor the chase, the first two days I had no luck. Over the next two days I could see the models developing and coming to agreement for a pretty big chase day although storm movement was fast, this don’t not put me off. It was now the 11th and models looked crazy, but still no funds allowed for us to chase. Made one last request for help and bang we had a kind follower offered $200 for fuel, we took this opportunity and went for it. We left right away and straight on the road to Lincoln, NE.
Just after we crossed the border from Kansas, we could see towers blowing up in front of us along the dry line. We could see the potential of being a severe weather day. We could see line that already developed N/E of us but decided it would dissipate too soon as it was moving on. We decided to dash N/W instead of a cell that was starting to fire up which would later evolve into a howling beast.
After hitting through Lincoln, we then passed onto Sutton where we caught onto this supercell. The road networks would not allow us to get round this monster. So we hung back waiting to get round, after sitting round well ahead we could see everything spinning, even some miles every little bit of cloud was spinning. This was a mean monster that was moving so fast at around 50mph at the time. It was moving fast, so meant we had to keep moving non-stop. We managed to get north of it and then get back south to run alongside it, to its south. We could see the huge shelf cloud on the beast, we could even see constant Gustnadoes, and strong updrafts kicking up dust. We could even see other storm chasers coming away from it with hail damage, with some dents the size of a grown mans fist. I then decided to take another look at radar and work out my play, I could see another cell picking up behind it with a strong updraft. I decided to go for this as the current one was moving so fast we couldn’t catch up. We then waited for the next one, which soon caught up. We could see it coming in the distance and damn was it moving fast at 65mph. It was kicking up so much dust and dirt on the rear flank and could see a huge hail core, not something we wanted to get into. It was certainly a photogenic storm, it constantly kept trying to throw down a funnel but I don’t think it was even capable with its such fast motion as its feed was most likely cut off every time. Radar was picking up baseball sized hail, we knew it was a strong one. We then decided to shoot south away from it as we could see the storm direction was starting to shift, at this point we could see the RFD which was huge and the shelf cloud was just amazing. As we were shooting south on the Interstate we could see it picking up to about 70mph, this was one incredibly fast storm. It was even getting late around 6:30pm .We decided to call it a day as it was to fast to chase but at this point it was chasing us. We had no other options to take so had to keep sticking south on the interstate. We saw constant tornado warning and large hail reports, so we knew we didn’t want to get caught by it. At one point we had to shoot through the RFD, debris was hurling passed in front of us, just glad we made it through. So back to the getaway, we were onto about 8:30 pm still getting chased by this beast. It was like a race to get away before being caught by the bears cage. We then got reports over the radio of quick touch downs and severe hail damage, which sounded pretty significant. At about 9pm we then managed to get onto a N/E option to get back home, after being chased so long, It was nice to have the relief of getting out of the war path. Although we never got a tornado that day, it was a big learning curve as although we are the chasers we can still be the chased and on this day we certainly were. Back home safe at midnight we reflected on our day and how lucky we were not to be sucked up by this fast moving monster of Mother Nature. Written By Lee
The words “oh my lord we're all gonna die” rang in my ears as lee, our navigator suddenly realised that after a long delay in refreshing the radar, the mesocyclone was right above our heads. Hail had started to fall and dent our rental car and we had over 2000 views on our live stream as we frantically tried to get out of trouble. It had been a day of frustration as we had missed most of the decent storms and the meso we were under eventually weakened. We saw some storms near Tuscaloosa and headed that way when I suddenly smelled that pine smell I had always heard chasers talk about after a tornado. It was then came across a chilling site of carnage on the road. Trucks tossed like toys and bits of trees and wood everywhere. It was the aftermath of the mayflower tornado and emergency crews were on scene offering assistance to those who were still shell shocked from their encounter. After a fantastic lightning show in Tuscaloosa the sirens went off and as night had well and truly arrived, decided to rest for the night and headed to the comfort inn and suites in Montgomery Alabama. While the guys settled down for the night, I decided to keep an eye on the radar as we were in a tornado watch area and didn't want to be caught unawares! Well at around 1:20am the storms looks to miss us so I turned off the laptop and went to bed. Suddenly I snapped awake, the tornado sirens were going off outside the hotel and as much as I'd head them on youtube and TV, this was a totally different experience. The guys woke up and lee went to the laptop to look at the models. “WHY HAVE U TURNED IT OFF?!” He shouted in a slightly panicked tone. “Sorry I always turn things off” I replied. After looking at the models it looked bad as there were multiple cells with tornado warnings on them. So still in our PJs we went downstairs to look outside as the hotel had no shelter. I stood there laptop in hand with my knees knocking uncontrollably, after all it was my first encounter with a tornado heading to me! In the end there was no choice we decided to grab our stuff and drive out of danger. So we ran to the car and with radar information, drove away from the storms. After they passed we returned to find the hotel had been missed and it came within a mile of us. It was the most scary but best experience of my life, which at one point made me want to leave and go home. But in hindsight I would definitely go through it again and have a real respect for those who live in the areas effected by storms every year cause that night I felt what you must go through every time you hear a siren. Samantha block
