June 9 and June 10 (cap bust and Denver drop-off)

NE 2

The Tempest group hanging out in Jay Em

June 9:  We began the day in Thedford, NE, and Bill did not seem too gung-ho about today's prospects.  That being said, we west on NE 2 into Mullen, NE, where we had brunch at Red's Cafe.  This was another example of a place that is clearly not equipped to deal with a large group, but I would certainly give it another chance if I found myself travelling through the town.  We continued west into Alliance, NE, where we had a pit stop.  During the pit stop, a handful of us took the van to a Napa store and found something to try and fix the AC.  Sadly, the repair did not work, so we knew the AC was officially shot.  After the pit stop, we continued on NE 2 into Hemingford, NE, where we found an old house to take our group picture.  The models at this point were still wishy-washy with storm development, and the general trend was going down.  Out of Hemingford, we took NE 71 west to Cut Across Road.  This brought us to NE 29, where we headed north into Harrison, NE.  From Harrison, we drove west on US 20 into Lusk, WY.  After a pit stop, we drove south on US 85 to the town of Jay Em, WY.  We poked around town for a while as we were waiting for something to happen with the weather.  The atmospheric cap seemed to be getting stronger as the afternoon wore on, and our hopes for storms were dwindling.  We continued south into Torrington, WY, where we had another pit stop.  From Torrington, we continued south on US 85 until we reached WY 313.  This road lead us into Chugwater, where we stopped for a final time.  At this point, Bill unsheathed the big silver fork and called it a day.  As he was calling around for rooms, some of us came across the Homesteaders Machinery Museum, which was free admission.  There were lots of old pieces of machinery, and it was neat seeing these parts of history on display.  He found rooms for us in Cheyenne, and we had our first real dinner of the trip.  It was nice being able to eat with real plates and silverware!  Our total mileage for the day was around 400 miles.

Blue sky bust

June 10:  After meeting in the lobby to get everyone rounded up, Bill treated everyone to a nice breakfast at The Egg & I.  He felt bad that the van's AC was not working, and the breakfast was delicious.  After breakfast, we drove south to our base hotel in Denver and dropped of the guests.  It was bittersweet saying goodbye to them, because they were a fantastic group.  We shared lots of laughs, storms, and bad jokes!  Our mileage for today was 104 miles.

June 8 Supercell near Wanblee and Norris, SD

We woke up this morning knowing that today was going to be our best chance to see a tornado.  The SPC had an enhanced risk not too far from where we were, and the conditions were going to be wonderful to see a tornado or two.  My night was very short as I had a bout of food poisoning from my "dinner" the night before.  Word to the wise:  Don't eat a chicken Caesar wrap at 11 p.m from a convenience store!!!  Anyway, we were on the road by 11:00 the next morning and headed south on US 85 into Rapid City, SD.  Along the way, we stopped in Sturgis to check out the town.  We had a quick fast food lunch in Rapid City and found a truck stop to make some

minor repairs to the damaged van.  At this time, a nice supercell was churning over the Black Hills near Sturgis, and chasers were quickly converging on the storm.  While it looked nice, Bill preferred to not chase in the hills, and I don't blame him.  We did not want to get caught in the chaser circus, and the area further to our southeast looked better.

After attempting to plug the leaks in the radiator with some fluid, we headed east on I-90 into Kadoka, SD, where the good parameters (and improving with each update) were for seeing supercells and tornadoes.  We dropped south on SD 73, and by the time we made it to our east option of SD 44, we were treated to a gorgeous supercell with a huge wall cloud to our west.  This was located east of Wanblee, SD, in case you are interested :)  We found a spot a couple miles to the west of SD 73 to watch the storm.  Outflow ruined our fun, for now, as the wall cloud dissipated while we were photographing the monster.  This was caused by the other cells in the area merging together, which resulted in a big HP beast of a storm.  Bill was not too hopeful of tornado prospects at the moment, even though the "super storm" was in very good air.  We decided to get a bit further east on SD 44 to stay ahead of the storm.  It is a good thing we did, because the storm began to reorganize, and there was some dust getting picked up under the base.  According to Bill's account, "This was looking a lot more like RFD wind, and perhaps a lurch towards tornado development, rather than cool outflow and undercutting."  We got about halfway between SD 73 and SD 63, where we found a spot to pull over and watch this storm.  By now, the storm had a rapidly spinning wall cloud underneath it, and it looked like the whole storm was rotating very hard!!!.  Tornado development seemed imminent, and it was very similar to how the El Reno tornado developed in May 2013.  We were very excited for what *could* happen, especially with how high the shear values were in the storm (148 knots.)  Values this high usually result in tornadoes, and Bill felt that it would have dropped a very large and violent tornado if this all transpired.  We began to feel cool air coming from the direction of the storm.  This is a chaser's worst nightmare when it comes to a potentially tornadic storm, because cool air means instant storm death.

The storm began to make a turn to the southeast, and we took our south option on SD 63.  By this time, the storm was pouring rain and throwing lightning bolts left and right.  Because of the high amount of precipitation, we could not make out anything in the RFD notch.  Bill believes something was in there, but it was too hard to tell due to the torrential rain.  We stopped about halfway to Norris, SD and stared at the storm.  There was something "interesting" happening a few miles to our west, and there was a tight couplet on the Rapid City radar.  Was there a significant tornado in that mess?  We will probably never be certain, but odds are, there was.  After a few minutes of watching, we noticed rain curtains beginning to rapidly rotate around the storm.  We needed to get out of there now!!!!  We were in the "bear's cage" which is where tornadoes love to develop.  In this case, it would have developed right on top of us if we didn't get ourselves out of harm's way.  It was a fun experience to drive the van while getting pounded with the wet RFD.  We managed to escape without any harm, and we also got to experience atomized rain.  This type of rain is generally seen in tornadic storms, so it was a welcome sign.  We made it to Norris and headed a couple miles east to watch our storm.  It looked a bit more unorganized, but it sure gave us a good run!

From Norris, it grew weaker and more outflowish, and it chased us into Parmelee, SD.  We headed east out of Parmelee on US 18 and headed into Mission, SD for a brief pit stop.  The locals were all amazed by the impending storm, but I think they were also a bit scared to see a group of storm chasers pulling in.  At this point, the storm was all outflow, and we needed to blast south on US 83 to stay out of the rain.  Along the way, we made a couple of stops to watch the storm, and we drove into Valentine, NE for dinner.  Our dinner was cut short because the storm was moving faster than we anticipated, so many of us did not get anything.  Such is the life of a chaser!  We found ourselves in Thedford, NE for the night after driving 372 miles.

June 7 Ekalaka, MT supercell

We began today in Gillette, WY, and there were a couple of options for us to choose from.  Our first option was to make the play in eastern MT, and the other option was to blast north closer to the border of SK.  Before we headed out, we found the Frontier Auto Museum and spent some time touring the facility.  There were lots of classic cars on display, as well as vintage signs and gas station equipment.  I spoke with one of the cashiers, and she said everything is part of her grandfather's collection.  It was originally kept in a barn, but he was convinced to open up a museum to let the public enjoy everything.  I am certainly glad he agreed to do this!!  I will post pics of some of these treasures in a separate entry :)

After we were finished poking around, we headed north on WY 59, which turned into MT 59.  We reached US 212, and we headed west into Broadus, MT, where we enjoyed lunch at the Powder River Stockman's Club.  They were certainly not ready to accommodate our large group, but that is to be expected.  We continued north out of Broadus on MT 59 into Miles City, MT.  The chances of severe weather looked good near Miles City, and there was some convection from the morning moving into better air at this time.  However, we did not want to get too wrapped up with this morning junk, so we opted to scoot west into Terry, MT, where we had a pit stop.  The lady working the convenience store was not too happy to see us, and she made sure to let our group know about it.  Perhaps she was having a bad day!  After lingering in Terry for a while, we headed south on 10 Mile Road/Road 305 until we reached US 12.  At the intersection, there was an old school house with a swing set that we investigated, and it made for some good photography opportunities.  The mountainous terrain to our west provided a beautiful backdrop with a storm.  Unfortunately, the storm was sputtering, and it looked like the atmospheric cap was going to win.  However, there was nice tower going up to our south near Ekalaka, MT.  This was in good air, and it looked promising.  We blasted east on US 12 into Baker, MT, where we headed south on MT 7.  We followed this road into Ekalaka, where we continued south and east on MT 323.  This road allowed us to get east of the storm, which was nearly stationary, and we had an unfortunate encounter with a deer near Albion, MT as we were driving.  Luckily, no one was hurt, but the same could not be said for the deer.  The van was also heavily damaged but drivable.  As we continued our drive, we found a place to stop to watch the storm and inspect the van.  It was a neat experience standing in the open fields and watching this beast of a storm come right to us.  We followed MT 323 into Alzada, MT, where the nice lady running the convenience store was kind enough to stay open for us.  Our day ended in Belle Fourche yet again after driving 466 miles.

Sidenote:  The impact with the deer was worse that we thought.  It knocked out that van's AC for the remainder of the trip, which just happened to be warm and humid.

Intersection of US 12 and Road 305

East of Ekalaka, MT

Getting closer...

June 6 Powder River Pass/Buffalo, WY storms

Today's chase began in Belle Fourche, SD.  Our plan was to get further west near the Big Horn Mountains with hopes of latching onto a nice supercell.  We headed west on SD 34/WY 24 through Aladdin, WY and Hulett, WY.  Along the way, we stopped at Devil's Tower (cue music from "Close Encounters of the Third Kind"), and I apparently need to watch the movie to understand the significance of this monument.  It has been added to my list 😋  In either case, we continued southwest into Moorcroft, WY via US 14.  We enjoyed lunch at Donna's Diner, and the food was excellent.  From Moorcroft, we headed west on I-90 into Buffalo, WY, where we had a pit stop.  After lingering in Buffalo for a while, we headed west on US 16 into the Bighorn National Forest to investigate a cell that looked healthy.  It was a very curvy and hilly road, but the scenery was beautiful.  We made it up to the Powder River Pass, which was 9,666 feet above sea level.  There was even snow on the ground, which fascinated some of the guests, who have never touched snow before.  We turned around at a scenic lookout, because our data was non-existent.  In addition, there were some healthier cells forming back to our east, so we wanted to get closer to those.  Once we got back into Buffalo, we took WY 196 south and used this as our primary chase road for the cells we were targeting.  There were a couple of nice wall clouds, but the storms never got organized enough to produce a tornado.  One of the storms could not make it past the mountains, but it still gave us some nice views.  Low moisture, inadequate wind shear, and high storm bases were the culprits for no tornadoes.  We were in Gillette, WY for the night after driving 384 miles.

June 5 Lodgepole, SD storm

We began today in Lemmon, SD, and our plan was to play up near Bismarck, ND.  Because we were in decent position, and Bill did not want to drift too far away from our target area, we had a leisurely morning in Lemmon.  The guests were dropped off at the Petrified Wood Park to poke around for a bit.  After 20 minutes, we headed to a local grocery store to stock up on some goodies.  Lunch was in town at the Alaska Café.  Shortly after lunch, we found ourselves heading east on US 12.  We turned north onto SD 73/ND 49 towards New Leipzig, ND.  After driving around the town for a bit, we continued our journey north on ND 49.  Along the way, we stopped at Lake Tschida for some scenery and power waiting.  Bill also looked at data and began thinking that our better play would be closer to MT.  In addition, there were lots of chasers in the Bismarck area, which was another strike.  After a while, we opted to head north into Glen Ullin, ND, where we had a pit stop.  We ventured a couple miles out of town and found an abandoned house to photograph.  Soon, a cumulus field started bubbling.  Bill gave us another quick pit stop in Glen Ullin, and we were in chase mode immediately after that.  Storms were beginning to fire closer to MT, so we needed to head further west.  Unfortunately, that meant we had to blast south on ND 49 down to Elgin, ND, and take ND 21 west.  We drove through the town of Mott, ND, and then headed south on ND 8 into Haynes, ND.  From there, we turned west onto US 12 into Hettinger, ND, where we continued our drive south on ND 8/SD 75.  At this point, the storm was approaching Ekalaka, MT, and it looked good both visually and on radar.  We eventually headed west on SD 20 past Reva, SD until we got about halfway to Buffalo, SD.  Bill had us pull off to the side of the road so we could observe the impending storm.  Then, we headed south on some dirt roads until we got back onto SD 79.  As luck would have it, there was a broken down big rig  with 5 blown out tires that was blocking our path.  We were fortunate that there was a way to get around it, or else the chase would have been over.  In either case, we continued south on SD 79 until we reached the town of Newell, SD.  Our storm was turning into a high-precipitation blob, so we let it move away from us to enjoy the awesome sunset and display of mammatus clouds.  After driving 387 miles, we found ourselves in Belle Fourche, SD for the night.

June 4 Beginning of Tour

Hello everyone!  It has been a while since I last updated my blog, but I have some exciting stuff for this year's storm chasing adventures.  My first storm chasing trip of the season began June 4, and we met the guests at the base hotel in Denver.  This was a full tour which consisted of 13 guests and 3 staff.  After the safety orientation, our plan was to head as far north as we could in order to be in position for the next day.  We headed east on I-76 and took the exit for CO 55.  After heading north into Iliff, CO and drove west on US 138.  When we reached CO 113, we turned north and headed towards Sidney, NE.  The road turned into NE 19, and we followed it into Sidney.  For lunch, we stopped at Sam and Louie's Pizza and continued north after eating.  We took US 385 through Alliance and Chadron, NE and followed the road until we took US 18 north.  After a pit stop in Hermosa, SD, we headed into Rapid City, where we headed east on I-90 until we reached New Underwood, SD.  At that point, we headed north on New Underwood Road until we reached SD 34.  We continued east into Howes, SD, and we continued north on SD 73 until we reached our hotel in Lemmon, SD for the night.  Our total mileage was 584.

July 7 Julesburg, CO LP supercell

Cu field near Ogallala, NE

Lake McConaughy

I never got around to creating a post for July 7, 2017, and the details are very hazy for me at the moment.  Go figure!!  Luckily, Bill was gracious enough to allow me to use his write-up for the day.  Before I post his account of the day, I will post what I wrote as my Facebook status the next day:

Sandhills of Nebraska

Lewellen, NE

We started in Hot Springs, SD today, and our goal was to catch a storm or tow near the Cheyenne Ridge.  We ended up intercepting a picturesque LP supercell near Arthur, NE, and we chased it down to Ovid, CO via Julesburg, CO.  We drove 589 miles and found ourselves in Denver for the night.  This was also the final day of chasing, so we said goodbye to our awesome group.  Even though the weather pattern was poor, we had storms, lots of laughs, and loads of fun.  Total mileage for the week was 2923 miles, and I drove a total of 6,632 miles during my two tours.

Now for Bill's more detailed account:  "The day previous (July 6) was a reposition day for the most part, though we did wind up with a nice lightning show during the evening in Hot Springs.  We drove the Enchanted Highway and visited Mount Rushmore, too.  Unfortunately, we were stuck in a restaurant in Hot Springs as the thunderstorm approached.  I hate it when that happens.

We had to play relatively closely to northeastern

Colorado on the 7th, since this was the tour’s final chase day and we needed to be back in Denver by midday on the 8th.  The weather gods smiled on me and provided a severe storm chance on the central High Plains.  Northwest flow at mid-levels was more than strong enough to provide adequate storm shear, and dew points near 60F on east-southeasterly upslope flow contributed to modest instability.  SPC was only marginally impressed, and they plastered a “Marginal Risk” of severe weather on the High Plains.  After lunch in Scottsbluff, we made our way south to the southern Nebraska Panhandle.  A cluster of cumulus clouds drew us towards Ogallala, Nebraska.  From a high spot in the Sandhills north of Lake McConaughy, we observed a strengthening and organizing storm base to our west-northwest.  It quickly became clear that this storm was worthwhile, and I needed to be closer.  It was rotating hard and turning to the right, or dropping to the south.  We maneuvered around the north side of the lake, and barely made it in front of the hail core to our south option near Lewellen.  The storm base was on the high side and there was a prominent clear slot near the hail shaft.  I wanted a good look at the storm structure, so we headed south towards Big Springs.  The updraft base moved south and was not too far to our west-northwest, near Big Springs.  The sun was setting and the light was great…and we were WAY too close for the structure.  I knew that the storm structure would be the main show, and I had allowed the storm to get too close.  We had to dash west a few miles and then south again to get good structure views in the great light.  I never really did get as far away as I would have liked, until we were near Julesburg at dusk.  Still, I managed to get some impressive structure shots with my wide-angle lens, and with Michael’s even wider-angle lens.  Thanks, Michael!  (My primary wide angle lens had been accidentally left behind in Denver at the beginning of the tour.)  Since the storm had been accommodating, we headed to the base hotel in Denver for the night, and I began my drive back home to L.A. a little after midnight!  My storm chase tour season for 2017 had ended."

I will also mention that this storm had some fairly intense and close lightning bolts, which kept us on our toes during photo stops.