Reports and Pictures Chase Day 11 - Oklahoma

[Paul Sherman]

Well what a day is all I can say, 800 miles and 2 tanks of petrol, started and ended the day in Norman and somehow in between drove to Dallas Fort Worth to pick up the lucky 12 and still managed to bag 4 Tornadoes, 2 of which were very strong wedge to cone tornadoes that have done significant damage and unfortunately killed people.

 

We got onto the first Oklahoma Storm at 3pm and it quickly dropped a tapered cone tornado just east of Edmond.

 

 

After this it became a little insane, we stopped near Arcadia and witnessed a white cone tornado at a range of 200 yards, this was ripping up trees and blasted us with rfd winds over 80 mph.

 

We then blasted east and North and witnessed the Carney wedge Tornado (Claire has pictures of this)

 

I then noticed this storm becoming a bit junky so went south to the tail end charlie supercell near Norman, we were getting reports of a large wedge tornado on the ground 6 miles west of Shawnee so we went north on highway 177 and witnessed an incredible cone tornado just to our north.

 

 

Roads were being blocked by Police but strangely they allowed me to drive around them just saying at your own risk, Arron got some incredible video footage at this point which he will upload tomorrow.

 

More of the same tomorrow again for chase day 1 official for tour 3

 

 

 

 

[Craigers]

Looks great Paul. This year seems very good for tornado development!.

Reed Timmer managed to get inside that tornado before it turned into a big wedge!

[Nick F]

Amazing chase for you guys, must rank up there as one of the best. Was gipping stuff for us back at home watching all the the News9 live coverage on the Edmond and Norman/Shawnee storms as they were dropping. You must all be totally shattered but looks like it will play all over again later today with strong tornadoes gain possible in similar area of Oklahoma.

[lewisosd]

Great stuff guys! Bet everyone is mega chuffed! Do it all again today!

[Roger J Smith]

As bad as things got, the one good thing is that neither of the large tornadic storms levelled a large town with damage being mainly confined to smaller places and rural areas, obviously devastating for them but with the echoes we were seeing around 6:30 to 7:00 pm CDT there could have been an even worse disaster if some of those cells had been only 2-3 miles south of where they ended up tracking.

 

Looks to me as though today's tornadic potential will be further east (w MO, extreme se KS, nw AR, e OK) with perhaps less intense thunderstorms developing along a secondary front approaching from eastern Colorado and western Kansas. Do you go east and deal with the trees and the hills, or go a bit west and north for the less stressful and more visible storms?

 

Gosh, the visitors must be in the deepest sleep of their lives, I can't imagine flying all day, getting into a car and chasing two F-3 tornadoes, and not being a bit tired, although perhaps hyper at the same time. And that heat/humidity blast that hits any visitor from the north temperate zone added in. Great reporting as always.

[nsrobins]

Amazing stuff last night - you must be worn out - but sad to hear of the damage and injuries - inevitable given the severity of the circulation at times.
Interesting to see where the initiation line turned out to be - about 50 miles west of my target so I now have a pair being 50 miles east the other day LOL. Both understable in retrospect but no model, except maybe GFS, has performed brilliantly with these events.
I have to say the Channel9 helicopter coverage is a very useful addition to teh chasers armoury as you get a completely different perspective from 2000ft.

Onward and upward and more to come this evening.
 

[gpspete]

missing the action gota check out finances for next year  no splashing out on Iceland this winter i think 

 

well done to all on the tours so far hopefully a lot more to come 

[alexisj9]

Are there any first time chasers on this tour?

 

If so 4 tornadoes on the first day 1 just 200yards away, just wow.

[chionomaniac]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-22592695

 

 

News of last night. It was both frightening and mesmerizing at the same time.

[matty40s]

3 late nights on the trot and another to come by the looks of it.

Some sensational footage in the last two days and switching from stream to live copter feed to anoher stream is becoming an art - not bad seeing as I am running off a tethered mobile with average reception - roll on 4G.

Highlight for me was finding the copter following the early wichita cone crossing I35.

[jimbo36]

First pic of the Edmond nado, Arron & Sian running back to cars to get away from nado forming overhead. 2nd & 3rd pic shows large nado removing four of the team from the field of play :-)

[DanN]

Fantastic days chasing from Paul and the boys :-)

 

Terrain is horrible on this side of Oklahoma, too many trees and too many other chasers. But we managed it, this was my favourite pic of the day, the trees parted and....hello!

 

[Tom Lynch]

Stu and I arrived south of Norman just after the cell had crossed the I 35 at one point it looked like we could have got to Norman before it. However for what technology we had on board we did pretty well and relied on team work. We stopped south to look at an area of rotation over the interstate and saw the wall cloud to our east.  We had to juggle the sat nav which I had to unplug to plug in the laptop, we rotated the Mifi and then Stu's smartphone and I even dug out my old paper map of Oklahoma.   I knew that we were possible not too far off the junction for highway 9 which Stu confirmed usung the GPS on his smart phone.  We set off east along highway 9 with the knowledge that the raod was heading east and the cell north east.  It was nice seeing the cell as a backdrop to the Storm Prediction Centre complex.  Stu saw a report of a water spout at Thunderbird lake minutes before we passed the Thunder Lake park but had trees between us and the storm.  We decided that if we wanted to get into the action we needed to find a north road. So Stu once again used his GPS to find a north option.  We took the first opportunty possible and started to get caught up in the damage path and lucky not to get rammed by other vehicles. One cop car actuall had sustaned damage i think in the same way. A four way stop is bad enough but whenyou have 6 cop cars 5 fire trucks all giving you different instructions it can be a little risky just turning round. We did at that point get stopped from going north and so decided to head back south to highway 9 and go east a bit and take the next north option. This again was strewn with tornado debris and we once again got to a road blockage and had to chat with a member of the fire service. I told him we were chasing the storm and he asked if we were with the NWS and if we had ID I told him we were Netweather TV and so he reluctantly waved us by with a You are at your own Risk caution.  It wasnt too long before we found that the road was blocked. There was a tree across the road and power cables close to the road.  All around us was the scattered homes and belongings of local familes.  At that point we decide that our only option was to continue east again on highway 9.  My laptop had died ,Stue's smart phone was running out of power and then had no internet for a while.  We looked at a couple of north options one being a dirt track but being sensible carried on the blacktop. We arrived in Shawnee and most places were shut because of the tornado.  I figured if I could find a cafe that I could park outside and plug in my latop we could meet up with the rest of the team.  We pulled into a Mcdonalds the manager said they would be open in 34 minutes so i asked the girl behind the counter if I could in anyway and plug my laptop in she agreed.  I could then connect to the Wifi in the car and get a handle on what was happening and where the team were. The girl liked our accents and thought I was Scottish because I spoke differently to Stu so we had coffee and watched the carnage unfold on the TV in the macadees.  They had to throw away and recook all their food.  After a while on I 40 heading east Stu recieved a message say that we were booked in at the Guest Inn in Norman and so turned around and set off west.  Our haste was short lived beacuse we hit two areas. A way east of Shawnee it looks like in order to escape the tornado some cars on the interstate actually tried to turn around and go east on the west bound side and there was cars dumped all around the hard shoulder. Some still have their hazzards flashing.  We then hit the Shawnee junction and it was obvious that this is where the tornado actually crossed over the interstate.  We could see major damage to buildings, trees and trucks . One of which had actually been blown off the overpass. We had to come off the I40 go around some areas of damage and back onto the interstate west of Shawnee.  We set off for the Guest inn after about 50 minutes of road hold ups.  

 

All in all we had an interesting day and although we didnt have the correct gear properly in place to chase on a moderate day,we did well. We didnt get to see the tornadoes filmed by the team but unless one of the southern cells went east it was always going to be the case. They were always heading away from us.  Whilst driving passed the SPC there was a lot going on above our heads but couldnt find a clear spot to stop and get a good view.

 

 

Tom and Stu

[Paul]

Cheers Tom, enjoyed the vid, glad Stu found you in the end

[jimbo36]

6x2 pano stitched of one of yesterdays supercells

 

[ItIsGee]

What a day!

Thanks Paul is all i have to say!

Edited May 20, 2013 by crashlanding

[Coast]

 

Tornadoes hit Plains, Midwest; 1 dead in Okla

 

Another round of dangerous weather is expected to slam the Plains on Monday, after tornadoes that ripped through five states Sunday killed one and left more than 20 injured. A tornado in Shawnee, Okla., severely damaged a mobile home park and killed a 79-year-old man whose body was found out in an open area of the neighborhood.

 

"You can see where there's absolutely nothing, then there are places where you have mobile home frames on top of each other, debris piled up," Pottawatomie County Sheriff Mike Booth said after surviving damage in the Steelman Estates Mobile Home Park. "It looks like there's been heavy equipment in there on a demolition tour. "It's pretty bad. It's pretty much wiped out," he said.

 

More than 60 million Americans are at risk of severe storms today, with the primary targets including Oklahoma, Kansas, Missouri and Arkansas, the National Weather Service's Storm Prediction Center warned. "Damaging wind gusts, large hail and tornadoes are possible in all areas," Weather Channel meteorologist Kevin Roth said. Oklahoma City, Tulsa, St. Louis, Cedar Rapids and Minneapolis are among the cities most at risk for severe weather today, AccuWeather meteorologist Meghan Evans said. But Chicago, Detroit, Dallas, and Indianapolis also are in the danger zone.

 

Sunday, there were 24 reports of tornadoes in five states, the Storm Prediction Center reports. "In what has otherwise been a quiet spring for tornadoes, May 19 appeared to have been the second-most active day for tornadoes in the nation so far in 2013," Weather Channel meteorologist Jon Erdman said. The storms in Oklahoma on Sunday that ripped off roofs and tossed big trucks like toys were part of a severe weather outbreak that stretched from Texas to Minnesota. Twisters were also reported Sunday in Iowa and Kansas.

 

Across Oklahoma, 21 people were injured, not including those who suffered bumps and bruises and chose not to visit a hospital, said Keli Cain, a spokeswoman for the Oklahoma Department of Emergency Management. Booth said six at Steelman Estates were hurt. Gov. Mary Fallin declared an emergency for 16 Oklahoma counties Interstate 40 was closed by the Oklahoma Highway Patrol after winds overturned semi-tractor trailer trucks and other vehicles, Newsok.com reported.

 

 

KFOR-TV showed footage of homes damaged and cars and trucks flipped from highways near Shawnee. Other video showed flashes from electrical transformers blowing out as they were hit by high winds or debris from the tornado near Edmond. A tornado touched down in Golden City, Mo., early Monday morning and tore through two counties, Barton County Emergency Management Director Tom Ryan told CNN. The number of injuries and extent of damage were not immediately clear. Sedgwick County, Kan., emergency management director Randy Duncan says officials are grateful for few reports of damage from a tornado that touched down near Wichita Mid-Continent Airport. He told CNN the area emerged "relatively unscathed.''

 

 

Forecasters had been warning for days that severe storms were likely across the region.

 

"I knew it was coming," said Randy Grau, who huddled with his wife and two young boys in their Edmond's home when the tornado hit. He said he peered out his window as the weather worsened and believed he saw a flock of birds heading down the street. "Then I realized it was swirling debris.'' In Iowa, a tornado touched down on Sunday about 30 miles west of Des Moines near the town of Earlham, the Des Moines Register reported.

 

Meteorologist Kurt Kotenberg said a large low-pressure system is parking itself over the middle of the country and "really isn't going to move much over the course of the next few days. … It's basically going to keep pulling up that nice Gulf (of Mexico) moisture that keeps fueling everything." Overall, Iowa has a roughly 70% chance of severe thunderstorms from late Sunday afternoon through midnight, with more storms likely on Monday and Tuesday, Kotenberg said. The weather service's "hazardous weather outlook" warns of the potential for "all modes of severe weather possible," including golf-ball sized hail and winds in excess of 60 mph.

 

The threat of twisters comes less than a week after tornadoes left six dead, dozens injured and hundreds of homes destroyed in Texas and just shy of the two-year anniversary of the Joplin, Mo., twister.

 

Video here:

 

http://www.usatoday.com/story/weather/2013/05/20/tornadoes-severe-weather-plains-midwest/2325875/

 

 

 

 

[chionomaniac]

Thanks for the video Tom. Last night on channel 10 there was footage of the tornado's path across I-40 and route 177 where the tornado had crossed right over the intersection NW of Shaunee. Cars that had taken refuge under the underpass had come to grief along with a massive trailer that possibly had been flung off the overpass onto the road below. The firemen were also rescuing a trucker who had almost gone the same way and his truck was precariously positioned hanging onto the side of the overpass. Brave souls those rescuers. The aerial footage was shocking. I think it is a miracle if only one person died as a result of these wedges.

 

It was also the best virtual chase that I have followed knowing that you and the other half of the team were on theses beasts tails.

Edited May 20, 2013 by chionomaniac

[nsrobins]

Agreed it was up there with the busiest of virtual chases of the last few years (the gold standard of course being that incredible evening of 27th April, 2011). Having been online the night of the Greensburg EF5 in 2007 and knowing what a tornado emergency could entail, it was shocking to hear a tornado emergency being declared on the Wichita storm last night, only thankfully for the meso to lift and recycle right over downtown, sparing it from a potential mauling.
It really is only a matter of time before an EF4/5 impacts the heart of one of the region's major metro areas - Tulsa, OKC, Wichita, DFW - but at least the dedication of the spotters and chaser community will hopefully continue to give people sufficient warning.

[chionomaniac]

Agreed it was up there with the busiest of virtual chases of the last few years (the gold standard of course being that incredible evening of 27th April, 2011). Having been online the night of the Greensburg EF5 in 2007 and knowing what a tornado emergency could entail, it was shocking to hear a tornado emergency being declared on the Wichita storm last night, only thankfully for the meso to lift and recycle right over downtown, sparing it from a potential mauling.

It really is only a matter of time before an EF4/5 impacts the heart of one of the region's major metro areas - Tulsa, OKC, Wichita, DFW - but at least the dedication of the spotters and chaser community will hopefully continue to give people sufficient warning.

Yes and a rinse and repeat tonight - though I will have to retire earlier as I am a tad tired at work today!

[Arron]

Only managed to take 3 pictures yesterday but got some lovely video in 1080p of the Shawnee tornado, here it is!

 

[duckeyh]

For those who haven't seen my Carney image on Facebook :

 

Edited May 20, 2013 by duckeyh

[jimbo36]

My vid of the Shawnee, OK EF4 tornado

http://youtu.be/hdQv5POstGQ

[Arron]

Very short clip of the Edmond tornado

 

 

[Cookie]

Nice video