June 12, 2002
Storm Chase
Northwest Oklahoma
Editor: Putnam
Reiter
Forecast -
I did very little forecasting for
this day and really only became interested after seeing SPC's Day 1 outlook. My
enthusiasm level was pretty low even with the June moderate risk. Conceding to
Rob that we had nothing better to do, I consented. It was well worth the
effort!
The general environment was a
dryline in the Texas Panhandle with an outflow boundary located across northern
Oklahoma. An MCS had moved across northeast Oklahoma during the late morning on
this day. Temperatures across northwest Oklahoma warmed well into the 90s with
CAPE values above 3000 J/Kg.
The Chase -
Team 1 - Rob Ferguson and Putnam
Reiter
Miles Driven - @400
Departure Time - 15:00 CDT
Return Time - 22:30 CDT
We left Oklahoma City and headed
towards Kingfisher which is northwest of OKC. After a brief stop in Kingfisher
we continued west towards Watonga where we turned north from Highway 33 onto
Highway 51A. A tornado watch was issued about the time we left Kingfisher for
much of NW Oklahoma and another tornado watch had been issued for the Texas
Panhandle. As we traveled north on Highway 51A we heard a severe thunderstorm
warning for a storm in Woods County. There was also a storm near Ponca City.
Driving through Orienta we turned
west on Highway 412. As we drove past Togo, Rob snapped a few pictures of the
storm over Woods County. We turned north on Highway 281 towards Waynoka. As we
got into Waynoka I made a brief stop for fuel. Getting through Waynoka, we went
north on Highway 14. As we approached Highway 64 we started to get our
storm-scale features. We noted a lot of low hanging clouds, some of which were
not attached to the cloud base.
We turned west on Highway 64 for
about 1/4 of mile and parked. Hanging out for a few minutes we watched the
cloud features and what looked like a serious attempt at a funnel. This was
during the time when we noted the rear-flank downdraft moving towards us. We
headed east to get back ahead of the storm. About this time the updraft area
gusted out. It was also about the time when a cell merger occurred with a small
storm moving into the southwest flank of this storm.
We zigzagged south and east,
playing tag with the storm. This put us about five miles south of Alva when we
reached Highway 281. We headed south a little watching what looked to be a new
rotation area. The storm may have reorganized after the merger. Continuing our
game of zigzag we ended up on Highway 45 just west of Carmen. At this point we
had northerly flow even though we were several miles east of the circulation and
should have been in southerly flow.
Coordinating with RADAR we decided
that the storm was evolving into an MCS and we should hit the road for OKC.
Sure enough the storm followed us back to the city. We had enough time to get
fuel and food, and then go await the arrival of the MCS. Said MCS moved into
OKC around 22:15 CDT with the best activity moving through Edmond and Jones. We
got very little at our location.
Overall we were quite pleased with
our evaluation of storm feature evolution and our reaction to this. The storm
merger seriously complicated the chase and I certainly think that a few chasers
got a nasty surprise.
Lessons Learned -
- This was one of our better
chases, however there are two things to note with one being kind of funny.
First the serious item.
- We noted several areas we
thought might be the rear-flank downdraft; however after review it appears
that much of what we saw was outflow. Storm evolution was difficult and of
course we would rather see the RFD.
- The funny item is to make
sure never to extend an antenna when closing the car door. Rob's TV antenna
has a perfect kink in it that fits the angle of my door.
General Observations -
This could better be titled
'chaser behaving badly.' Unlike our previous chase, on this one we noted
several chasers parking in the middle of roadways and otherwise ignoring all the
lightning by standing outside their vehicle. These storms fit the normal
pattern for June with copious amounts of lightning activity. There were a lot
of people out, probably hitting a 10 on a 10 point scale. So, finding a spot to
park was sometimes difficult. However, the main roads weren't blocked and we
got where we wanted to go.
Multimedia -
-
Picture 1 -
Near Togo looking northwest at our storm. 17:13 CDT
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Picture 2 -
Near Togo looking northwest at our storm. 17:14 CDT
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Picture 3 -
West of Alva looking northeast at a funnel cloud. 17:54 CDT
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Picture 4 -
West of Alva looking northeast at a funnel cloud. 17:54 CDT
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Picture 5 -
West of Alva looking north at scud clouds. 17:56 CDT
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Picture 6 -
Southeast of Alva looking southeast at blowing dust. 18:06 CDT
Picture 7
- Northwest of Carmen looking north at blowing dust and scud clouds. 18:19
CDT
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Picture 8 -
Northwest of Carmen looking north at blowing dust. 18:20 CDT
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Picture 9 -
Northwest of Carmen looking west at blowing dust and rain. 18:40 CDT
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Picture 10 -
Northwest of Carmen looking north at scud clouds. 18:45 CDT
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Picture 11 -
South of Goltry looking to the west at a shelf cloud. 19:24 CDT
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Picture 12 -
South of Goltry looking to the west at a shelf cloud. 19:24 CDT
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Video
- 8 miles west of Alva, looking northeast at a wall cloud/partial funnel.
17:54 CDT
- Additional video from this
day can be found at
Multimedia.
- Note:
Windows Media Player 7.1
or newer is required for the above video.
Encounters -
- Storm 1: Alva, Oklahoma
- Tornado: No, but a lot of 'gustnadoes.'
- Hail: None
- Wind: Probably around 40mph
or so.
Storm 2: Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
- Tornado: None
- Hail: None
- Wind: Around 30mph, the big
stuff went east of us.
