Tag Archives | April 2015

April 26th Central Texas Incredible Supercell and Multiple Tornadoes

Day Five of the Close Encounters Tour produced the best event of this young season so far! A triple point supercell formed southeast of Abilene, Texas, and moved along the warm front producing a couple tornadoes, amazing structure and grapefruit sized hail. A second supercell evolved near Dublin, Texas and became the tornadic beast of the day traveling along the warm front as well, all the way to south of Dallas by midnight. We witnessed several tornadoes from this storm, amazing structure and inflow winds over 60 mph! Crazy, wild night for us!

 

April 24th Northern Kansas Tornadic Supercell

Day Three of Close Encounters had good potential in Texas and Kansas. We chose to chase the triple point near Hays. The first tornado warned storm formed right near Hays and failed to produce. A second storm formed just northeast and became the storm off the day. We witnessed a couple brief tornadoes (although one we couldn’t get a visual on actually was fairly significant!) and watched the superb structure of this supercell as it traversed the warm front of hours!

 

April 22nd Texas Panhandle Supercells and Tornado

Day One of the Close Encounters tour didn’t disappoint! A triple point southwest of Amarillo would foster the first significant tornado warned supercell of the day. Fairly limited low level moisture resulting in higher cloud bases, diminished the tornado threat. The first storm rolled across the panhandle all afternoon before weakening. Low and behold, another supercell formed southeast of Lubbock near the town of Lockney and had amazing structure and even produced a weak tornado we were able to witness. Fun day, and a great finish to it!

 

April 16th Texas Panhandle Tornado and Supercell

April 16th had good potential, but a tad limited moisture. Mid 50s dewpoints raced north on a strong low level jet and storms exploded on the dryline by mid afternoon. We interecepted the southernmost cell not far from Groom, Texas. Appearing outflow dominant and linear, we pushed ahead of it and watched as the tail end updraft become a rotating beast and produced a tornado. As the storm continued northeast, the structure was quite pretty as it tried again to produce several times, but just couldn’t stay focused long enough for that to occur. Overall, beautiful supercell and a great chase!

 

April 11th Southwest Kansas Tornado Warned Supercell

We got to chase close to home on April 11th, with storms developing in southeast Colorado off the Raton Mesa. As they moved east into southwest Kansas, deeper moisture and increasing instability resulted in an intense supercell forming which produced baseball sized hail and had incredible inflow winds. It came close to producing a tornado as well before diminishing after dark.

 

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