Last Day

Fir 2013, Monday was the last day chasing storms on the plains.

It turned out to be an active day and our lack of time hindered our ability to see the one tornadic cell that formed along the KS-NE border. Still, it was a busy day and we got to see a couple of great cells south of the most severe area. With more time, we probably could have worked out way in behind the largest, meanest cell of the day, but that was not meant to be as work and reality called us back to the east.

The day's activity was setting up along a stationary front that was just north of I-70, and just south of the NE-KS border. Storm could form on either side of this convergence zone, and it would likely to be enhanced by the outflow from the MCS (mesoscale convective system) that had formed the night before. There was likely to be widespread activity and with a lot of available mositure, there would be many storms and it would be hard to view the storms without being in the storms. This makes chasing and viewing more difficult and photography more challenging if not almost impossible.

In the mid afternoon, storms started to pop up, with the most instense nearby storms developing along the KS-NE line. We were south of I-70, looking for the tail end of the line that would likely develop or to find the storm that would develop in front of the line of storms, similar to Sunday's chase. Although a few cells did develop to the south of the line, none were all that powerful and the KS-NE line of storms soon became tornadic and long lived. The storms to the south would ebb and flow and the 90 minute drive to NE would prove too difficult considering the number of HP cells and out limited time. Instead we waiting for further development to the south. Unfortunately, relatively little development occurred to the south, while the cell at the tail end of the KS-NE line continued as a torndado-warned storm for the next hour.

We took some pictures of the nearby severe thunderstorms and looked at our options for trying to see the tornadic cell, but time was against us and it was time to start the 1300-mile journey home. We made it back in just over 26 hours. Once along Lake Erie, we encountered more tornado warned storms where we could see rotation among the heavy rain and low visibility.

For the entire trip, we traveled 5,500 miles in 8 days, visiting NY, PA, OH, IN, IL, MO, NE, KS, OK and TX.