Mesovortex.com

Sunday June 13, 2010

Chase Partners:
VORTEX 2

Departure Location:
Liberal, KS

Target Area:
Perryton, TX

Final Location:
Amarillo, TX

Distance:
359 miles

Another day in the panhandle as I swapped out of Probe 12 and joined Probe 16 as Josh left the V2 group.  We head out early without a morning briefing to Perryton, TX and wait for storms to initiate along the stationary front that was still draped across the Texas and Oklahoma Panhandle region.  Storms that iniate early do not look so good...however that quickly changes by early afternoon as supercells form along the front.  We witness the first tornado of the day near Booker, TX and have to drive through the core to get ahead of the storm on 270 in Oklahoma.  We witness another quick tornado to our south west of Slapout, OK as some teams deploy with the storm bearing down on us.  We head north of Slapout, OK to attempt another deployment and our probe was successful this time as my fellow deployer Ed and I got completely soaked deploying.  However my former probemates in 12 lost their drive shaft and were rendered without a car on the same road during this deployment.  We regroup in Follett, TX and send a group back to Probe 12 to attempt a fix while the rest of the group heads south for a new target of Canadian, TX before ending ops as the storms form a line and no longer contain mesocyclones.  On the drive back to the hotel we get on the south side of the storms and catch some awesome pictures of the flanking line and crepuscular rays with the sun behind the southernmost storms. 

  
Jim Reed and I near a flooded field from last nights rain
  
Storm development to our west.
  
 Lots of blue shades in the storm with signs or organization
  
 The first tornado near Booker, TX with poor contrast
  
The second tornado of the day near Slapout, OK
  
 The storm continues to spin vigorously
  
The storms become a line
  
 The southernmost storm with a sunlit background

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