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3-11-06
This was my VERY first storm chase! We decided to book south on I-80 and try to intercept
some fast moving cells in Galesburg. The day was VERY crazy down south with numerous supercells
producing many tornadoes, large hail and high winds. We actually just got the "blow off" from those
storms, but nevertheless still provided for a white knuckled experience.
Storm reports for the day:
Joel actually got a very nice picture of a tower going up as we were en route to Galesburg. Cells were
firing everywhere around us as we kept heading south.
The updraft base. This
had great
structure but we were too far under the base to get any pictures. We could feel some weak inflow from our backs at this point. This was completely rain-free at the time this was shot. Oh yeah, and I'm FINALLY shooting in full manual! This was my very first attempt at doing so. |
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This was about 20
minutes later. The
once rain-free base now had turned into a pretty impressive, fast moving hail storm. This hail core was approaching us at about 40-45 mph. There were also tornado watches out all around the area. |
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Ping-pong ball sized
hail pummelling us.
There was a house to the back-right of this shot, and right after the hail quit, it starting dropping some very heavy rain drops. Some guy ran out and told us that there were tornado warnings and asked if we wanted to come inside for shelter. We sort of laughed and told him that we were chasers. Friendly gesture, yes, but he got drenched to the bone for no reason, really. |
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After the insane hail
core, this was the scene
trailing it on the road ahead. |
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The same system that rolled us. This doesn't really look that impressive from this shot, but it was quite the adrenaline starter for my first ever chase! |
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Same location, panned
to
the left.
|
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Trailing cumulus with
contrails above. |
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The Road to
Destruction.
This was finishing up our chase. We tried to catch back up to the storm, but it was literally impossible. This thing was scooting along at a pretty good pace. |
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So, for my first ever chase, it was a very good one! The adrenaline that starts to rush
cannot be explained unless you actually experience it yourself. Unfortunately, the radar
grab below is the ONLY one I can find on this day. They used to have radar grabs
much closer to the source. Anyway, you can see the nice cell we tagged just to the
north of all the others.
