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after a
data stop in Enid, my gut feeling was that quality BL moisture would
struggle to make it up to my preferred target of Beaver/Perryton/Woodward.
thus I headed south on 83 toward Shamrock. while en route... this
storm developed just to my west (near Wellington), while several other
storms developed farther south (southwest of Childress). it wasn't an
easy decision... but I let this storm go and chose the more southern
target--partly due to the high-based nature of this storm (though this
wasn't particularly surprising, since it had just recently developed). |
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i
intercepted the still-multicellular storm complex in Childress, and
immediately headed just east of town to get a view from the inflow region of
the storms. this is a low-contrast photo of the forward flank gust
front of the leading storm cell. |
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i kept heading east as new cells continued to backbuild to the south and the
whole complex of storms moved slowly northeastward... really hoping a
supercell would evolve on the southern flank. it never happened.
i moved just south of Quanah to get this photo of the southern flank of the
complex. |
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As the
complex moved closer, I spotted a very low-to-the-ground inflow band feeding
into the storm. |
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After
noticing a lot of dust being kicked up directly in the city of Quanah as the
storm approached the city, I quickly headed north and then east of town on
Highway 6 for a closer look. The dynamic circulation in this photo
began to my immediate northwest. I was a little awestruck and wondered
if this could somehow be a tornadic circulation. Moments later, my
moderate southeaterly inflow was replaced by a cool westerly blast and I
knew I was witnessing a gustnado. |
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The circulation tightened up dramatically (better seen in video)... |
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then,
in an eye-blink, took a right turn towards me. I scrambled to roll up
my window and did so just as the gustnado spun itself apart atop my car and
blasted me with gravel and dirt. I headed slowly east again as sheets
of dirt lifted all around me. It was a pretty intense experience. |
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A
little farther east, looking north at the nose of evolving bow echo. |
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Obligatory sunset shot from north of Vernon, TX. |
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This is
what chased me the entire way home. I ducked in and out of it west of
Lawton, and then again in OKC. Accerlating ahead of it the second time
was really quite difficult, as I was trying to best its 55mph forward motion
without hydroplaning. Zombified, I slept 3 hours and ultimately made
it to my target city in extreme northeast Missouri the next afternoon.....
but bad roads, bad timing, bad luck, and perhaps a faulty forecast meant I
would be ~15 minutes too far behind to make it to southwest IA for the
fast-moving warm front tornadoes. I guess should have gotten a room in
Lawton, slept in, and headed for the Missouri bootheel instead... |