Okay quick short long update…. hahaha I know it makes no sense!

So we started the day in Woodward, OK and it was nice to finally sleep in catch up on some much needed and missing sleep. We decided a late checkout was best. In an interesting twist, we booked the room well in advance and it turns out Greg Johnson and his chase tour were staying at the same Super8 in Woodward.

Look a funnel… NOT

It was nice to meet Greg again and I also got to see Chris Chittick again, the last time we truly spoke at any length was at a gas station just south of El Reno in 2010 when he was with Reed Timmer in the Dominator. I also got to meet a few other twitter users who I regularly engage with including Jade and Randy. So we hung out a little at night and I took this selfie the next morning before we headed off to our target hotel in Childress, Tx.

Cleaning the Ford Expedition

MaryAnn made sure we cleaned the chase car! She can be a little OCD and the fact it was covered in dirt and mud spatter from the previous days chase was killing her. So a quick was resolved that issue for the time being. After the wash, MaryAnn was in communication with Kathryn & Dave, two fellow chasers from Chatham Ontario that I’ve never met in person, who were also in Woodward. We all met at the local Braum’s Ice Cream shop and had lunch, it was a pleasure to meet Kathryn & Dave in person.

After lunch, it was southward to Childress. It was a nice pleasant drive that brought us through Wheeler Texas, a little town which I’ve been through many times and ironically is the setting for a movie of which I’m the executive produce (Sixty Minutes to Midnight). Our director Neil Mackay had never actually been to Wheeler in person so I made sure to send him some quick photos showing this his pre-production research had paid off.

Wheeler Texas

Once we landed in Childress, we did the usual stuff, hit the store and grab some food. We actually booked out hotel at around 11:30AM before we had even left the Super 8 in Woodward, and it was good that we did. The hotel actually had chasers when we arrived at 5PM and by 8PM the place was an absolute zoo, which was a good thing. I ran into several chasers who I’ve spoken with over the years and then had the opportunity to meet a legend in the chase community, David Hoadley.

David Hoadley posing for a selfie

David was the original founder of Storm Track Magazine and essentially is known as the first recognize storm chaser. He essentially started it all as a professional photographer and has written about the ethics of chasing, photographing storms and many things over the years. In many ways he is a true legend within the community and I’m overjoyed to actually meet him in person. We had a brief 10 minute discussion and he was a wonderful person to talk to. He is also such a wealth of knowledge it is just phenomenal.

Now on to the serious stuff… tomorrow is a serious day. While I storm chase to see the amazing power of nature which is just mesmerizing there is the reality that things on high risk days can get out of hand quickly. My focus will be on the safety of our group, and to make educated, safe and intelligent choices to help us find out way to any potential tornadoes and do so without getting in trouble. Likewise MaryAnn will have the responsibility of safely driving the vehicle even in potentially adverse conditions. Safety is priority one, which means eyes on the road and eyes on skies. When there are this many chasers in a potentially small areas people do silly things and collisions, which can be serious are a possibility. Our goal is to avoid any such issues.

There is another thing storm chasers sometimes forget. On days where the risk is high and large long track tornadoes are expected, there is a high likelihood some people will lose their homes, properties and potentially their life. This is something I do not take lightly. I have witnessed enough devastating tornadoes to know what happens, I have seen enough communities wiped off to map to know the pain such devastation these events cause. I absolutely, do not wish for a tornado, I do not wish for anyone to get harmed. As a chaser, I’m going out there to see nature, I can’t stop it, I can perfectly predict it and I don’t with such devastation upon anyone. As a group there is an understanding that if we come upon tornado damage, we will render assistance as best as we can and we pray that people who may be in the path of these storms are spared any destruction.or loss.

So with that said, it weighs heavy on me knowing that tornado may be a day that changes some peoples lives and I hope that I’m wrong but fear that I will not be.

So I’m at the point now where I’m packed for the most part and here’s what I’ve learned over the years.

I have always habitually over packed, and it arises from the fear of needing something I may not normally bring. When chasing at home or locally I bring all of my lenses, 4 DSLR cameras and two or three video cameras. It may seem like overkill but I have had cameras go down at the least opportune times and having a backup has served as a remedy to this. Also, bringing all my lenses means I can do anything whether it be macro or super-telephoto, even artsy fisheye stuff is fair game.

The lens collection

What I’ve come to discover over time is that for tornado alley trips, I really don’t need the majority off the stuff I bring. It ends up just becoming a slog fest where it feels like I’m moving everyday with pelican cases, backpacks and the like. At the end of a long chase day the last thing you want to do is move stuff when you’re mentally and physically exhausted, and this is on top of the fact that batteries need to be charged and memory cards need to be cleared. I’m also burdened with the task of figuring out the next target. So the last thing I want to do is move a bunch stuff.

I’ve come to discover that on these trips I really just use the workhorse equipment. The two lenses I fallback on are the Canon 11-24mm ultra-wide and 70-200mm telephoto. In years past I’ve brought everything, and I mean everything including the 800mm which is just overkill. From a practicality point of view, because of haze and atmospheric distortion, you can’t really zoom in past 200mm, there’s simply too much clutter in the air, so for tornadoes and storms anything beyond the reach of a 200mm lens is impractical. In an ideal world the 24-70mm should also be on my list but the reality is that I rarely use this lens with storms, everything is either ultrawide or zoomed in. I have found the 24-70 is good for lightning, but it tends to be most useful towards the upper end in the 50-70mm range. So I’m still unsure as to whether it’ll be coming along.

When it comes to video, I just rely on two cameras, the Sony AX100 which is a beautiful camcorder, and the Sony A7RII which is phenomenal in all conditions. The camcorder sits on the dash but can quickly be put on a tripod. It offers all the features and function of a video camera which is important because trying to make a DSLR a video camera is painful, and having a built in zoom with a rocker servo and momentary auto-focus are sometimes very important. The A7RII on the other hand is a DSLR but for the chase trip I leave it fitted with a Canon 16-35mm wide angle lens and it just shoots beautiful wide shots of storms.

Here’s the problem ultimately with having and bringing too much gear – despite what you think you can do in your head, the physical reality is very different. In 2010 for example while a nice cone tornado dropped from the sky in Watonga OK I was so busy trying to operate 4 cameras I did not really enjoy it all that much. It’s a physical impossibility to shoot with two DSLR’s and keep track of two video cameras at the same time. On later trips I tried to just leave GoPro’s going all the time but then you end up wasting memory, and their lenses get dirty. In the end you don’t really pay attention to any specific camera, and what you get is poor quality content. It’s better to just focus on one or two things and not worry about a plethora of gear.

Cone tornado in Watonga, OK – May 2010

The other issue to consider is loadout and how that affects your ability to safely observe. There are many situations where you simply do not have much time at one location and every second you spend unloading photo and video gear is one less second you have to use it and one more second you have to spend putting it back in the vehicle. So ultimately, you cut down your observing time and if you underestimate the amount of time needed to pack up and run, it’s easy to get into real trouble, and it’s a lot harder to get out of trouble than it is to get into it.

Just a couple things to share.

But first i’ll start with a story from earlier this morning…

I stopped at a local Walmart for some socks and a couple pieces of clothing. It was a miserably rainy day so I dawned my waterproof shell, headed out and did the shopping. I then drove some 40 km north of the city to my mechanic for a quick oil change. My intent was to leave the car and take the subway back downtown so I would arrive at work on time.

Everything was fine, arrived at my mechanic in Concord (Vaughan) without issue. My mom had called and offered to drive me to the subway station to save me a 15 minute bus ride.

She arrived and it was then, as I transferred my work related items to her car that I realized my wallet had vanished!

I quickly checked my mechanics shop, then called the Wal-Mart in Etobicoke near Sherway gardens… nothing, no wallets had been turned in.

I was pretty panicked and frustrated at this point. I asked my mom to drive me back to the plaza parking lot, I had an inkling it had fallen out of my jacket as I hopped into the driver seat of my SUV.

About 20 minutes later I was back where I had started. I headed in to Wal-Mart and just then I saw it on the customer desk behind the counter! It was soaking wet but together, and I really don’t carry cash and in this case there was none lost but I didn’t care, it was my license and health card I was concerned about. The Walmart employee told me it had just been dropped off by someone who found it in the parking lot.

I can tell you, that’s one hell of a way to start the morning! What a relief and my lesson has been learned, I’m bolting this wallet to my forehead!!!

I’m so thankful whoever turned the wallet in did so, I can’t thank them enough!

Turning towards weather and chasing, Maryann has installed a rather large hail guard to protect the moon roof (moon roofs are basically giant sunroofs because… the moon is bigger than the sun??? No idea why they’re called that).

This will be a huge help, hail is always a battle, I do my very best to not put the vehicle through any sizeable hail but it’s not always easy and sometimes things go south and there’s simply no escape. The windshield is the most resilient and easily repairable glass in the vehicle. It’ll take a lot to break it. The moonroof is about the worst thing to break, it’ll expose everyone to the outer elements, have the vehicle interior soaked along with gear and prove a considerable setback. So having a hail guard prevents us from losing our roof.

I’ve also put in a rush order for an Inspeed anemometer, I already have one unit, but a second will serve as an important backup.

GFS afternoon 2M temperature forecast – May 17th

In other news, I’m happy to report that the GFS is continuing to bump up temperatures, we might not really need our sweaters after all, looks like the warm air will make a solid push deep into SW Ontario, so aside from a cool morning, the rest of the day Friday looks warm and sunny.!

With just over 3 days remaining, the final push to prepare, sort and pack for the trip is underway.

There have already been multiple tornado outbreaks of varying scales in the southern plains.

Cape Forecast – Sunday May 19th 2019

As much as I hate looking at operational model runs for convective events days to weeks in advance, the GFS, CMC and ECMWF have been in general agreement showing a very active and prolonged multi-day severe weather episode unfolding. It’s a repeating pattern, one after the other back and forth from west to east until the end of the month before ridging begins building in.

While this storm forecast is important, a more immediate and pressing matter to deal with is the clothing forecast for the drive down. Silly as this may sound many storm chasers, especially those coming from Northern climates tend to dress inappropriately, either wearing too much, too little or not dawning transitional clothing. It’s easy to assume it’ll be hot at the final destination but the weather on the way there is often cool and unsettled.

The GFS 2M temperature forecast for the afternoon of Friday May 17th 2019

So for the first leg of the journey Friday it looks like spring wear, once we get deeper into Illinois we’ll finally transition into summer like weather as far as heat and humidity go.

After the dreary spring weather here in Southern Ontario and a painful lack of warm fronts, I’m ready for some sunshine and heat!

Well it is the spring season and the chase departure day is quickly approaching!

It’s never easy organizing trips like these because you always end up planning them months in advance and you’re really working on climatology. It’s not easy to guess whether the beginning or end of May will be the “best time” and ocean signals only go so far, a sudden blocking ridge that shuts down the plains is possible even if ocean patterns suggest it is unlikely months in advance.

This year I’ll be heading down as the team navigator & forecaster once again. Maryann Williams will be driver (she’s a little insane) and was kind enough to lend her vehicle as the chase car. Our friend Neil Ellis from New Zealand will be joining us and we’ll have a new companion, a professional photographer Matthew Breiter from Minnesota.

I wasn’t able to head down for the 2018 season in part due to my wedding and work obligations that simply did not spare me the time. But this year will be different and the trip is booked as of March.

The CFS outlook for May

Getting into the models, the CFS predictions of a major western trough which continued for much of the winter, through March and April seem to be coming to fruition. The CFS thus far, and even with the weekly data, continues to show an amplified western trough for most of May with an emphasis on the latter half of the month.

The plan is to head down for the second half of May leaving on the 17th and returning at the beginning of June just as the death ridge starts to build in over the plains and cap off the more major activity.