NZstorm wrote:The SPC high risk yesterday didn't verify which didn't surprise me. The event was essentially a straight line wind set up. High risks are supposed to be based on tornado probs so a clerical error at the SPC.
I thought the high risk was a high straight line wind risk, not tornado risk.
It came across on the U.S news thats it was a straight line high risk.
Thanks for the correction Tim. I wasn't aware a high risk could be issued for wind.
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Haven't been chasing at all since the El Reno tornado on May 31 but been enjoying the sights of Utah and Colorado. Arches National Park (Utah) looks like something right out of Central Australia, only more spectacular and without so many flies! Back home in a few days.
Another very bad fire season ahead for Colorado's parks. Lightning creating multiple small fires on Monday, only to turn out of control on Tuesday due to the dry, gusty winds.
Denver Airport was reporting 37/-14 (RH 3%!) at 5pm Tuesday with gusty foehn westerlies.
Thanks for posting that. Puts to rest the claims they are getting bigger & more frequent. It was just unfortunate that they were a couple of big ones in populated areas this year.
Thinking back... Joplin 2 years ago, Greensburg 6 years ago.
This year will be remembered for Granbury, Shawnee, Moore & El Reno.
Wide-angle shot of the El Reno, Oklahoma EF-5 tornado from May 31. We were 3 miles SSW of I-40 Exit 123 at 6:13pm and travelling east as fast as possible. Photo looking back WSW. Note this is taken at 10mm on the 1.6X crop body, so that tornado was MUCH closer than it looks! Probably just over 1 mile! I think from here the tornado went another 2 miles east from the location in this photo before widening again and taking a hard changing 'dive' northeastwards and tragically taking out three of the best.
For those left wondering exactly how the Twistex crew ran into trouble in the El Reno tornado, here is a very detailed blog from chaser Dan Robinson (who also has some excellent storm photography on his site). He's the chaser who was caught on his own dashcam leaving his vehicle and diving into a ditch during the tornado.
In brief, he was directly in front of the Twistex team and probably the last person to see them alive. The head-on inflow winds were so strong that his car struggled to drive away from the approaching wedge. I imagine that the Cobalt, with three guys in it, would have had even more trouble. He doesn't mention it in the blog, but another chaser said in a YouTube comment that Dan could see them dropping further and further behind his vehicle. Dan barely made it out. His full account is here: http://stormhighway.com/may312013.shtml, and you can also find multiple versions on YouTube of the video he took at the time. Really sobering stuff.
Some of the stuff is very valuable, giving other chasers valuable insight into what went wrong and that anyone getting in front of the tornado is in extreme risk, even if they think they know how fast it's traveling and what direction it's going.
One of my US friends never posted anything about El Reno at the time, the first I knew he'd been there was a comment made in his season summary after he'd finished chasing for the year. He commented he'd not liked what he was seeing and didn't trust his observations. Feeling unsafe he'd moved away before the big change it made that caught so many out.
With the jump in size it made, rapid acceleration and turn all simultaneously it caught many out. Many very experienced chasers have commented how they normally travel in a straight line at that stage of the Tornado's life. If this one had stayed in a straight line maybe Twistex would have been ok, we'll never know.
RIP not only the 3 well known Twistex members, Tim, Carl & Paul, but also the others, in total 6 in Granbury Texas, 2 in Shawnee, 23 in Moore and 22 in El Reno Oklahoma.
What flagged us to get out was the strange shift of the tornado going from WNW to WSW of our position. The very focused and impressive CG lightning hitting the same area also suggested that this wasn't any normal severe thunderstorm. VERY powerful thing to move so rapidly.
Here is a sequence of shots from that day. We stayed just on the southwest side of El Reno Airport for a good 25 minutes after we crossed the Canadian River in time. The road in the shots lies direct east-west.
17:54, WNW
17:58, WNW
17:59, WNW
18:03, WNW
18:04, WNW
18:08, WSW
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18:13, WSW
If this one had stayed in a straight line maybe Twistex would have been ok, we'll never know.
Many ifs, but if it did and there was a chaser bottleneck on our route I and others probably wouldn't be here today as it would have overrun us.
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I see the tornado has been downgraded to an EF3 rating.
The NWS have decided to honour the intent of the EF scale and ignore the 290mph winds recorded by radar. It had been given an EF5 rating based on the radar ob. It seems a bit mickey mouse changing ratings like this.
