5/23/07 Texas Chase Report

Jon Merage and I saw two very nice supercells in Lipscomb and Hemphill county Texas along with hundreds of other chasers. Both storms were riding the warm front where tornado potential was maximized. We observed several funnels but no tornadoes. ROTATE measured a weak circulation near the time of the first photo but it was rainwrapped. At one point, we were observing the storm on a turnoff when the DOW, TIV, and the whole ROTATE convoy pulled up in the same lot. We got upclose and personal with the TIV as it deployed its hydrolic arms to brace its self for a high wind/tornado event. The whole spectacle was distracting and we soon found our selves sampling the core where we observed strong wind and quarter sized hail. We managed to get out of the core just in time to see the storm become completely outflow dominant. A new supercell had formed to the south near Canadian Texas and we raced to catch up with it before dark. Upond reaching the storm after dark, we observed amazing lightning and a huge striated bell shaped meso. We got sandblasted while taking lightning shots and drove to Canyon Texas where we bedded down for the night.


The core that would soon overtake us Meso earlier in the day

(TIV) Tornado Intercept Vehicle

Striated mothership north of Canadien Texas

Huge Meso, I wish it was daytime!!!