Definitely Inconclusive

Finally getting some time to go through some night time video of a couple of tor warned storms this past year. The first one I looked at was the August 8th sup. that passed just north of where I live (the large wall cloud would've been clearly visible from our house). Going through the video frame by frame proved nothing but the fact that there was a large wall cloud. If there was a tornado in there it would not have been photogenic although the wall cloud would've been a beauty. Possible maybe longshot funnel but it is next to impossible to confirm with the shaky video and uncooperative lightning. But even still it was cool to have such a strong storm pass so close to my house. I've been thinking about it since Aug. 8th and I'm wondering if I would've been able to see the west metro tornado had I stayed home instead of been out in the Lake Minnetonka area. There is a nice hill just west of the house that has a nice view to the west/southwest. Considering that the tornado was about 10 miles to the southwest of the hill, I really wonder if I would've been able to see the tornado from there. I know for sure I would've had an incredible view of the wall cloud. The reason I looked so hard at this video is one it was so close to home but also there were some damage reports from the area the meso passed over. NWS was unable to confirm it was a tornado as the damage was so sparse but if it was from a tornado, I'd probably be able to see atleast a funnel in my video. As far as I can tell, there was no funnel. Weird thing about this storm was the RFD winds were really localized. Nothing like 9/21/05 where the RFD damaged a path like 15 miles wide (from about Andover south to New Brighton)and did more damage than a couple of tornadoes it produced. That was a fun storm.

The second video I'm looking at is the video I got on August 2nd out near Marshall, MN. There was a TON of lightning with that storm, but in order to pick up the lightning on my video camera I had to slow the shutter speed down so I dont have as many frames to help my cause. Even still, with the amount of lightning there was I still get some **decent** views of the base. I haven't gotten through all the video but after the point in the video I'm at right now I think the storm starts to crap out so if there was a tornado I would've already seen it. Plus, the storm started to speed up as the chase went on and we got further and further behind the storm hence a worse and worse view of the base. Either way, this would've been an ABSOLUTELY BEAUTIFUL storm with a little daylight. As far as I know there was no wind damage from this storm so my guess is that there wasnt one. Or if there was, again it would've been brief, weak, and not photogenic (sounds familiar, right? cough2009cankissmyasscough). Anyways, a cool storm and fun chase regardless of no tornado.

Also, I talked to Todd K. a couple days ago. Talked for a little bit about 8/8/09 and the tornado north of Burkhardt, WI. Official NWS damage survey said that the tornado was 1/4 mile wide which is a good sized tornado. While talking to Todd he said that it may have been closer to 1/2 mile wide, and was widest right as or right after it touched down. Weird....Usually its the other way around with it getting bigger the longer its on the ground. Surprisingly the RFD damage was fairly localized in this area as well. Another thing to note is that no powerlines or poles were broken in the tornado damage area even though the tornado caused significant roof and garage damage and was rated an EF1. On August 19th when I came across the tornado damage in North Branch, MN there were some powerlines and poles down, but it was only rated an EF0. Are the powerlines and poles engineered differently or something in different states? Anyways, just a couple things to chew on.

Lastly, I'm starting production on my 2009 chase DVD. Actually came up with a name for this year so it will be "Mother Nature Rage and Grace II: Two Thousand and None". Will have a trailer up sometime this week hopefully. Right now hoping to get it done by early December but it may take a little longer to finish as I am still getting used to my new video editing software. Also, I'll try to get some video grabs of the 8/8/09 wall cloud and 8/2/09 storm. Any suggestions on how to get video grabs? Do you do it in the video software?

Some more pics

Blah, a real lack of ANYTHING to talk about lately hence the lack of blog posts. But figured I'd update with some more pics I never got posted during the chase season. Here's a few, will post more throughout the winter in an attempt to keep myself sane until next season. Not the greatest of pics but enjoy!


June 17th in southern Minnesota:


These are from July 27th in southwest Wisconsin (yes, southwest Wisconsin, the epitimy of horrible chase terrain in the central US)
It was a frustrating chase as I started out behind the storms and didn't get out in front of them until they had merged together and started to line out. But there is something interesting in this first pic, this was taken shortly after the tornado was reported near Mount Sterling. The base is obviously very unorganized and to be honest I'm not even sure this is the same storm. There was a bunch of little crap going up all around the main storm I was trying to get on so this may have been one of those. Anyways, a little knub with some scud in what appeared to be the right area for the updraft. Feel free to leave a comment as to what you think it is.


Lastly, gotta love chasing in Wisconsin. And to think this was about the best view I had of anything all day. As things are lining out:

July 14th out in southwest Minnesota just outside of Pipestone. Shelf cloud on a line while tornadic storms are raging about 90 minutes west of my house. Bill Doms is getting a nice, close up view of the shelf...and rain/wind (according to his report).

Marking my calendar and an unexpected rant about ST

With the lack of any weather to talk about lately and no exciting weather to talk about in the foreseeable future thought I would update with some other things.
Number one is for the first time in probably 3-4 years I will be going to a Minnesota Wild game! Marking my calendar for Feb. 10. We already got the tickets so we dont have to wait and hope some tickets open up. Section 215 against the Coyotes! And as a bonus it's the end of the rink the Wild shoot at twice. Section 215 is the upper corner but there is not a bad seat anywhere at the Xcel so I don't really care where we sit. Going with a couple of friends for my birthday as well as my friend's girlfriend who coincidently has the exact same bday as I do. So really looking forward to that!

Also looking forward to the F5 get together in Big Lake on Oct. 17th. Should be a great time with some great people. Still have to make my 5 minute movie for it but that shouldn't be a problem since even colleges give us MEA break so I will have time to do it next week.

I'm also writing an english paper on chasing. It's a division/classification paper and is a bit of a satire so I will post that when I get it done and my grade back on it.

And lastly, people over at ST still really have their panties in a bunch for some reason. It's been over a week of bitching about content posted their. Admittadely there was a pretty retarded thread started there a day or two ago that I couldnt believe someone actually posted, but all this bitching started way before that thread was posted. So, TO ALL PEOPLE WHO HAVE THEIR PANTIES IN A GIGANTIC WAD AT ST: STFU!
The motto "If you dont like it then dont read it" works great for me, I dont see how so many other people have such an incredibly hard time with it. And even if it's that tough for you then just forget about it! Are we REALLY gonna bitch and moan for every thread that we dont like? C'mon people, we're bigger than that. I thought last winter was bad, this winter is gonna be even worse hands down at this rate. I just do not get people sometimes.

Anyways, didn't mean to get in to a rant, just wanted to share the news about the Wild game and look at what ST ended up doing to me. Whatever, Feb.10, I know where I'm gonna be!

Entertainment at Stormtrack

Wow what a fun couple of days it's been over at Stormtrack. It seems SDS has already taken over a majority of the members with an effect of a series of flame wars. It started last night in a topic about Reed Timmer and people who were on both sides of liking him. Unfortunately, I didn't see it until the mods had gone through and gotten rid of the worst posts but there still some amusing ones in there. A lot of history and bad blood in that thread which I have no clue about so I'll stop here about that thread.

This morning Bob Hartig posted a thread about civility since the flame war on Monday night got so out of hand, and it was FAR from the first one, but also FAR from the last. It didn't take long for this thread to go down the exact same road as the thread on Monday night. This time, IMO, it's even more heated than last night's war. I lost some respect for some people but then again maybe that proves how little I knew them. Even still, you'd hope people would be bigger than some of them were in these threads. But for the rest of us it's fun to kick back and watch everything unfold. Hopefully the mods don't lock it soon since it'll be entertaining.

One thing I do have to say is that Tim and the mods at ST don't deserve to have to put up with this shit, but then again what did they expect when they took on that responsibility? Funny how the mods let these threads go sometimes too. It's gonna be a long and interesting winter.

North Shore Pics

Here's 4 pics I got from the North Shore on Wednesday. I didnt have as much time as I would've liked thanks to a traffic backup in which I went 3 miles in 50 minutes. Anyways I made it to Gooseberry and Tetagouche. Had to stop in Duluth to pick up a new memory card so didnt want to drive back south to Jay Cooke just to head back north. So I've taken too long getting these pics up so here they are:

Gooseberry:







Tetagouche:




I have more pics to go through and will post them when I get time, probably on Wednesday. But maybe not, its supposed to be nice again this Wednesday so I may head out somewhere again. We'll see.

North Shore Day Trip Wednesday

Planning on heading up to the North Shore tomorrow after class to get some of the early fall colors. I know that the colors are only getting going but with the forecast looking so good I can't say no to a trip. Gonna hit Gooseberry for sure, try and get Tetagouche too or maybe head up to Lutsen or Grand Marais. I dont get out of class till 10:50 so I wont get up there till after 12:00 but should still have plenty of time to mess around up there. I also want to head out next Wednesday if the forecast is good, not sure if it will be to the North Shore again or somewhere else. Anyone have suggestions for other nice state/national parks around Minnesota? Preferably ones with rivers/streams/waterfalls or overlooks?

Update...I guess

Haven't posted much lately, but then again there hasnt been much to talk about. No storms, haven't done much photography. One thing to note is I have started work on Mother Nature Rage and Grace Vol. II now that 2009 is pretty much officially over. Not a bad season, I think I made the best of what was given. 11 chases, over 8000 miles, lots of tornado warnings, only a couple brief tornadoes, but that seems like what everyone else is saying about this season. Not a ton else to say, gonna try to make a trip to the arrowhead/north shore of Lake Superior here in a couple weeks to get some pics of the fall colors. Hopefully the weather cooperates and I can get up there. Otherwise will have to stick around here, which has worked out the last couple years. Still a lot of work to do on my website midwestchaser.com but that'll come together this winter. So, to have something that is actually of interest to anyone reading this here is a couple of pictures from chase season 2009 that I never posted. Enjoy!

Shelf cloud trying to overtake me on July 14th just outside of Pipestone, MN.


Incredible mammatus show on the way home on July 14th down near Worthington, MN. Just another example of why I need a superwide angle lens.