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These images are from east of Meade, Kansas looking north toward the Gray/Ford County storm |
SOUTHERN KANSAS / NORTHERN OKLAHOMA SUPERCELLS
27 MAY 2001
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These images are from east of Meade, Kansas looking north toward the Gray/Ford County storm |
 Spinup at 6:11 PM |
 Same rotation but what is it? |
 More than likely a gustnado |
 The same untornado |
| Then the fun begins. Below are images of
two storms going simultaneously, a large HP to our west and a mothership meso LP with a
Tornado Warning to our east. We're blasting south on Bob's Road directly
between the two cells. |
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From: "Amos Magliocco" Date: Mon May 28, 2001 9:50 am Subject: Sitka, Kansas area supercells |
| Jeff Lawson and I saw three supercells
yesterday, two with RITORs. Many funnels and blocky wall clouds, no tornadoes. However, the last two storms rank among the most amazing I have seen in my life. The first supercell RITOR was near Meade around 5:00 PM (my guess-have to go through GPS log file to confirm exact times and places). This storm separated itself from the line and presented strong inflow and a large wall cloud that was nearly on the ground. Over time, the storm became outflow dominant and morphed into an HP monster with a huge, bright white rain core before it developed yet another updraft region and meso. As we moved south and east to stay in front of this storm, we noticed a distinct updraft/ downdraft interface to our east, with a very flat and smooth circular updraft region. We continued east to keep this new updraft and our old HP storm in sight. We finally took 160 toward Sitka as the new development to the east displayed a large wall cloud and clear midlevel banding. The HP storm, meanwhile, developed large column-like towers along the gust front, with condensation rolling up the front edge like a conveyor belt. We saw at least 10 chasers coming the other way on 160, but we elected to continue east and dove south on a gravel road (we've come to call these types of trails "Bob's Road") out of Ashland. This decision allowed us to stay ahead and between both storms for the next forty minutes, and the two cells became visually stunning. The storm east appeared looked to be sculpted of clay, the clear banding and stacked plate base as if smoothed by human hands. This storm was the second RITOR of the day. We were taping and driving for an hour, massive hail in both storms, watching the cells begin to merge. When they did, the four-tier striated banding stretched around the HP to the west, gracefully curved back to the north to highlight the "notch" or indentation in the line which Jeff and I occupied during our amazing run, then stretched to the west around the mothership meso, sculpted storm. It was the most amazing banding I've ever seen, and we got lots of tape. Finally, Bob's Road stopped going due south and forced us to make a few jogs west and east, and those did us in. The storms had merged into a line and were upon us, so we found a big, reinforced tin shed off the road and pulled into an open bay. At that moment, pea to dime size hail pummeled the metal roof for several minutes, and powerful wind gusts tore apart trees while we rolled tape. We had an amazing chase, and were very grateful that we chose to go east toward Sitka and then south on Bob's Road out of Ashland to stay between these two amazing storms for as long as we did. I can't wait to get home and post the images. But alas, the atmosphere is reloading for today, so we're not done yet. Amos Magliocco |