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A slow moving boundary pushed south through the area and was prog'd to stall in se NE, nc KS. There was pretty good moisture to the south of it and 30 knots at 500mb aloft...good enough to get me out the door. This shot is on the north side of Beatrice NE at the Holiday Inn Express. This growing tower to my ne seemed to be flipping me off, so I took its picture. I head east out of town to keep this in reach and it croaks. I then try to head south for stuff going up near Concordia KS. Rather than driving west back into Beatrice I try to get to 77 by using gravel roads. Back to back my road does not continue through like was being shown on the GPS. So I dig out my delorme map of NE and find a paved road that would. The delorme map had these roads correct. Man GPS(street atlas) mapping can piss me off sometimes. It loves to have roads on it that aren't actually there. As I near Marysville KS I see train crossing arms coming down. Ug! Rather than driving around them real quick I decide to wait. A few minutes later I get through there and come to highway 36. As I get to this highway to turn right/west I see a cop going east down the hill towards me. He hits the intersection the same time as I do. Seeing him right there in front of me I make sure to stop completely. I stop and go and he flips around behind me and turns his lights on. I ask him what he is pulling me over for and he says, "you rolled through that stop sigh." I said, "ummmm, no." I was like, I know how to roll through a stop sign and that was not it. He proceeds to write me a ticket which comes to $120. I'm still pissed because I made it a point to stop. Did I stop for 3 full seconds? No. Had I known Officer Anal was the cop right in front of me, looking right at me, I would have sat there for a freaking full minute. I've managed to go 3 years with no tickets to wind up getting 2 of the dumbest ones in my life in a months time(other was being stopped and ticketed for no seatbelt while in IL). It seems funny to me I get a ticket turning right(after a brief complete stop) at an empty 4 lane highway from a cop watching me while he makes his turn across the westbound lanes. I'm sure I had a better look at westbound traffic than he did. But whatever, I didn't stop for 3 seconds, I broke the law. I will say I made it a point to roll through as many signs as I could the rest of the night.
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After the several delays I get to a severe warned storm nw of Clifton KS. Spotters were reporting 3 inch hail with the storm. The problem was a storm right behind it raining into it now.
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I imagine the storm would have been nice had it not been getting rained on from behind. I stick with it for a bit since the lead storm always seems to be the one that does the best. It didn't improve though and I began to lose hope for it. So, I jump east and drop south towards Clay Center. Not far into this move the one to the sw becomes tornado warned.
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Now south of Clay Center, shot looking east at the mammatus display downstream from the storms.
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The tornado warmed storm never looked that great. It kept backbuilding to the sw as it moved south. I had a brief glimpse of the udraft above this and the storm was pretty multicellular. Having no real inflow was really hurting this storm.
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This big cow comes over making all sorts of noise. I chatted with him a bit and tried to relate my chasing pains to his life pains. I let him and the other one know they didn't have to worry about this storm as it was taking a dump. Right as I say this he lifts his tail up in the air and proceeds to take a dump as well(I imagine, I couldn't get any visual). It was pretty symbolic of 2006. Dumps all around.
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It was much more intense in the storm that it appeared it would be. I headed north hoping to catch any mammatus display before all sunlight was gone. I had to punch through the severe warned storm to do so. The above is a video capture on the highway south of Clay Center. I had just stopped and thought it would be ok to continue north. Right as I get back on(image here) visibility goes bye bye. I end up stopping a couple times on the highway as I had no choice. I didn't figure anyone would run into me as surely they couldn't see any better to be able to. Losing sight of that white line on the side is certainly no fun. I really wished I had sat where I was longer. It looks quite dark at this time but the sun hasn't even set yet.
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I'm north of Clay Center a ways now. The sun set on my way to this location. This was snapped while doing 60(I wasn't out of anvil precip enough yet and couldn't pass up this farm and scene). I removed a closer object that blurred on the left side of this image. I very very rarely will remove an object. I just don't shoot settings if something is going to be a distraction(or at least I really try not to). I dread the day I get a close tornado and don't have time to find a spot clear of powerpoles. I honestly don't know that I can force myself to shoot something with powerpoles all over in the way.
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Ahhh, nothing beats twilight shooting. Things are still lit up and yet they dynamic range is much much smaller. It is easily the best time to shoot they sky.
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Even with the light being lower, if there is still much of any light, getting lightning in a shot can be somewhat tough. The sky blurring quickly becomes a problem as the light gets lower. I think I stopped a few of these down so the DOF would be better(which didn't help the sky).
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One thing I'm going to be more aware of from now on is how close I park to the highway. I find traffic lights don't add much to twilight settings. I guess it depends, but most of the time they don't. All it would take is driving 1-2 miles off the highway you are on(well not always). I had serious reservations of even being this far onto this road. The road I'm on isn't really wide enough for two cars. It seemed more dirt than gravel. It was also wet. So, all in all not a horrible chase, though not great by any stretch. It would have been sooooo much nicer without that big fat ticket. That really killed it. I was cussing again as I got closer to home as I started to think about it again. I'm surely stupid for not stopping for 3 seconds. I remember thinking to myself to stop, but don't do it too well as then he'll just think I'm hiding something. It is funny how that happens sometimes. You try to do things right but not too right. I remember that crossing my mind as I tried to do the stop right enough. I could see him staring at me the whole time we came to meet at that intersection. I imagine driving a Mustang doesn't help my cause any. |
