As I left Pratt in the morning it was pretty much clear, other than a band of mid-level clouds to the east and north. I was behind the dryline, but about to punch ne back across it to Hutchinson. Just before Hutchinson, these early cu started to form ahead of the front. It was only 8:30 or so. It was cool to watch the sun's effects on the moisture just ahead of the front. Before long these cu were much fatter and covering more of the sky.
I'm now at McPherson looking se at the first convection of the day. This was before 11 a.m.
I moved east to highway 15 and watched the storm to the south move north. This shot is looking west from this location. It was cool to be able to see this entire arc of convection firing on the drypunch. I assume that one way west was the stuff out by Hays. But anyway, you can follow it from the first tower at the left arrow moving to the right, on around to the stuff right infront of me.
The south storm soon became tornado warned but nothing much was ever noted with it. I met up with Steve Peterson around this time. It was interesting trying to find the blacktop out of Romona(think that was the town). If we took the fatter line that was on the gps I think we'd still be stuck in the mud. In this above picture we are going back west to highway 15(think we just left Hope). This storm had a better base just before this, then soon got that beavertail'ish thing to the nne of it. It would soon be tornado warned.
Going north on 15 now. This thing was excessively blasted over.
I'm now going east towards Johnston KS. Notice the dots towards the top. That is small hail and rain coming out of another updraft on the arc to the se of this one. This storm got another strong plume up the southern end of it. As this happened a funnel formed below.
You can see the nub funnel in the center of the image.
I drove west for an intercept if it wanted to do it, but it didn't.
The base was pretty round but looking colder and colder.
I'm now just outside of Solomon getting hailed on from this storm.
I go north of Solomon and Steve soon pulls up again. On radar this storm was now starting to go more west than anything. You could see it changing, with some curling on the west side of the base, and an east to west cutting rfd on the left side of the image(looking south here towards Solomon). I noted it at the time, but figured this had been happening all day. Meanwhile some storms were moving up towards Manhatten and Topeka. One storm was turning right on the front, but having to eat stuff ahead of it. I began to wonder if that storm would become the storm to be on. Also of concern was beating the snow storm home in my Mustang. So I opt to leave this one and blast east on I-70. As I get back to the interstate I see lots of chasers watching it. The second I get eastbound I look back nw and see this nub funnel poking down. Then I look back again and it's gone. Then I look back again and lowerings galore are going on. Great! I'm now eastbound. I was like, well gee aren't I the idiot. I was thinking I just royally screwed up. I get off at Abilene and go north a bit, trying to watch the storm. It was still doing all sorts of stuff underneath. I then say screw it, it will just do what it is going to do, I'm continuing east. So I go east again and Steve calls and says, "You didn't leave did you?" I said, yeah I did, and I can see I screwed up. He was smart and just went north first for a bit, with the option to go east later. He informs me it's corkscrewing hard now, so I stop at the next exit and drive all the way back to Solomon. I catch it to the nw a bit and it is crossing into cold air and croaking. Not to wish bad on other chasers, but I'm glad I didn't miss a nice tube. I deserved to. It's always hard playing this game of when to leave and when not to. I used to never leave things in the past unless it was clear it was toast. Now with better, more constant data, I find myself leaving things all the time. You never felt like you were missing all that much when you didn't really know what else was out there.
Here is the storm looking back west from Abilene, before I made the drive back to it.
Here it is during the drive back. It was the first storm I seen all day that was able to backshear.
Here is me stuck in Lincoln. My first worry came in Beatrice when extremely wet snowflakes(hard to even tell they were snowflakes) and sleet came down hard enough to ice up my driver's side wiper. At that point I didn't figure I'd make it home in my car. Then it let up some and changed back to rain. So I try for Lincoln. I was soon wishing I'd just stayed in Beatrice. I hit one section that was covered in sleet and quite slick, then I got past that. Then about 10 miles south of Lincoln I hit an extremely slick area with thunder sleet happening. There were already 3 cars in the median trying to get out. I luck out and make it to the gas station south of town, on the east side of 77. I'm not sure my car would have driven up the incline at the stop light to get there had I not been able to keep it rolling. The troubling part of this was I realized I'd have to sleep in my car here, if I couldn't get the rest of the way into Lincoln. I park so that I could watch the highway, hoping it would soon improve. The sleet let up and after a bit, traffic started to increase again. I gave it a bit then tried for the last 8 miles to Lincoln. It wasn't too bad once I got out of where that sleet storm had gone through. By the time I reach Lincoln, massive flakes are coming down, with thunder. I say screw it at that point and get a room. Judging by the amount of cars off the road between Omaha and Lincoln, I'm glad I did. On the way home the next day, I counted 14 just between Lincoln and Waverly. My parents drove to Lincoln and said they counted 78 between Omaha and Lincoln.
Note on motels/travel: So I go to get this room at the Econo Lodge. One problem, they say my card won't work and is reporting suspicious activity and I need to call some number. This certainly isn't the first time. They do this every year. What is suspicious activity? Buying two tanks of gas and one motel room evidently. Is that what a crook does? Seems to me they'd probably want something worth a bit more for their trouble. I guess one just has to call them each time they travel. That or just don't use them. Usually whenever they've done this in the past, I had a voice mail at home. This time I returned to no voice mail. I guess I'd better call and go through the steps again. I've heard others that call ahead of time still get the same problems and have to do all the calling. Is travelling and buying gas and motels with a credit card that out of the norm nowadays?
This motel did have a good shower head height, unlike the one at my chin(I'm 5' 9) the night before. The water pressure was something else. You had to lean into it so it didn't blow you over and through the wall.
Was this chase the last 2 days worth it? No. Should have known it is too early. Fall for the same things each and every year. Good thing is there's a whole lot of time to fall for more of them!