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Hey a fun chase day, what a surprise. I wasn't expecting much this day, but since it was so local and had some things going for it, I opted to chase. I met the outflow boundary in North Sioux City a bit early. The cu up there looked to go anytime, as I left home around 2pm. I get there and they are flattened by area cirrus. I could see that was a decent possibility before leaving, but the area wasn't too thick, so I figured it'd pass and they'd bubble back up. Soon convection was firing se of Sioux Falls, in nw IA, while all the cu west of this area looked like garbage/capped. According to the spc mesoanalysis page, there was a skinny, 45 knot 500mb jet coming into ne NE, atop indicated surface based cape of 4000..."uncapped" cape I might add. Still, the cu looked like crap. The convection in nw Iowa looked like crap too(linear). I had problems keeping my ac running while parked, so I soon had to leave/move. I said screw the convection and headed west into ne Nebraska, hoping maybe at least if something went here it might want to be more isolated. I stop north of Dixon NE and park for about an hour. Steve Peterson showed up about 30 minutes in. All the sudden, a thick area of accas formed in nw IA, west of the convection there....a good sign. It was cool how fast it filled up the area on the satellite loop. It soon reached sw above our boundary(now two boundaries). As this happens the cu finally start to bubble in se SD, to our north and northeast....without much development west of due north. This was a good sign too, as hopefully we could be on the western most storm. Above is one storm due north of us. We watched it slip east, while monitoring the one tower just west of it.
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We're still in the same location, looking north. This is now our western storm, which was beginning to dominate. It wasn't much on radar quite yet, but it had continous thunder with it now. You can barely make out the curling rfd notch to the base(directly over that grain bin and just left). Wasn't much longer and this was severe warned. A problem soon occured, as a line of clouds formed just ahead of these storms. It was annoying, as you couldn't drop south for structure, as they'd start blocking the view. So we played between them as much as we could.
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The storm gets too close to get it in the shot, so we drop south. Our area of clouds south of it let up a little. As we pull over, we can tell our storm is already taking a big dump as it slips to our east, as it drops southeast. It looked so bad, I was having more fun talking to the cattle. This was until something moves under my feet. I've never jumped so bad on chase. There was a lot of smashed down taller grass and whatever it was, it was under there. I looked down as I jumped back and saw the grass move a bit, then nothing. It seemed too big and strong to be a snake, but who knows. Might have been a rat, or maybe it was just a large bull snake. Seemed odd it let me stand there for a half minute or so before deciding to move.
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Well, having nothing else to chase, and this now very garbagy storm moving towards home, the only option was go home with it. Just as we are turning around to get back on the highway, it starts lifting scud pretty good. It was somewhat interesting at the time, but still not enough to bother taking a still of. As we dropped south it continued. After 6 miles or so we had to drive east, to the next option south, about another 7 miles away. As we go east, the wall of scud gets bigger and bigger, and now it had a big curling rfd west of it. It was cutting us off and our only choice was stop, let it pass, and try to catch up again....or....just drive under it the last couple miles, then punch south as it closes in again from the nw. Beings it had looked sooo bad, and it still didn't look close to producing a tornado, we just blasted under it. Neither of us knew at the time the storm had gone tornado warned. Not that that would have mattered much. As we get close to the lowering, the rfd is punching south over head. I'd have to guess the north winds in this were 60mph or more. They were pushing south on the car pretty hard. We could see this curling around to the east, right to the lowering we were becoming more under by the second. I was the lead car(of all 2 of us, lol....only chasers we saw all day). I'm not a big fan of driving under crap that I can see is rapidly changing, but it didn't seem threatening enough, just quite yet. So we are briefly under it, then quickly on the east side of it. This was about a mile from our turn south, when we got on the other side of it. Once we were over there, the winds were hard out of the east. We turn south and I noted some leaves ripping off the trees, going west. That area(that you can't really look at when it's above and behind you and you are driving) we knew was approaching again. Immediately the wind switched to west and buffeted the car a bit. Keeping the peddle down we were quickly out of harms way. I'm sorry, but some of chasing to me IS the thrill of anything like that. It's only good when you are just a bit excited and not really scared. It's no fun when you are scared though, and the times you know when you should be. This wasn't all that spooky really, but it had potential to be lol. The worst cases are simply when you can't see, like at night. I'm not sure what portion of this the above sitll is. I tried to shoot video more than stills, while not driving/being blown/hydroplaning off the road. I did set it down a couple times to try stills. I know this still is looking north. I think it's right when we got east of the main lowering, just east. The hard cutting rfd is pushed south over the highway behind us/left of the shot. This stuff in the shot was pulling back west and lifting up towards that lowered area. Maybe I'll grab a couple video frarmes, but probably not.
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The shot above is 19 minutes after the image before it. It was pretty annoying now, it was moving so quickly. We got ahead of it as we drove south, but again had to punch east so we could go south again. It didn't look as threatening this time, and we also started our east jump earlier than the time before. But anyway, again we're going east, looking back west here.
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We are now dropping south, shot looking west. I don't recall the name of this town. We are nw of Pender, I know that. It was starting to get better again.
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Right before we got out and took these couple quick stills, that lowering towards the right was a lot lower. The whole storm just looked pretty good right now. I thought we were in business.
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You can see one mid-level inflow band curling around to the nw here, along with the rounded base below it. It's just too bad our inflow was so dead now. It would be good, then there'd be no wind, then it'd be ok again. Not long after this, it went down hill again and stayed there. It was a lot more than either of us expected this day, and all in all a pretty enjoyable short chase.
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So, the storm continues to vanish into nothingness. Steve heads south and I head east, both basically driving back home. I've been wanting some lightning with fireworks ops, but not really expecting them. The only lightning producer now were storms well into IA. Our dying one was producing a few yet, but they soon stopped. I also had no idea who was doing fireworks this night and who wasn't. I almost drove south to Oakland Nebraska, then east to Tekamah and home. That's the way I usually go, except coming from West Point most times. I thought what the hell, heading to Decatur with my dying storm isn't going to be any further of a drive. Before Decatur it was dead. As I approach the town I see a couple big boom fireworks(you know, the ones they give you as a heads up the show is about to start). I was like, hmmmmmmmmmmm. Too bad no lightning producers around though! These were to the northeast of me and I wondered if they were from the Casino across the river in Iowa. I reach highway 75 and can drop straight south for home, or go east and pay the toll over the bridge into Iowa and I-29. I was sooooooooo close to dropping south for home. I shot Blair's fireworks the night before and wasn't dying to shoot more. Wound up saying screw it, will go east and see what happens. I turn north into Decatur, then east through town to the bridge. As I'm coming down into the main part of town, boom boom boom, almost directly over head. I thought, oh crap, they are right HERE. What to do, where to pull over...people everywhere. I was just about to the toll thingy, not sure what I was wanting to do. I get there, pay, and head across the bridge, wondering what would be available on the other side. Turns out there were few cars over there, and a decent area to pull off on. So I stop, slap my camera to my window and start shooting. I soon noticed what looked like a tower(storm) to the northwest. I kept watching it, hoping for the obvious, but no such luck.
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Not long into this.....sprinkles! Arrrrrrggghhh. My dying storm had a few sprinkles left for me I guess. Funny you can enjoy a storm that long and have it later sprinkle on you and your camera, as you try to shoot a cool scene. So I'm dealing with the sprinkles when I notice.......a........FLICKER! My little tower that couldn't, actually could. I saw the one here, then nothing for about another minute.
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Once I saw the flicker I pretty much did not care what the fireworks wanted for an exposure. I cared about what the lightning needed. I figured at least all the way open at F4 and probably at least ISO to 200. I thought most of the fireworks could handle that, but would go downhill fast if I ISO'd up past that.
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Turned out the combination worked fairly well for both. Then toss in some longer exposure twilight sunset colors, and you got yourself one odd scene.
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If only I could control the fireworks. I always want to yell, "Slow down or spread them around!" This is especially true when you are wanting a bolt of lightning with them.
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I don't know what kind of cracker that is at the top there, but it sure was putting out some red light. Notice someone else over there wanting in on the fun, with their fireworks. I have no clue what is making that storm look so green on this shot. To make a digital image the pixels use different amounts of red, green, and blue on a scale of 0 to 255, with 0 being completely black and 255 being completely white. That's when all three are all 0 or all 255. If you have red = 100, blue = 100, and green = 100....you'd have a middle shade of gray. So when all are equal you have a shade of gray from black to white. But when they aren't equal they are making up some color. For instance, if I open the image in photoshop and cursor over it up there around that red area, I see the values are around....red = 229, blue = 44, and green = 55. That area obviously is leaning heavily towards red, hence those values when looking at "info". Why am I saying all this? Well you'd expect that green looking area of the storm to lean towards green when looking at the info. It looks slightly green on screen, that's for sure. Well it must be some trick on the eyes, maybe cause that red is on there, I don't know. When I cursor over it I see all the values are near grey(all close to equal), and they even side slightly away from green. For instance here is an example of a few pixels in that area. Red = 44, blue = 43, and green = 42. All the pixels I moved the cursor over had green the lowest. They are all a lower number since it is closer to black(shadows) than it is to white(highlights). But they sure don't side with green like it looks like they should. Anyway... Half way into this, it was actually sprinkling pretty good. It was almost a rain. I think the slight sw winds kept most of them off the lens, or the lack of much wind where I was.
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Notice the same kind of cracker putting off two bright red flashes.
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Ahhhhhh, an actual bolt. That's what I was really hoping for. The red line on the highway is obviously tail lights on a passing car, for anyone wondering.
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I think I smacked my head and said, "doh" outloud, when I saw that bolt, knowing my shutter was open. The storm was a lot more active now, but the far majority were just in-cloud flashes. I was snapping away left and right and think I only missed one bolt while checking the lens. This was likely around when it was really sprinking good. I kept thinking they were going to cancel the rest of the show. I was having to restrain myself from cheering about this point. I'm a pretty quiet person, but man it was rather cool. This above is at 25mm. The fireworks aren't that far away, and neither is that storm. It was something to see them almost playing off each other now, side by side.
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Finale!
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Or so I thought!
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Finale! If you look real close you can see a rain drop reflection from about that stop sign and to the right. I was in sprinkles for the majoirty of the show, and only my last couple shots of the finale had that drop on there. An all around very lucky, scene and shoot. What a show. Thank you mother nature....and Decatur!
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