Neva took me to the Twins Game last night and it was fun but I still don’t like baseball that much. Sorry, I just don’t see the thrill in it just like some people look at storm chasing and say “It’s Just The Weather”.
Well the seats were next to where the pitchers warm up and we were in the front row right next to where they were throwing from mound. I don’t think they liked it when I said “I have stood in faster winds in a hurricane, I want to see at least Cat 3 or faster!” Neva said they heard me from the look she got.
At the MN Twins game in the Metro Dome.
Here is a photo from the game. It was fun but Baseball, it’s just not my thing I guess. I’ll go again because I get to relax and veg a little with Neva but to compare Storm Chasing to Baseball, it’s like sitting out in the middle of a field in Kansas waiting for the cap to break and then it never does, just hour of watching your chase partners goof off.
Just working from home today and was hoping to get a much needed brain dead time to sit back and veg and go work out but that’s not going to happen today. The forecast for tonight in Minnesota is for a chance of snow now. And I thought we were done but I guess the snow is caused by this global warming stuff, oh wait, snow is cold… Oh well, it’s just another tax on us poor people.
Wow this is going to get chilly up here for the next few days per the GFS forecast.
Ok, off to try and make it to the gym to work out.
This week has been pretty insane. I had a lot of work to do with paperwork that I was hoping to get a jump start on last weekend but could not and then on Monday just when I thought I was going to get a chance to sit down at my desk and get caught up, Bill calls and said that Jesse caught the VA tornadoes.
Chesapeake, VA Tornado – 4/28/2008
Wow, well that was pretty insane as this was the top story for the world on Monday and I was dealing with all the networks for Jesse to make sure his copyrights was protected while still making sure he was able to get paid for the video.
That was a lot of work and then on top of that I had more DEE DEE DEE chaser drama to deal with.
Sometimes it amazes me at how stupid people are. Well at least the
clock as struck 15:01 as in your fifteen minutes are over, please go
away now.
Well, I did put that fire out and today I actually got some sleep and then was able to finish up my stack of paperwork.
Now it’s time to relax and see what tomorrow will bring with the forecast. Looks like a possible chase day on hand, but then again, it also looks kind of hyped. Etherway, I’m going to get a rare full nights sleep at a normal time for once.
I just got back to Neva’s after a pretty interesting evening and
night chasing the blizzard warned storm up by Fergus Falls MN. The
winds were strong but not as insane or intense as the last blizzard that
I chase 15 days ago up in Duluth but the snow pack was insane and the
amount of snow was intense. It is a now five days before the month of
May and you could go and “Snow Mobile” around Fergus Falls MN if you
wanted to this weekend.
Ok, time to call it a night and get some sleep.
Here is the video blog from the chase. Check out the very first shot. That snow pile is HUGE and this is not the lite fluffy snow but the stuff that is like concrete. At least it will be gone in a week but then comes the flooding.
Last night was interesting. I went to Iowa to storm chase and have some bugs to work out with the severe storm chasing with some new gear setups. Data, well the data was kind of an issue in Iowa but it has always been in issue along I35 in Iowa.
But my forecast area that I went over with Tony with the new computer model data he got his hands on and let me in on, it totally worked out. And people wondered what the BNVN secret was, it’s just better forecasting.
My target was for just south of Mason City around the Dow’s area around sunset.
Sure enough, this is what fired up.
BULLETIN – EAS ACTIVATION REQUESTED TORNADO WARNING NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE DES MOINES IA 835 PM CDT THU APR 24 2008
THE NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE IN DES MOINES HAS ISSUED A
* TORNADO WARNING FOR… NORTHEASTERN HAMILTON COUNTY IN CENTRAL IOWA… NORTHWESTERN HARDIN COUNTY IN CENTRAL IOWA… SOUTHWESTERN FRANKLIN COUNTY IN NORTH CENTRAL IOWA… SOUTHEASTERN WRIGHT COUNTY IN NORTH CENTRAL IOWA…
* UNTIL 915 PM CDT.
* AT 832 PM CDT…NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE DOPPLER RADAR INDICATED A SEVERE THUNDERSTORM CAPABLE OF PRODUCING A TORNADO 9 MILES SOUTHWEST OF DOWS…OR 28 MILES EAST OF FORT DODGE…MOVING EAST AT 23 MPH.
* THE TORNADO WILL BE NEAR… DOWS BY 850 PM CDT… POPEJOY BY 900 PM CDT…
THIS TORNADO WARNING REPLACES THE SEVERE THUNDERSTORM WARNING THAT WAS IN EFFECT FOR THE SAME AREA. GO TO A BASEMENT OR SMALL INTERIOR ROOM ON THE LOWEST FLOOR!
Sure enough, the forecast verified and I was sitting under this beast as it when the tornado warning was issued. I’m not sure since the visibility sucked but I think I got hit by some strong RFD winds that slammed my truck while I was watching what looked like a funnel back-lit by the lightning about a half mile or so away. But I can’t confirm it since this was a mega heavy rain beast, so as they say on the show Myth Busters, this was a “Plausible” tornado intercept since it was tornado chasing after dark. Plausible since I think I saw a funnel back lit and I got cored with hail, high winds and a ton of heavy rain at night when it’s the most dangerous time to chase.
Here are some screen caps from this chase. The main problem with this chase was that it really was not that photogenic.
Here is a vid cap from the dash camera of the lightning. Most of the lightning I saw was in the clouds so you could not see much for cloud to ground blots. Also there is some lowering I saw on the way to the chase near Albert Lea MN. It looked cool for about a minute then it just looked like crap and I was back to my target area in Iowa.
This was from the first wave of storms to hit the Dows Iowa area. This is a vid cap I did since I was spending most of my time looking around to make sure I was not going to die from Baseball sized hail that the radar was reporting. Below are more screen caps from the chase.
Ok, now it is time for me to get some sleep then wake up around noon and drive up to the US / Canada Boarder area to chase the winter storm. Looks like over a foot of snow up north and I want to be able to chase a tornado or tornadic warned storm one day and then a major winter storm the next. Nothing is more insane or intense then being able to get right into the mix of all of the different types of weather.
Just wondering, with the price of everything going up, what have you cut back on buying in the last few months?
Me, two years ago, you could find me at a Starbucks blowing $5 a day on coffee, everyday. Now, No way will I go in unless I’m having a caffeine withdrawal while on the road.
I did not give up on my coffee, I just buy it in bulk and brew my own
a coffee and make a mean cup at home now for $10 a pound which lasts
about a week.
So at with the Starbucks cut out, I don’t spend $1825 (est) per year on coffee.
Yeah that’s a lot of coffee.
Also, watch ABC 20/20 tonight because they are doing a tornado myth
show and they picked up a ton of footage from BNVN for their show
tonight.
Well, I’m off to get a nap in before I head up north for the weekend with Neva.
There was a great show on ABC 2020 tonight about weather myths.
It was cut a little short due to the stuff happening in Texas
with the Polygamy news story but that was no surprise to me since I got a
call this afternoon from one of the producers saying that there going
to air some other footage later in the year with another story because
of the Polygamy scandal story taking up a big chunk of the first part of
the show.
Otherwise, I’m just busting ass with working on stuff here and
got a ton of stuff off my to-do list. It feels good to get this stuff
done after working on it for six months. Soon the new site will be
launched and I’ll have the new home for BNVN up and running.
I spent most of the time shooting video for KSTP in Minneapolis and the networks since this was a major event hitting in Mid April. If were suppose to have global warming, why am I chasing a blizzard in April when I’m suppose to be chasing tornadoes? Oh yeah, I forgot, it’s not “Global Warming” it is now Climate Change or as I like to call it, Climate Tax.
4/10/2008 Winter Storm Slams Duluth, MN
This chase took a lot out of me since the drive was freaking intense
just to get up to Duluth, MN from Minneapolis, MN I left my place
around 5:00 in the afternoon to head up north since I was waiting around
for my new computer parts and did not get much sleep the night before.
Honestly, I almost opted to stay home and focus on the local area
instead of heading up north since the Twin Cities was under a Winter
Storm Warning. I was thinking why drive 200 miles up north when you
could get snow right in town. But after looking at the latest forecast
models and surface observations all day to forecast when and where this
event was going to happen, I went with my original forecast and headed
up north.
Rush hour traffic sucked to say the least but when I got to the north side of town is when the real hazards started, the sleet.
From the north side of the metro around North Branch, MN to Moose
Lake, MN the roads really started to get bad as I was following and now
in the freezing line of the storm system where it changed from rain to
sleet and heavy wet snow. There was a lot of cars in the ditch and I
even saw what looked like a Tour Bus or Large RV in the ditch at one
point.
When I stopped for gas in Barnum, saw a BMW in the ditch and stopped
to shoot some footage. I think they had a new tow truck driver helping
them out since he did not hook up the car correctly and I could hear
plastic snapping as he was pulling out the car. How could I tell? He
was using the cable from on top of the boom which at the angle of the
cable was pushing up against the bottom of the front of the car causing
it to damage the cars front ground effects.
Anyways, the stop in Barnum MN was a good thing since I was able to
winterize myself and change into the space suit I pretty much wear all
the time for chasing the intense cold. And it was good for me because
as soon as I left this scene, I got back on Interstate 35 and a few
miles down the road just outside of Duluth, I came across a 18 Wheel
Semi Truck that jacked knifed about a mile ahead of me. As I got up on
the scene I found it was blocking both lanes of Interstate 35. I
stopped and another trucker was there to help light up the wreck so
drivers would not run into the trailer. I talked to the driver who
looked kind of pissed that I was not the state patrol but a news
cameraman there too shoot video. Only his pride was hurt so I talked to
the other truck driver who stopped and he asked if I could stay until
the State Patrol showed up on the scene. So I lite the area up with all
my flood lights on the front of the Jeep and then shot a bunch of video
and snapped a few photos of the jack knifed semi until the state patrol
showed up. The trooped thanked me for flood lightning the scene to
help warn everyone else and then I was back on my way to Duluth.
Now I made it to Duluth before the snow started to fall but the winds
were screaming with reports of sustained winds in the upper 40s and
gusts to over 60 miles per hour. But it did not take long for the snow
to start falling and it was not the lite fluffy snow but the heavy wet
concrete like snow that is the worst to deal with. Even though the snow
was the nasty heavy snow, this is all going to melt in a few weeks and
help raise Lake Superior which has been dealing with a drought for a
couple years.
The winds and waves were pretty intense during the over night hours and I broke off the chase about two in the morning to start editing and uploading footage to KSTP and the networks. I thought I was going to be able to get the video out and get some sleep by 3am but those planes were scrapped now that I got the footage out because now I was seeing thunder snow and power flashes form the heavy snow and high winds snapping power lines. When I got back from shooting some more footage for the station and the networks, I was staying up way past the point of being insane sleep deprivation and still had to do some phone interviews. Neva said I sound good but very tired on TV but hey, I was up all night and into the next day. It was pretty funny while I was doing the interview for The Weather Channel because I called it a frozen tropical storm and it was just like a tropical chase since I was now sitting in my hotel room, in the dark without power since the storm knocked out the power. I did have one of my powerful LED lights with that I use for scuba diving. That lit the room up pretty good while I waited around for the sun to rise.
All in all, it was a great chase but the down side of this chase was that I made the mistake of not bringing along a lot of paper towels to keep things dry and was using some hand towels. Yeah, fabric softener and camera lenses don’t like each other… And I forgot to bring along some food from home. Nothing special but anything would have been better then the food I ate… I had McCrap for two meals yesterday and today I feel like I have a McHangover with a massive headache from lack of sleep and eating bad.
Ok, not much sleep but the laptop has been rebuilt and is ready to go.
I’m just checking the weather obs and this is just in from Mason City Iowa. There reporting a wind gust of 49 miles per hour. That’s strong tropical storm force winds.
Mason City Municipal Airport Lat: 43.16 Lon: -93.33 Elev: 1194 Last Update on Apr 10, 12:53 pm CDT
Right now I’m on standby to head to Duluth for this setup but since the weather is not going to hit up there until tonight and tomorrow, it may hit Minneapolis today and then Duluth tomorrow. Also as promised, I’m also importing the photos from the last 2 weeks to get things caught up there before it gets anymore out of control.Oh and before I forget, I was the guest speaker with Adam Frederick, KIMT-TV Chief Meteorologist and long time storm chaser http://www.severewx.com/. We gave a speech at the Midwest Journalism Conference that was held on March 28th and 29th. Adam gave a great talk about severe weather forecasting and in my book, one of the best Skywarn Training for the media to show the reporters and news directors. I gave a talk about what it is like in the field while chasing all the different weather and the hazards in chasing.
Chief Meteorologist Adam Fredrick from KIMT TV speaking at the Midwest Journalism Conference.Adam and I talking about the weatherMe speaking at the Midwest Journalism Conference.
Well, that’s pretty much an update for now. Oh and yes, the laptop is up and running just fine as I’m typing on it. The rain just started here so I have to get ready to head up north for the Blizzard.
