This year was a two part chase, around an awesome trip down the Colorado river through the Grand Canyon (more on that soon).

Part 1

On May 29, I headed down to Maryland to visit my father and brother and his family, and then drove down to Asheville, NC to see my sister. I left the car there and flew back to NYC for a couple events, then flew back to Asheville and headed west for chasing on June 6, needing to arrive in Flagstaff, Arizona by June 16 to start the Grand Canyon Trip. I did a couple Grand Canyon training hikes along the way and arrived in Dallas on June 7 and picked up my friend Pamela who had flown in.

Note: Click on any photo to enlarge.

June 8

Thursday June 8 was the fist chase day, and it was a very marginal setup. We headed down from Dallas and got on a marginally severe storm down south of Waco, TX and then headed northwest to Abilene and had a nice dinner.

June 9

There wasn't any severe weather within a reasonable chasing distance, so Friday June 9 was a down day. I got my oil changed (over the last several years I’ve had my oil changed in this car in Kansas City, Roswell, and now Abilene). I did a very hot hike along the river, did my laundry, and then we went out for a chicken dinner (complete with chicken dance) at Belle’s Chicken Dinner House which I had stumbled across several years before. After, we visited the bingo hall, saw a tornado (sculpture), checked out a sculpture garden, and went to an upscale bar for a night cap.

June 10

We headed over to south of Dallas/Fort Worth and watched a storm form west of Waxahachie and took refuge under a church awning as the lightning intensified, and as the hail picked up it got a severe warning. Then we headed west again and got on another severe hailer near Weatherford. Then we headed up for a weird dinner in Wichita Falls at a restaurant in an otherwise abandoned building, and then drove through an amazing sunset onto Vernon TX for the night.

June 11

On Sunday June 11 we finally had a great chase day. We got on a couple massive hailstorms from their initiation and first thunderclaps near Wheatland, New Mexico through south of Amarillo, TX where we tried to get south in front of one of the storms and didn't make it, so we rode out some golf ball sized hail in Happy, TX (my car has a bunch of new hail dents now). The sunset on the backside of the storm was incredible. Below is a video that shows a lot more detail about the chase.

June 12

Storm chasing is all about ups and downs, highs and lows. On Monday June 12 I made a few mistakes and it was just totally frustrating. We got a late start because I was fighting my laptop to try and edit photos from the awesome day before, and then drove flat out 250 miles from Amarillo to Doole, TX and once again got on the initiation of the storm of the day before it even showed up on radar. This is my favorite thing; to get there and see the birth of these monster storms. I thought we had it made, and we started tracking the storm east, and then I lost visual on the storm base in the hills and drove into some bad data areas. The next few hours was a frustrating attempt to get back to the base without core punching the storm which now had baseball sized hail. But the storm thwarted us and turned south east. It then got a tornado warning and I could see all my friends on spotter network right in at the base of the storm. Eventually, we gave up and went after the northern storm, but it died and the sun set, while a split from that northern storm went on to pound Dallas with softball size hall. We drove in defeat onto Waco for the night.

June 13

Tuesday June 13 was an excellent chase in the Texas panhandle and made up for the bust the day before. We started out in Waco and pushed almost 500 miles all the way north of Amarillo to Cactus, TX where we finally intercepted the tornado-warned storm. It had been moving slowly and I was agonizingly watching it develop on radar, and over the horizon. Right after we finally got there, it dislodged from whatever boundary it was sitting on it started lining out and accelerating south and south east. We skipped the first east road option in Cactus wanting to avoid the giant hail, and then leap frogged the storm and its awesome shelf cloud and outflow boundary south to Amarillo and then east to Groom where the westward outflow boundary kicked up a new storm right over us which then went severe. It was a 700 mile day but worth it; we ended up back in Amarillo ready to get out of chase mode and head west the next day. Be sure and click some of the photos to see the details.

June 14

I had to get west to get ready for the Grand Canyon trip, so Wednesday June 14 was a 600 mile day, going first from Amarillo to Albuquerque, where I dropped off my chase partner at the airport (after visiting Saul Goodman's office location, of course). And then on the way into Flagstaff, there was a storm, so of course I chased it a bit before heading to my friends' awesome rental house in Sedona for the night and to repack everything for the Grand Canyon trip.

Part 2

After the amazing Grand Canyon trip, it took a day just to decompress get some miles and do some laundry, so I headed east from Flagstaff to Farmington, New Mexico for the night on July 1.

July 2

Storm chasing is often (mostly?) about frustration, and Sunday July 2 was no exception. I started in Farmington in northwest New Mexico and was trying to make it to north of Amarillo before the storms fired. Unfortunately there's a whole lot of mountains and not many roads between those two places, but I was just finally about to punch through the storm line when I hit a multi-mile construction traffic backup and dead stop on I40. I bailed north on one of the few roads, but couldn't get through because...there were very few road options. Thanks to that traffic jam I missed a mini haboob coming south out of Amarillo. But at least I got a nice sunset from my hotel in Dalhart, TX.

July 3

Monday July 3 there wasn’t any reachable severe weather, so I got my tires rotated and ran a bunch of errands before heading to Colby, Kansas to be in position for the next day’s chase setup. Colby's main attraction is "Wheat Jesus" so of course I had to visit. The moon was full as well that night.

July 4

On Tuesday July 4 I headed over from Colby, KS to Burlington, CO to watch for storm initiation. For a couple hours, I sat in a very nice empty park and watched the birds and read a few chapters of a book. I then rode around and spotted some cumulus clouds building back in KS (south of where the models had forecast) and headed for that spot, and that was where I ended up for the afternoon. I got on a few nice severe storms, and spotted a few landspout/gustnados and got to report them to the National Weather Service in Goodland, Kansas. I set up my lightning trigger for a while and right after I decided to move, a huge bolt struck less than a mile away. I got attacked by a swarm of flies that must have thought it was their lucky day to have a mammal show up on their little dirt road. But it was a good chase day and I ended up back in Colby—at the same hotel I had left that morning. Kansas remains my favorite place to storm chase.

July 5

July 5 was one of those days driving down from Colby to my New Mexico target where I was really questioning what I was doing, and wondering if I should just start heading home. And I felt that way...until I got on the first storm. Seeing the base of a strong storm energizes me and makes it all worth it. I got on several different storms east of Trinidad, Colorado, and was watching at first from the New Mexico side. At first was a low precipitation cell, and that fizzled out, and then a big monster hailer developed and got a tornado warning, and then I drove around the backside through a beautiful road about in far north New Mexico as you can get to see the sun on the storms from the west.

July 6

Thursday July 6 wasn't the most photogenic storm day, but it was some intense storm chasing. Or, rather, the storms ended up chasing me. I started out in Trinidad, CO, and with storms forecast to fire late, I took my time and saw the sights in that very cool little town. Then I headed up to my initial target of Limon out in eastern CO, and just as I was about to find a nap spot when a chaser friend from NYC told me that small landspouts had been spotted over near Denver. So I ran up the interstate and got a look at that storm, and then started working my way down near Punkin Center where I sat and watched to see what would develop. The models were showing the strongest storms after sunset, and they were right. As sunset approached, I started heading south since I started out the day pretty tired and didn't want to chase a tornado on dirt roads with softball hail in the dark. The storm got going and it quickly became huge and incredibly powerful. I stopped quickly in a Love's trying to find some food and told the counter guy he was in a tornado watch and showed him on the radar the massive storm on the way (I'm no longer surprised how little awareness people have of the weather). I stopped briefly in Lamar to shoot eerie inflow bands that were rushing into the storm from 25 miles away. It was huge and powerful and seeing the aftermath online the next day I definitely made the right decision blasting east to get out of the path of the storm. I stopped briefly to try to shoot some of the amazing lighting, and a guy drove up and started asking about the storm. This was a little nerve wracking since it was now close to midnight and I was alone out there, but he said he wanted to get to Lamar and I told him not to go that way. About 15 minutes later, the storm showed a massive rotation on radar and went right through Lamar with softball hail. On my way to Garden City, KS I ended up in one of the most intense cloud to ground lightning displays I've ever seen, as a new storm band formed right over me. I raced this storm to my hotel and it finally overran me at about 1 am. I haven't been on a really intense nighttime storm like that in a long time and it was pretty wild.

Heading Home

On Friday July 7, I started heading home, and it’s appropriate that on the way I randomly drove through tiny Rozel, Kansas where I first saw a tornado—an EF-4 at sunset—10 years ago. This storm inspired my first tattoo as well, and a visit here was a good way to wrap up the chasing portion of this trip and begin the long, lonely drive home.

And on Sunday, July 9, while the northeast was flooding, I made the final push home. It’s helpful in these situations to have a lot of radar access and knowledge—at some points I would wait for storms, other times I would race out in front of them.

And, finally, I should give a shout out to my awesome 2021 Toyota RAV 4 Hybrid. It sits for weeks here at home barely driving, and then I do trips like this one, which was more than 9,300 miles in a few weeks. In a little over two and 1/2 years I’ve put almost 45,000 miles on it. It’s been flawless and drives great in anything short of deep snow or mud (or mud that’s like snow, which I encountered this year). The adaptive cruise is great, especially in these intense conditions where I’m processing a lot of information. I had three Subarus before this one but I’m a Toyota guy now.

Finally, being officially early retired now, I’m looking forward to having flexibility to chase more in 2024.

Great Plains Storm Chase 2023