On June 12th, a rare HIGH RISK was issued for portions of northern Illinois as conditions looked to be coming together for tornadoes and a potential derecho later in the evening. I started the day in Kewanee, IL and by mid morning I was already out the door headed north on IL Rt. 78 with a target near Stockton, IL. I spent the early afternoon in Rochelle, IL (farther east) before progressing west toward my initial target. This day featured a warm front in northern Illinois with a strong cap in place across much of central Illinois. The area along the warm front I was targeting featured 3,000J/kg of CAPE, 0-6km shear at 40kts, a moist boundary-layer with dew points near 72°F, and a supercell composite approaching 16. By mid-afternoon supercells began to develop. I headed south on IL Rt. 78 toward Mt. Carroll, IL getting a good view of a developing supercell. This supercell would not produce a tornado and many storms would struggle initially. Explosive development also occurred farther east toward I-39 and also much farther west in Iowa where some tornadoes touched down. I was quite aggressive on this day with fast storm speeds initially so I tried to keep up with the initial round of supercells that developed and moved east toward I-39, but they quickly became outflow dominate. Unfortunately, before I could get back to my "target-area" along the warm front in northwest Illinois I was already too far out of position. This put me way behind and I called it a chase knowing I'd be giving up a shot at a tornado in the late evening. Indeed the target would later verify with a tornado near Mt. Carroll, IL. Ouch, that one hurt! I still was somewhat happy to get some decent structure and a nice supercell out of northern Illinois. How often can you say that in this area?! I shot a few more pics at sunset as the cold front began to light-up to the west. I've added a few photos and a short time lapse video below:
best structure shots of the season!
horizon at sunset...
I've added a short YouTube time-lapse (above)
Overall, the HIGH RISK actually busted, but I did see a nice supercell on this chase day. Best of all, I was home by sunset which usually is never the case! I ventured out once again on June 14th and I'll update with another post from that chase day accordingly.
