Last Wednesday, I woke up in Kansas City, MO hoping this chase day my 2011 bad luck would turn around. I got out the door pretty early heading east along U.S. 36 targeting Columbia, MO where it appeared discrete tornadic supercells would form and be fairly long-tracked. The conditions present on this chase day were fairly similar to the previous day in Oklahoma just further east. This was another high risk day, but after having an annoying high risk chase the day before I chose to stay away from the high risk-area as much as possible. I chose an area along I-70 that quickly was destabilizing with conditions quite favorable for supercells and tornadoes with 2,500J/kg of CAPE, 0-6km shear at 50kts, a moist boundary-layer and backing winds at the surface, and low LCL's around 750m. I wanted to blast back west along I-70 to intercept a tornadic supercell near Sedalia, MO early on however, I made a good decision to turn around as I noticed a few "blips" along a remnant outflow boundary back east along I-70. These "blips" would later become supercells and produce a few brief tornadoes. Luckily, this day I was in perfect position and made the right decision by staying-put near my target. I sat south of Kingdom City, MO just south of I-70 watching many areas-of-interest as the supercell tried many times to produce a tornado with multiple funnel cloud attempts it finally dropped a cone tornado along a good ole' Missouri tree line. Damn Missouri trees! I did witness a brief touchdown along I-70 as I repositioned and caught a nice occluding rope tornado on the backside of the mesocyclone. After the occlusion the supercell tried once more to produce near Mexico, MO as it produced another cone funnel, but it quickly would dissipate as convection from the south cut off its moist inflow. Soon after I quickly traversed across Missouri into Illinois as it looked like some of the more favorable conditions were progressing into Illinois. I managed to cross the Mississippi River and get on I-72 where I found another supercell rotating near Winchester, IL that produced yet another funnel before becoming largely outflow dominate. At this point I called it a chase ending a 2-day chase trip on a successful note. Photos and some time-lapse video can be found below:
Distant clear as day cone tornado a few miles away along I-70 that did produce some damage...
First attempt...cone funnel! (center)
Cone funnel...(right) (luckily I had some time-lapse going at this time)
Rapid rotation (center) as this thing starts getting latched onto the boundary
Occluded circulation produces a rope tornado on the backside...
The mesocyclone begins to tighten up once more...
Almost produced yet again...
Wide-angle shot as it's about time to move north to try to keep up...
Winchester, IL supercell viewed from I-72 brief cone funnel (left)
Supercell becomes quickly outflow dominate with many cell interactions
One last shot along I-72 as I head home "happy" for once...
I've added a YouTube time-lapse (above)
That ends this successful chase day. Finally, I made the right decision and put myself in a good location to see a tornado. S-U-C-C-E-S-S! Storm reports can be found here as this chase day was yet another tornado outbreak. Now on to the next...
