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May 24 - 27
This tour can be described in one
word: Juicy. We savor action every day, and plenty of excitement to
go along with it.
The first evening brings with it a passionate display
of lightning and storm warnings throughout Central OK that lasts for hours.
On May 25, we drive into NW OK, and are rewarded at nightfall
by another profound light show that includes upclose bolts that sizzle images in
our eyes followed by earth shattering explosions of thunder. We also watch disco
light-type displays that accompany a storm that produces three inches of rain
within a couple hours. This includes eerie beauty of lightning backlit
raincurtains.
May 26 takes us further south, from Woodward OK to Elk
City as our base. Towards suppertime, thunderstorms begin to blossom just south
of us, from Central OK to the Panhandle of TX. At one point three of them have
hook echoes on them.
We choose to chase towards a storm in the Altus OK area that
has a tornado warning on it. However just south of Hobart OK, we are
greeted to the explosive birth of our own storm that mounds up into a twisted
supercell and meso, where clouds rotate clockwise at the upper reaches and
counterclockwise at the base.
This storm becomes the most spectacular supercell that
either of us have ever seen. It towers gray-black with tinges of green and
pastel blue. Frequent trees of lightning spew out of the top of this storm over
our heads and a huge rotating wall cloud manifests within a miles of us, hanging
close to treetops.
We feel stunned at the structure of this cloud, and as
windwhipped rain and hail begin to slap us, we look for a twister to form, but
despite some promising lowerings, nothing drops.
We give chase till the double flying saucer base turns HP
(high precip) and fades out.
During the rest of the evening, we witness two more
wall clouds on storms that have tornado warnings on them, and also delight to
awesome lightning displays. At one point, a huge bolt of lightning drops
right through the core of one of the wall clouds.
May 27th brings us wall clouds and even a funnel cloud
in the Wichita Falls TX area. We go on some wild goose chases, and dodge areas
of big hail. Again we delight to spectacular lightning and awesome cloud
structures.
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