May 31, 2006 Storm Chase

May 31, 2006 Storm Chase | Rotating Storm and Supercell in CO
All photos © Copyright 2006 Matt Ziebell

Another upslope setup today with marginal dewpoints and decent shear. After a quick stop for lunch in Limon, I headed NW towards some convection that was moving off the front range. While en route, a spotter observed a funnel cloud from a cell in Arapahoe Cty only about 15min from my location at the time. Here is this TOR warned cell showing some attempts at trying to organize west of Deer Trail. Of interest, the dense precip core in the rear is dropping some hefty accumulations of small hail along/near portions of I-70 at this time. 1438 MDT

I headed east on I-70 and stopped to observe this rotating wall cloud near Agate. A couple other chasers were pulled over nearby admiring this as well; though the rotation refused to focus any further. 1506 MDT

I had to go back to Limon and then north before I could get to any decent east road options to stay up with this cell. Here's a ~140° view of the now distant cell NW of Limon. Just to the right of the wet RFD (center) is the base of interest.

Now north of Limon, this storm has become more linear while developing this escalating inflow tail of sorts to my west. This would soon become overtaken by the outflow nearby and become part of a shelf cloud.

Here's the leading edge of the updraft base as it displays an ill organized wall cloud (on the left) with some rotation at times. I had been watching the Weld Cty supercell on radar for some time now and was getting the urge to ditch this cell fast given the downhill trend. 1557 MDT

Nice photo op to my east of new convection blossoming. Cbs were quickly popping everywhere in the vicinity of the earlier cell making it difficult for any one storm to remain discrete for very long.

Yeah, this storm was going linear fast. The wall cloud on the left is slowly being overtaken by the outflow. I took this 180° sequence just before heading north for the Weld Cty supercell.

While en route to this supercell, a TOR warning was issued for a confirmed tornado in Weld Cty about 50min from my location. Here's the supercell's southern flank as viewed from near Brush later on at 1705 MDT.

This supercell had already been in progress for 3hrs by this point, but the RFD now appeared to be slowly taking over. Overall, still rather photogenic. Oh yeah, this cell is also dropping copious amounts of hail!

Some better contrast of what I'll call a modest wall cloud in the distance (directly left of the scud tags). Unfortunately, outbound winds were already at my location...crap. 1717 MDT

The decaying supercell hit Brush pretty hard with hail 2-4" deep. I should have pulled over again for photos when it was much deeper than this. This was actually the first time I've ever seen hail accumulate! It's not much fun driving on, but is certainly easier with front wheel drive. 1734 MDT

I stopped in Akron to watch some new cells pop nearby. A few CGs ignited grass fires west of the city, but that was the only by-product from these storms besides beneficial rainfall. The town sirens sounded for these fires and thereby played on my gullibility for a few panic-filled seconds!

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