Week of July 21st

Been an interesting past few days for me. I have been in Tucson, Arizona filming monsoon storms. We are starting a new tour in 2008 called Desert Thunder and my goodness, our exploration this year has fit the name to a T! Daily storms developing off the mountains east of Tucson and migrating to the low deserts by early evening producing flash floods, INTENSE photogenic lightning, pretty backdrop for the cactus, and one haboob (dirt storm) that caused a MASSIVE pile up on I-10 that I came with 100 yards of being a part of. A semi barreled through as cars slammed on their brakes as the haboob dropped visibility to zero. The semi smashed into the rear ends of several vehicles causing a huge fire storm that was quite extreme! The video has been on every major network in the US and even landed me a couple live interviews by news agencies! Pretty wild!

Roger Hill

July 3rd

Started the day contemplating a chase, but didn't know for sure if I would. By late morning, strong and rock hard towers were developing south of my house . Just finishing our tours, I was tired, and was headed into town to take care of some mailings. But, seeing the convection south of me, I couldn't resist. I blasted down I-70 headed for Limon around noon. Shortly after I got on 70, NWS PUB issued a tornado warning for the area southwest of Limon, CO in northeast El Paso county. Radar was pretty clear to see the boundary with various areas of interest along it. However before I even arrived in Limon, the developing cells dissipated.

I decided to go to the Post Office and mail my packages while I was there, and when I came out around 1:30 PM MDT I noticed a rather large area of towering cumulus off to my northeast, northwest of Flagler. More rapidly growing cumulus were developing along the boundary, which was as clear as day. What bothered me was my 91/44 ob at Limon, but noticed much better moisture farther northeast. So, off I went! I headed east bound of I-70 and watched as the towers developed into two young thunderstorms.

About 10 miles west of Flager, and about 5 miles north of I-70, a small tornado developed. This tornado quickly became visible to cloud base with a fairly transparent tube of dirt. It lasted only 4 minutes from 3:14 -3:18 PM MDT. The young thunderstorm farthest west developed a flared base, cork screwed updraft and even a clear slot, so I pushed east to get on it. At 3:21 PM, another debris cloud formed and by 3: 26 PM was completely to could base where a small funnel appeared. By 3:29 PM, the tornado had a rather large pear shaped debris cloud and was simply gorgeous to watch. At 3:31, the next tornado formed just west of it under a new tower. It persisted for 4 minutes before dissipating. Meanwhile the original tornado was continuing to strengthen. At 3:34 PM, a long slender grey funnel appeared just east of the clear slot and at 3:36 PM it touched down. At 3:38 PM two tornadoes criss crossed each other and made for a wild photo op!!! At 3:41 pm the one tornado lifted, while the supercell tornado continued. At 3:45 another tornado formed west of the supercell tornado, and another tornado formed southeast. Quite a wild shot with 3 on the ground at the same time! The farthest west tornado diminished and lifted at 3:49, while the supercell tornado persisted until 3:51. The farther east tornado lifted at 3:53.

Now is when the real fun begins! At 3:57 PM, I was near the junction of Kit Carson County Roads AA and 13, northwest of Siebert. A debris swirl formed about 100 yards to my north. Thinking it wasn't much of anything, I pulled over and got out of my van to watch. As I turned around, a coal black debris swirl formed about 300 yards to my south! I grabbed my cameras and them up. By 4:03 PM, the southern tornado became VERY strong with debris to cloud base and was the most photogenic nonsupercell tornado I have ever photographed! At 4:07 I turned around to grab another lens and saw a HUGE tornado just to my north. I couldn't believe my eyes! This was only about 200 yards away. It had a 300 yard debris cloud with a fat grey funnel directly overhead and extended from a very pronounced clear slot on the east side of a beautiful circular updraft! The wind speeds at the surface were QUITE strong around it as you could see multiple vortices rotating in it and inflow jets streaming into it. Gorgeous site! Meanwhile at 4:13 PM the tornado to my south diminished and lifted. I decided to head north on CR 13 and see how close I could get safely to the large tornado. I came within literally 50 yards of the debris cloud and stopped, filming every precious moment. The noise was horrendous!!!!!!! I saw pieces of tin flying around the base, along with fence posts and barbed wire. Soon, a telephone pole snapped off. I could see what looked like a couple dead animals in the field it had just crossed. This tornado moved northeast, then north and finally northwest, just missing the county sheriff's farmhouse, while his horses totally panicked trying to escape. At 4:22 PM, it dissipated, while yet another tornado formed to its west under a new tower. This fairly thin and snaking tornado lasted from 4:29 – 4:34 before giving in to developing cores.

As I headed south on 59 to Seibert hail to quarter size starting falling on me.

What a crazy day! You can watch the videos here at The Denver Channel!!!

Roger

June 21 Update Part 2

Caught a beautiful striated, albeit fairly high based, tornado warned storm near Bassett, Nebraska tonight. It produce two funnels and also had hail to baseball size. Damaged the two vans from it. Then chased a line segment in Cherry county, Nebraska that was a spectacular lightning producer.

Back to Denver tomorrow to get ready for my North Land Lecture Tour.

Roger Hill

June 21

Crazy morning thus far! Intercepted a supercell producing 4.5" diameter hail near White Lake, South Dakota. The storm was spectacular! Now I am waiting for later convection to fire off the Black Hills. Stay tuned!

Roger

June 19

Well, June 19 was certainly an interesting day. I caught a classic supercell near Hoxie, Kansas that tried everything it could to produce a tornado, and failed. Another storm developed on its flank and that became our new target storm. We were in front of this beast as it morphed into one of the most incredible HP supercells I have ever seen, pummeling us with 4" diameter hail, high winds and a couple of funnel clouds. I even had a bolt of lightning that struck 100 feet from me. Quite intense.

Today, June 20, I am off to Valentine,Nebraska for what could be a wild afternoon of severe weather.

Roger Hill

Update, June 14

After a quiet few days, this past two days have been pretty exciting. We caught a briefly tornadic supercell near Murdo, SD on Tuesday, June 12th. A truncated cone funnel developed south of I-90 and briefly touched down as it approached the interstate. June 13th had some promise in the southern plains, and after a VERY VERY long drive to north central Oklahoma, we intercepted a tornadic supercell in Major county. We had to drive through one of the most intense cores I have ever driven through! We caught one tornado and a couple funnel clouds.

Today, Thursday, we will chase in the Red River area before heading back to Denver tomorrow.

Roger

Update, May 30

Sorry it has taken me so long to update here. I had an unscheduled surgery which put me behind the power curve BIG TIME.

May 22: I caught three BEAUTIFUL supercells in Kansas, one of which produced two tornadoes not far from Hill City. One was a truncated cone and the other a small elephant trunk shaped tornado. Great chase and the storm structure was incredible!

May 23: I caught four photogenic HP supercells in the Texas panhandle that produced three tornadoes, one of which was very strong and lasted about 15 minutes. Due to poor anvil level flow, storms became high precipitation which choked the updrafts as they became tornadic. Beautiful storm in Hutchinson county, TX as the sunset produced the best tornado of the day.

May 29: The Elbert/Lincoln county storm was pretty for a bit, but also became a typical Colorado Ice Machine. It became outflow dominant and despite tornado reports near Simla, there were NONE! I was right on the spot where the reports came in. As the storm started producing intense hail, scud developed and was lifted up to the gust front. It appeared to form little condensation fingers that could be mistaken for tornadoes. THERE WERE NONE!

I am in Amarillo, TX tonight and will chase the Oklahoma panhandle area Thurs. There should be beautiful storms and possibly tornadoes. The long range models continue to advertise a potential severe weather outbreak by mid week next week. Time will tell!

It has also been a pleasure chasing with my friends Tony Laubach and Verne Carlson. Now if we can catcha nice tube together!

We are also making a program for the Travel Channel which will air late fall. Stay tuned!!!

Roger