The mental wear and tear of looking at scores of numerical forecasts for days took its toll so I took to the road to find a good storm and check out some gear. It is remarkable that one of the models had a nice grasp on this day over a week in advance. Probably a fluke.
This early chase meant an afternoon away from the evil machines at the Y. If I had gone there I would have spent the time staring at radar on the tablet. I also benefited from an escape from the weather in the upper Midwest, where the atmosphere was snowing its hinder off. This is a burden for my employer, the dumbest airline not yet in bankruptcy (DANYIB), and I understand the indigestion. But they have the same problems in dry air that they do inside a cloud.
So I took recess this afternoon and drove into Mississippi, which I could see from my office if I had a window. (I asked not to have a window when I changed jobs just for that reason.) It was the usual cold-season mid-south outbreak: not-enough cape, too-much shear, wicked fast storms. So prospects for good photography were slim, and made worse by the Mississippi landscape of countless ugly trees and undisciplined terrain. At least it would be a short trip.
I murdered two storms just by driving toward them. They may have been born dead anyway, judging from their resemblance to squishy slugs of cat hair blown down a hallway by a noisy fan. I spent some down time wrestling with balky computer hardware and these distractions eased my frustration with the weather. To this point my worst mistake was scanning the fm dial for weather information. I learned much of the impending recruiting dilemmas for a couple of SEC schools, groundhog history, and the latest politics (ACA 63, GOP 0).
Finally, a storm developed that managed to avoid all of the others. So many to this point had evolved into boring linear shapes, joining with their neighbors in some sort of unholy communion. I’ll spare you the reasons for my disdain. I saw a few other chasers drifting along with the storm. A friend told me early in the day that many Oklahomans were streaming toward Tennessee. It reminded me of the old Oklahoma-Texas punchline about the IQs of both states going up. Or down, I can’t remember. There was less than an hour before sunset. Tick-tock, atmosphere. I stayed with the cell, driving east to Holly Springs. I crossed the damage track from the big December tornado twice. That one left quite a bruise. This storm looked better and better and the NWS issued a tornado warning before 5pm. I could see the wall cloud every once in awhile thanks to rare gaps in the trees. The sirens wailed in Holly Springs; no doubt still a jittery town. I found a high spot at a strip mall and watched the low cloud base cruise northward. The rear-flank downdraft was evident and I thought I might get lucky. The rotation persisted as the storm moved past the west side of town. Then, the combination of heavy rain and the lack of a well-placed road ended the chase. Also, I was driving around the countryside with water beginning to pile up along the road. And it was getting dark. I declared victory and clocked out.
The tornado warning for my storm expired and was not reissued. I did not see any sign of damage when I drove the path of the rotating lowering. There were confirmed tornadoes in east central Mississippi and western Alabama that were beyond my reach. And the Bass Pro in Rankin was hit by half-dollar sized hailstones. If I was judgmental I would say the atmosphere, which hates us, underperformed. The two storm pictures are views to the west of the rotating cloud base; something only a meteorologist could love. A good day for me, even without a tornado. The Four Cylinders of the Apocalypse®™©, at eleven years and 262k miles, still runs well.
Wall cloud and rear-flank downdraft west of Holly Springs, Mississippi