I’m not even kidding… I ran into fellow chaser and friend, Vince while watching a struggling storm north of Sutherland, Nebraska yesterday… we chatted for the better part of an hour while watching this nearly stationary storm struggle, go through an impressive LP phase, then fizzle over our heads.  Toward the end of its life as we were chatting away, we heard a small plunk on the ground next to my vehicle and Eagle-Eyed Vince spotted the source, a single, solitaire piece of hail, which when it fell, was about the size of a penny.  But by the time all-thumbs…

Another day, another setup.  This one will take me back up into western Nebraska later this afternoon, day 1 of what will probably be a three-spot to kick off the first half of this final week of August, a month that has been very busy.  Once all is said and done and we flip the calendar to the first day of METEOROLOGICAL FALL (omg, please don’t drag summer out), I will have to look back on prior Augusts to see where this sits in comparison to priors.  This month has felt very reminiscent of early career Augusts here in Colorado…

Should be a quiet-ish day locally for me, some afternoon storms will likely pop off the higher terrain, but should be less intense and numerous than yesterday.  That said, barring something hyper-local, today won’t involve a lot of effort.  Tomorrow is a maybe up across the western half of Nebraska, so we’ll see how that shakes out.  Either way, it’s something I can wait til tomorrow morning to decide.  It would get me out in the field, which sets up for the one day I am watching with intent, that would be Tuesday.  Above is the hardly-means-anything graphic, but gives…

Well, despite no real ‘noteworthy’ plans to chase, Ma-Nature brought the action to me today, and in a very well timed manner.  After leaving Greeley from a Sound Bath with the wife and a quick trip to the store, storms exploded off the Palmer, firing off an outflow boundary that would be the trigger to heavy-duty severe storms up this way.  I got home, wet fooded the cats, changed my clothes, and drove straight out US-34 to slip in behind the first severe storm of my outing, a blizzard hailer that lead to all sorts of problems near Wiggins.  When…

Just realized that my last venture, August 19, was my 1,000th career log! Of those, 577 were chase logs, the other 423 were work/spotter ventures.  A crazy number of logs.  That chase also put me at #5 highest annual mileage.  I will lay it all out in a later log, but wanted to acknowledge the milestone.  1,000 career logs over 30 seasons!

Yeah, that was a mistake… unfortunately I kinda wussed out as I wasn’t feeling 100%, and as the day drew on, I lost the energy and motivation, so by 3pm, when things started to fire in the Black Hills (despite the models saying otherwise), I was already too far gone.  That storm ended up being a long-track supercell that produced 3″ hail, awesome lightning, and yes, even a damn tornado near Potter, Nebraska near I-80, which I could’ve made even leaving later when it became apparent that storm was in it for the long haul.  That storm tracked due south…