Tony's Blogbach, Between the Isobars

So one of pet projects as part of the new website was to have a Chase Outlook widget, similar to a version I had on my much earlier sites were I updated a single button to show my chase status; in the now era, I created a version that looked at the days ahead and gave the outlook for those days in a similar color palette to what I had for that single button.  For most of the season, it functioned perfectly as I created it, but I wanted to add some more detail to it with percentages, as the plain text did fine, but numbers read so well, and I finally undertook the updated in version 2.0 of my widget.  I think it looks really slick and will do well!  Another change you won’t notice right away, but I added overwrites for CHASE to include TROPICAL and WINTER stuff… no changes on the colors of those, but figured it would at least extend the use of this thing outside of the chasing season as I don’t want it to read NO CHASE PLANNED for months on end, particularly in the winter months.

So yeah, just a note here to mention that update and also to point it out as it’s introduction prior to the season was pretty subtle, a soft-launch if you will.

It’s been the ONE thing missing; a good chance to shoot lightning… and holy shit did that came in spades tonight!  It’s 4:23am right now, I’m probably gonna crash hard here shortly, but OMG did I just have a night!!!  How many times in my career have I left the house with the simple intention to try and get a few lightning photos, then by the time I get home, the world blew up!  Oh I cannot WAIT to write up this chase log.  I was in PJs at home, had a late pizza dinner, and suddenly a few storms fired; I put on real clothes (something in me said don’t make this a PJ outing), grabbed a couple cameras, and instead of hopping to a nearby hill, I positioned ahead of the developing line north of Greeley.  It started meh, and for about 20 minutes, I clicked away with not much to show.  Suddenly everything went nuts, the line thickened and went severe, and I shot west to beat the Greeley hail core and set up in Windsor where I got the shot posted above before another core overtook me.  From there, it was a hail chase, and I ended up watching Highway 60 get buried under several inches of hail.

I’ve been saying for weeks… all that I need now is a good lightning photo… and I got about 50. lol  I’m over the moon right now happy, literally happier than any tornado chase this year.  This is and always has been my favorite thing to shoot, and tonight, Colorado put out BIG TIME!  Oh yeah, and it hailed like hell, too…

Chase log coming… but a pillow needs my face in it right now…

Sitting at home this afternoon waiting to finish up a work project means that barring some pop up storm that results in me trying to steal a lightning photo, my regular season is done.  As I always have, I divide the year into four parts, similar to Football…

OFF-SEASON (DEC 1-FEB 29) May get some spot-chasing in, but very rare I get out during this time.
PRE-SEASON (MAR 1 – MAR 31) Dress-rehearsal, often a busy month, but it always feels like a warm-up despite some major events that sneak in.
REGULAR SEASON (APR 1 – JUN 30) This is what it’s all about, my full-time on the road season.
POST-SEASON (JUL 1 – NOV 30) Spot-chasing, often busy locally, with a few bigger events mixed in. Lot of chasing to be had in spirts, but far from constant.

It’s a rough idea over how I divide things up, but it typically works for what I call it, and in the end, that is all that matters.  Below are the stats for the first half of the year, ending as of today…

SEASON STATS (THROUGH JUNE 28)

TOTAL LOGS: 36 (27 Chases/9 Work Chases)
TOTAL MILES: 27,175 (Avg 755 miles per log – 9 chases over 1,000 miles – 1 of which was over 2,000 miles)
TOTAL TORNADOES/DAYS: 19 on 11 Different Days (0.407 batting average – 11/27)
LARGEST HAIL SEEN: 5.25″ (measured on Kankakee).
FIRST CHASE: February 19 in Illinois
LAST CHASE (til now): June 26 returning home from Oklahoma

THE MILES, on a quick scan, rank as #11 all time in most miles driven.  However, it’s worth noting that it is within 600 miles of jumping up three spots to get well into the top 10.  I would expect with an average back-half of the year, eclipsing 30,000 miles will be no trouble.  There’s quite a gap from my current #8 (27,720 miles in 2008) to #7 (31,018 miles in 2025), but as the math shows, only 545 miles between my current at #11 and the 2008 season.  Wouldn’t surprise me at all to blow past that with one solid chase in July.  I fully expect this year to get into the top 10 for miles.

THE TORNADOES, 19 seen, which sits at #13 all time.  Quality-wise, easily among the worst… I’d say maybe 5 of which were quality, the rest were birdfarts, half-condensed, dusty spin-up, stat-padders. Believe me, the number hardly reflects the quality.  As of today, I sit at 493 career tornadoes, 7 short of the #ChaseTo500 for my career.  I don’t imagine NOT having a few more opportunities to hit that mark in this, my 30th season, so while I had hoped to hit that by now, there is still time to do it for this benchmark season for me, so not done with that yet.  Obviously the Minnesota tornado in April and the Slapout tornadoes in June were the highlights for tornadoes for me.  And trust me, there were not ample chances this year, most chasers will tell you, but I left a lot on the table on the few days that did perform.  But, I am a one-day-makes-a-season kinda guy, and my two hits were good, so there is that.

THE HAIL, I’ve been a bit gun shy around hail cores since last year, but that doesn’t mean I cannot enjoy good hail, and I can do so WITHOUT destroying my ride.  Obviously Kankakee was the Hail Highlight, having documented the state-record hailer with a gross amount of stones seen OVER 5″ in diameter that day.  I rarely intentionally give up on a tornado for hail, but I did that day.  Easily among the top hail events I have documented in my career, no doubt.  Outside of that, the usual spread of hailers encountered through the season, all pale heavily in comparison to Kankakee, so even as many were probably good on their own, the shadow of the Kankakee storm lingers over.

THE STRUCTURE, I’m not a structure guy… what I mean by that is I am VERY happy when I am there to see it, but it rarely is something I will go out of my way for.  I think as I have grown in photography, the structure aspect of storms has definitely grown on me more over the years, so I do find I appreciate it more, even as it’s rarely among the top reasons I embark on a chase.  Given my recent stepping back from my Hail Boy days, I suppose it could slide into that spot a bit more haha But alas, this was a very good year for insane looking storms.  While the Oklahoma structure/nado combo ranks among the top, several days included some jaw-dropping moments, which again, hard to argue against.  They provided good opportunities to bust out the good cameras to capture.  Hard to pick a favorite, but there are many in the running here in 2026, a solid consolation prize this season for sure.

THE PEOPLE, truly where 2026 shined for me… I often chase solo, and my long time friend and chase partner, Ed Grubb is usually my shotgun rider.  And while that was the case early, as the season wore on, I found myself solo in the car for the most part, but I found myself much more this year than previous, in the company of others, coordinating chases and even in caravans during the chase.  This happened often, and it wasn’t always longtime friends.  I met many MANY new friends along the way, a couple whom I truly am grateful for.  I don’t consider myself typically very social, and honestly that probably hasn’t changed much, but I was a bit more open, and as a result, really got to enjoy the company of both old friends and new.  Friends to whom I hope will be the first of many years doing this in some part with.  It truly made for a much better season than having to rely on the weather alone, and some of my favorite chases were shared with some of these people.  If nothing else comes from this 30th season for me, I will be fine with that as this benchmark year was made much more special sharing it with some wonderful people.

So obviously the end of the regular season does NOT mean the end of my season.  Not by a long shot… chasing will continue, just not in the full-time, rapid fire style that is the regular season.  Things will spread out quite a bit, fewer multi-day trips, and hopefully more local, day-of action.  And who knows whether a fall season will materialize or not, so plenty of time left here in 2026 to pad the stats.

2026 wasn’t the year I hoped it would be… truth is, you make what you want of it, and for a lot of it, I was hard on myself for a lot of it.  This year did not provide many opportunities, and the few it did, most of them I didn’t take advantage of.  This being obviously strictly from a storm chaser’s perspective.  Those on the receiving end of this are grateful, and that being said, so am I.  Obviously I am never wanting to see impactful severe weather, so trying to make this sound like it’s suppose is tough, hard to get that point across in mere words.  Nature is beautiful, awe-inspiring, powerful, all those things can be both beautiful and dangerous at the same time.  And while I always hope for that to be in the middle of nowhere far from impacting ANYONE, it doesn’t always happen that way.  And that’s the part we do NOT want to see.  But when its a bad year for chasing, it’s a good year for people, so despite some very impactful events, this year hopefully has had mercy.  And that is what counts the most.  But when she doesn’t, I want to be there, and hopefully by being there, I can make a positive difference for someone.

2026 was a grind; a lot of effort and miles for not a whole lot to show for it.  I was definitely feeling it pretty hard; lots of missed opportunities, bad wiffs, and days I just couldn’t get out of my own way.  As June wore on and day after day fell short for me, I was definitely eager to get this season over with.  Having returned home from another Midwest letdown, I was ready to be home, but high plains action finally took hold, and I took a few more shots in my backyard.  Despite a VERY action-heavy day around Akron on the 22nd, things were pretty underwhelming.  Then came June 24, one of the better Colorado setups of the year.  And long story short, was another letdown.  My initial storm went bonkers, and I played the tornado game, only to watch a merger kill off that opportunity south of I-76 in the vast wide open nothing.  Another storm in far northeast Colorado fired, went nuts, produced a few brief tornadoes, and we the hour run from south of Akron up to south of Haxtun to get up on that cell.  We arrived to a gorgeous LP storm, and literally watched it die in the 15 minutes we were there AFTER producing multiple times.  I felt pretty defeated, it was my year summed up in one day.  The only thing missing was the storm we left producing tornadoes.  It did get warned, but ultimately, and mercifully, it did not.  I was ready to go home right then, but another day awaited after this, one that had some good potential, but was also starting to show its cracks.  I returned to the original storm down by I-70 and opted to stay in Goodland so I could wake up, see if I wanted to try the next day’s setup along the KS/OK border, or pack it up for the season.  I definitely wasn’t feeling it.

But morning arrived in Goodland, I went through the motions; breakfast, packed up, and without a lot of debate, just started driving east on I-70.  The day was looking messy, a boundary play somewhere near the border, but was not looking as promising as it did in the days prior (another theme for the year).  I wasn’t overwhelmed with optimism, but I went anyway.  My target was Dodge City, and after dropping south out of the pouring rain, I drove through mist and clouds, getting to Dodge without much clearing.  Then came the ol’ reliable… I will keep driving til I find sun, so southbound on US-283 I went, eventually landing in Buffalo, Oklahoma.  That was my new target.  After about an hour, a storm went up about 50 miles west near Beaver, and when I found myself alone with a pristine view to the west on what was easily among the best looking storms of the year, it finally happened.  Beneath that amazing structure in the WIDE OPEN nothingness of the far eastern Oklahoma Panhandle, a large, beautiful tornado came down.  And for the first time in months, I exhaled…

It’s hard to romanticize this kind of thing cause of the bad it can bring.  These tornadoes were in open country, no one to bother, and were under an incredible storm.  And for once, I was there; on time, in perfect position, and after seemingly forever, it felt good again.  This will be the first full chase log write-up among the backlog I have to do from this season.  It saved 2026.  I was watching this year creep its way to the top of m y worst seasons list.  Minnesota in April was really the only reason I hadn’t put this at the top of that list, but it was going to get close.  Missouri on June 10 was a good tickmark as well, but this… this was the ‘one day to make a season’ chase, and suddenly, it felt right again.  Ironically, there was about a 15 minute window for this show, and a lot of people missed it.  Honestly, I was surprised how many people SAW this, given I was in such a perfect spot to see it, and saw maybe a passing vehicle or two; I felt truly alone, nobody anywhere around.  It was peaceful, no crowds, just me, my tripods, and a couple cameras.  And it was probably the best structure/tornado combo I had ever shot, so imagine that.  The tornado would rain-wrap, and that would be it.  Other storms fired, and despite the great structure this storm hung on to for a while after, it never produced a tornado again.  But unlike just about every other day, I was there for it.  I wasn’t late, I wasn’t in a bad position, I wasn’t racing to get to it… I was just there… I was… Slapped Out of my funk…

Suddenly, 2026 wasn’t so bad…

Equals what exactly?  Truth is, we won’t have the answer to that equation til this time tomorrow.  The ceiling on this event is as high as any setup this year, but its 2026 and this year likes to do nothing with it.  That’s good, really it is.  No one wants to see these high ceiling events pan out.  But just because we want that doesn’t mean it will.  One has to go, the law of averages says so.  But will it be tomorrow?  That’s the question.

Chatter across the web varies from tornado outbreak of the year (a bar not terribly high, mind you), to a messy mess of low instability storms in the wake of whatever blows through overnight.  You’re here reading this now asking, “Tony, what is your thought?”  The answer… haha if I knew that, I’d be making a lot more money than I do lol

Sadly, there is no answer.  Sure, there are some incredibly hefty ingredients in play if you look at the models.  Just about any clock within the warm sector on your model of choice will pull a PDS Tornado sounding.  The numbers in some cases are off the charts.  Real potent over for these storms to bake.  But there are buts, BIG BUTS, and I cannot lie.  Morning MCS comes through, maybe bigger than anticipated, which would relocate that over further south.  Does it hang around too long?  Maybe not enough instability.  The dynamics are strong, super strong, thus you need to put some beefy joules with it in order for those storms not to get ripped apart before they get established.  That is a real concern tomorrow, one that, in my opinion, offers the bigger fail mode than anything the overnight stuff will bring.  Albeit related, it sucks the instability out which sets the stage for the dynamics to rip the updrafts apart.  So yeah, I guess writing that out, one could make a case that both are equally as important.

That said, I sit here in Springfield, Illinois; probably a target all on its own, so we’ll see what we awaken to, MCS, etc, and decide.  A lot of the reason for basing here tonight was to allow that adjustment tomorrow in a timely manner and not be hauling in from three hours away trying to assess that on the fly.  Tomorrow very well could be one of those ‘stay at the hotel’ days.

I dunno, I can’t get a feel on what I think about tomorrow.  It’s a VERY high ceiling event, one that if realized, will be among the biggest events of the year.  But it has big fail modes that can completely make this wiff on many accounts.  Do I think there will be storms?  Yes. Do I think they’ll be severe?  Yes.  Do I think they’ll be SIGNIFICANTLY severe?  Probably.  Do I think it’ll be a tornado outbreak? Possibly.  The numbers exist on the paper, so we’ll see how they’ll come into play.

Sleep awaits… may be a long day regardless.  We shall see…