Thursday - April 6, 2006 - Tornadoes near Manchester and Longford, Kansas

A very strong upper storm system moved from the Four Corners area into the central plains during the day. By evening, a 100 knot - 500 MB wind max was over Oklahoma City. A deep surface low took shape in central Kansas and a moderately unstable atmosphere moved northward across much of eastern Oklahoma, Kansas and Nebraska.

Early in the day it appeared that the greatest risk for supercells and tornadoes would be east of the surface low in northeast Kansas and southeast Nebraska. From Oklahoma City... this required a fairly early departure time and I left at 7:30 a.m. for Topeka. While Topeka was farther east than I wanted to start... the Kansas Turnpike was the fastest way north.

When I reached Topeka at midday... the strongest surface pressure falls and best moisture return was taking place in the central part of Kansas. I started adjusting my target area and moving northwest... first toward Marysville and then toward Clay Center.

Storms were already forming along the dryline when I stopped for fuel at Clay Center. I left westbound on highway 24 targeting a northward moving storm that was headed toward Beloit. While the storm had a nice shape on radar... it appeared quite small and I decided to change my attention to storms that were forming between Salina and McPherson. They were moving almost straight north and I could intercept them easily by heading south on highway 81.

I shifted east on highway 18 in the southeast part of Ottawa County as a dominant supercell took shape just to my southwest. I was east of the core getting a few large hailstones when the storm rapidly evolved into a tornado producer. A mesocyclone swung out of the southeast flank of the storm with the first signs of strong rotation to my southeast. I was trapped between a developing tornado to my east and a hail core of increasing size to my west. I tried to move east on highway 18 to get east of the developing tornado... but we both managed to get to the same part of the road at the same time. The next 15 to 20 seconds were quite intense as the meso passed over the car and winds gusted to near 90 mph. The car was splattered with field debris and was generally in control by the storm for a few moments. After it passed... I was able to look up the backside of the meso seeing incredible wrapping cloud motion.

A couple of miles east of my encounter... I started north on a county road toward Manchester. The tornado that had formed very close to me never got much better organized and appeared as a broad multiple-vortex bowl of dirt and mist which was evident for several miles to a point north of Manchester.

Near Manchester, my attention shifted to a new tornado (other image, other image) that developed about a mile east of me. This tornado was stronger than the first and stayed on the ground for several miles... finally crossing a county road and weakening about two miles east of Longford. Vidcap images of the tornado in its mature stage: ONE TWO THREE FOUR FIVESIX. Images of the tornado in its rope stage crossing the county road: ONE TWO.

The final tornado of the event was a very brief event about three miles northeast of Longford.This image shows the funnel cloud and small area of debris associated with it.