Southwest Oklahoma tornadoes – March 18, 2012

After getting very little sleep the night before, I almost sat this chase out.  I have become quite aware of driver fatigue over the past couple of years and thought that it may be a bit too far since I was running solo.  However, after an early afternoon nap and a check of data around 2 pm, I was convinced that there were going to be a couple of interesting storms and a few tornadoes.  I had my second wind and rolled out the door just a little after 3 pm.

My route west was a casual one – taking the scenic jaunt through Watonga, Thomas, Custer City, and Butler.  I had the feeling that good storms could form along the dryline from near Shamrock, TX northward to the Eastern Oklahoma Panhandle.  There were already severe storms occurring over the Southeast Texas Panhandle and Northwest Texas, but I was looking for something a little more convenient.

At Butler, I had to make the decision to stick with this feeling or start committing to storms moving into the far southwest corner of the state.  After some head scratching and discussion with Doug Speheger, I started making the move southwest.

A supercell storm had moved into Harmon County about the time I reached Carter, OK.  Things still looked a little messy and I took my time driving south to Highway 9 and then west to Reed, OK.

Along that path, the storm updraft came into view and looked more and more impressive with each passing mile.  I saw one funnel cloud and a lot of motion in the lowered base of the updraft.

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I took up a position just south of Reed and watched the storm continue to organize as it approached.  There was off and on hail which reached golf ball size, but the main core was off to the northwest and I had good visibility.  I ran into Hank Baker in Reed and we decided to move east a couple of miles to stay ahead of the hail.

Around 6:50 pm, the storm went through a rapid evolution from looking pretty average to having a rapidly rotating mesocyclone.  A tornado formed on the south side of Highway 9 and moved across the highway to the north northeast.  For a period of time, this tornado looked quite large as it moved into a region with few paved roads.  I headed back east to Highway 34 and then north to continue the chase.

Along the way, I got far enough away from the storm to see some amazing structure.

While on the move, I observed a brief tornado a few miles west southwest of Brinkman.  I got in front of the storm near Willow and once again got to see some incredible storm structure and a mesocyclone evolution which produced a tornado about four miles west northwest of Willow.  I moved a couple of miles to the north and watched the final tornado form about five miles northwest of Willow.  This tornado was on the ground for about five minutes and was the most photogenic of the day.

Needless to say, it was a good way to blow the cobwebs out of everything and get this year off and running. It looks like it will be a year where gas prices will play heavily in the go/no go chase decision and having good results are almost a necessity.

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