April 19, 2003:
A moderate risk for severe weather was issued by the Storm Prediction Center for this day. Initially, my chase group and I thought the action for the day would be in SC Oklahoma where an outflow boundary was situated during the morning hours. But by afternoon, even though thermodynamic parameters such as CAPE and theta-e were prime for severe storms in that region, the boundary had become diffuse. Still thinking that the outflow boundary would be where the action was going to occur, my chase group and I left Norman around 12:30 and headed south on I-35. Realizing after a while that the dryline was bulging much further east than originally anticipated, we skrapped the idea of chasing near I-35 and headed back north towards I-40. We were informed by my dad via cell phone that the SPC had just issued a PDS tornado watch for eastern Oklahoma. The cap began to break around 3 p.m., so we busted east toward a cluster of cumulus congestus. This area quickly blossomed into a severe storm and it produced our first tornado of the day near Welty just west of Highway 48 in Okfuskee County. After this, the base of the storm became ill-defined and so we targeted a new tornadic supercell SW of Bartlesvile, Oklahoma. This storm produced at least 4 tornadoes altogether, and we saw three of them.
The first was the Dewey/Copan stovepipe which we saw from a long way off (low-contrast). After this, another tornado was spawned to the northwest of the large tornado. It was very brief, but had condensation all the way to the ground for a short while. The final tornado was north of Edna, Kansas, and was partially rain-wrapped. If you look at the pictures of this storm closely, you notice a wall of condensation on the right side of the clear slot. This was confirmed as a tornado by NWS Wichita.

First Tornadic Supercell
Developing Tornadic Supercell in Okfuskee County
Tornado West of Highway 48
Tornado West of Highway 48

Second Tornadic Supercell
Tornadic Supercell SW of Bartlesville
Tornado North of Dewey
Powerlines Downed, Tornado in the Distance

Edna, Kansas Tornado
Tornado North of Edna, Kansas
Tornado North of Edna, Kansas
Note:Wall of condensation partially obscured by rain in center of image.


All Images Copyrighted by Gabriel Garfield (2003)