October 4, 1998
This is my first chase in Oklahoma, and what a day it was. I have
lots of nice photos and radar and satillite images from this day that I
hope to put on the page. I will work on adding those for the next few
days.
Date: 10/4/98
Partners: None
Miles: 222
Summary: Saw two tornadoes and a
mesocyclone near Kingfisher and hit several severe thunderstorms on the
way back to Norman.
The Chase:
I woke uparound 11:30 AM and just flipped on the radar like normal. I saw
lots of activity in Kansas and began to look at the possibility for
chasing today, which should have been obvious. Everything looked right in
NW Oklahoma and S Central Kansas. I watched as one supercell developed in
NW Oklahoma nd moved NE. I then watched a second one develop farther
south and follow a similar pattern. The satellite then showed what I
later found out was the dryline very clearly. I figured the next cell
would pop near Hobart, OK. As soon as I saw anything at all near there on
a satellite scan I grabbed my gear and left. From what I had seen my
destination was Kingfisher County. This was at about 4:20 CDT. I quickly
stopped at Sarkeys to see if anyone was there, but nobody was. I then
went down Lindsey Street to I-35. I went north to I-240 and West from
there to I-40 wastward. I then watched as the storm had formed nicely in
front of me had produced a severe t-storm warning for NW Canadian County.
I tried to cut through Yukon on State Road 3, but I had some problems.
The sign warning me of this had been moved, about 5 miles back. After
turning around I eventually got back to US 81 which leads to 3. I then
went N on 81/3. When I got to Okarche I first got the report from SkyWarn
on my scanner that a tornado was on the ground at 5:49PM. It was one
miles S of Watonga, or about 25-30 miles WNW of me. I felt that this was
a successful chase at this point since this was my original cell I chose
to follow, and it was only one county west of where I had set my target.
AS I continued N on 81/3 I got the report on my scanner of a rapidly
rotating wall cloud heading towards Hennessey. I decided to Continue N on
81. I wanted to go about halfway betweek Kingfisher and Hennessey, or
near Dover. As I got to the main intersection in Kingfisher where 81/3
and 33/3 meet I looked west as I drove through the intersection. I could
clearly see the Watonga tornado on the ground, it was 6:07. The tornado
was decent sized and was completely vertical. I quickly made two lefts
and a right to get facing the tornado on the western edge of Kingfisher,
and I got a photo of it. I then went west on 33/3. I stopped a couple
times to take more pictures of the storm. There was a great mesocyclone
that I got a nice clear view of when I was about 4 miles west of
Kingfisher. This was the first meso I had ever seen. By this time the
Watonga tornado had roped out from my view. I then waited on 33/3 at
about 6:24 as the storm moved NEward, just to my north. I was about 1-2
miles south of the edge of the mesocyclone as it passed by. As it got
closer to me I took a few more pictures. You could clearly see the winds
though the angle of the rain shafts in a couple pictures. There also were
a few nice scuds from this meso. I also have one pictures that may show
another funnel cloud, but nobody ever was able to determine if it was a
funnel or just another scud. Then I started back east to get to
Kingfisher where I could head north and try to keep up with the storm. As
I was driving east a wall cloud formed and began to take the shape of a
funnel. At 6:33 I took a some pictures
out my window while I was driving. Then I stopped and took a couple more
pictures on the shoulder of 33/3. The chaser in the car in front of me
stopped at this point was Steve Strum. I got back to Kingfisher and
headed north again. I saw the tornado pass over 81 about 8 miles in front
of me. I stopped on top of a high spot on 81 and got a couple last
pictures of the tornado. We then went east on a side road as the tornado
became more rain wrapped at about 6:44. I turned around at 6:55 and
returned to Kingfisher. I then went west on 33/3 again trying to find
where the first tornado touched down at. However, I never made it that
far as I began to run out of daylight. This did set up another great
photo opportunity since I was west of all the convection. The setting sun
on the tops of the other clouds was a
very nice view. I also tried a couple lightning photos at this time since
I had lightning to my N, E, and S. I finally started back for Norman but
was forced to go through a blanket of severe t-storms to get there. I
tried to follow 81 to El Reno. I hit pea sized hail just south of Okarche
at 8:07. I stopped on the side of the road a couple minutes later due to
the heavy rain, small hail and gusty winds. I finally got back to I-40 at
about 8:30. I then got into more heavy rain from 8:35-8:45. At about
8:50 I stopped at the beautiful Comfort Inn, in even more beautiful Yukon.
I had hoped to get in and see some radar to see when I could actually get
back to Norman. However, I walked in the door and was immediately rushed
into an interior room, the lobby bathroom. I had my scanner with me and I
was listening to what was going on. The employee helping out though was
spazzing out. Finally I got them to let me out so I could go see the
radar on TV. At this time there were two areas with great rotation near
Norman. One of which later produced the Moore tornado. Then they showed
what it looked like near me. There was a hook echo over Mustang, 6 miles
south of me. But that never developed into anything. And at 9:05 I left
and was on the road again for Norman. The line blocking my path had mover
NE. There were nearly constantky warnings coming out for these cells as
they kept moving. I arrived back in Norman at 9:40 or so to the sight of
power outages and fallen trees. Finally, at 9:50 I got back to my room.
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