- APRIL 7, 2000 DAY CHASE
- Participants of the chase:
Chase 1: AKA "Gravity Wave"
Driver: Rich Weiss
Team Leader: Wes Terwey
Quentin Calder
Chase 2: AKA "Rain Shaft"
Driver: Matt Hartman
Team Leader: Jason Reese
Log: Marshall "CROC" Huffman (Chief of Recording Operations of Chase)
Kevin Goebbert
Chase 3: AKA "Whazz up?"
Driver: Eric Mueller
Team Leader: Adam Stepanek
CHRO: Josh West (Chief of Ham Radio Operations)
Sean Kuyper
Chase 4: AKA "Supercell"
Driver: Jess Irvin
Team Leader: Melissa Ellsworth
Christa Keenan
Mike Bardou
7:30 AM
Weather Discussion on chase situation and status. Moderate risk out for Southern IN and Southern IL. Shear profiles along with CAPES of 1500-2000 J/Kg and helicity of 200-300 m2/s2; 50 kt Low Level Jet; Dewpoints 55-60 F; worry is with the cap. Warm front is expected to move northward rapidly where storms will fire. Gravity waves seen on satellite before departure gave us hope of decent cappage.
8:00-9:30 AM
Preparation for chase, set-up equipment and cars, and gather last minute data, specifically new Day 1.
*Note to future chases*: TOILET and Davis can not go on cars with rounded tops (newer model cars) the bike racks don’t fit.
10:23 AM
Depart from Valpo after brief problems with CB’s
Temperature: 58.4 F
Dewpoint: 33.0 F
Plan is to head west on 30 turn onto IN 2 and South onto 41/63 through Terre Haute.
10:34 AM
Debriefed by Wes with last minute data that was printed out. Surface Low is around St. Louis, Warm Front is just south of Evansville moving at 10-15 knots; LI’s -4 to -6, good wind shear, need to look for a clearing behind warm front where there
will be decent cap.
11:05 AM
Flash of lightning to the south while heading west on IN 2
11:08 AM
Turn south on US 41. Experiencing heavy rains through trip associated with a line of prefrontal storms. Light flooding on roads.
Noticed low level clouds screaming to the north. LLJ is now in place! TOILET is picking up 200 strikes a minute for storms to our East.
12:30 PM
South on I-74 interchange on IN 63
Temp: 56 F
Dewpoint: 54 F
Noticed a wind change from north to south, concluded it was a boundary from the other storms since little change in temperature.
1:10 PM
Arrive in Terre Haute with still cloudy conditions
Temp: 57 F
Dewpoint: 54 F
Plan is to stop and eat quickly and get more information from weather center on location of warm front and find a good place to sit.
1:16 PM
Stopped at Wendy’s to eat (they had a balls machine). Sealed TOILET to assure waterproofness. (Even without seal TOILET was dry) Mike found a carrot in his hamburger.
*Note to future chases*: Wendy’s on 63 is not known for its
cleanliness.
1:50 PM
Noticed a TV station behind Wendy’s. (WBAK Fox Affiliate) Decided to see if they had radar we could look at and if they had data for location of warm front. We were advised to go 12 miles south of Terre Haute where CBS channel 2 had doppler.
2:00 PM
Called weather center and was informed of storm warning located near Effingham, IL moving NE. Chose to move in on the
storm, since had little time to spare. Tornado Watch in effect for southern IL and IN. We headed towards the triple point.
2:08 PM
Leave for Robinson, IL. Head south on US 41 leaving
Terre Haute.
Temp: 59 F
Dewpoint: 57 F
2:42 PM
West on IN 154
Temp: 63 F
Dewpoint: 59 F
Picking up 350 strikes a minute on TOILET from the cell
2:54 PM
Crossed IN/IL border
2:57 PM
South on IL 1
3:15 PM
Jogged over a mile to Flat Rock, IL to stop and get gas at Maxwell House Cafe for $1.52
3:26 PM
Leave Flat Rock, IL and plan is to go to Lawrenceville/Vincennes Airport for data and flat area to watch the storm.
3:51 PM
Call to weather center informed us moderate had been downgraded to a slight. Beautiful CG out the window to our west with storm coming. Learned that storm was bowing out and decided to head south to get hit by the gust front.
4:02 PM
Found Mt. Carmel airport. (Amazingly flat and could see for miles!) Spoke to man inside and discovered he had a DTN station and could brief us on the weather in the area. He let us pull our cars up on the runway and face west. Saw a beautiful textbook arcus cloud. Also witnessed inflow of the storm. We could not have asked for a better view.
5:30 PM
Observed pea-sized hail.
5:33 PM
Leave airport and decide to head south on IL 1 to Mt. Carmel where another cell is located. Problem with the storms is that they are dissipating quickly and have little strength with them. Still wondering where the warm front is.
5:45 PM
Through talking to Kelly in the WX Center we decide to turn around and start heading back. The cell has reached us and is not impressive. One hour 15 minutes of daylight left. Plan is to stop at CBS station south of Terre Haute on way back and see if anything else is happening.
6:03 PM
East on US 50
6:13 PM
Crossed IL/IN border
6:15 PM
North on US 41
6:52 PM
Stop at WTWO-TV and talk to meteorologist Jesse Walker to check out Doppler. He was very helpful and educational to those wondering about the TV side of meteorology. All the storms were weak and dissipating. He informed us that we get to look forward to snow on the way back to Valpo. (Yeah!) VUSIT thanks him for his time.
7:20 PM
Leave WTWO
7:34 PM
Stop and eat at Burger King where three VUSIT members were crowned.
8:02 PM
Back on US 41 North headed home to Valpo.
9:31 PM
Stop at Phillips 66 for gas at $1.35
9:41 PM
Back on US 41 North
10:38 PM
East on IN 2
Driving back in sleet and snow
11:22 PM
Arrive back at Valparaiso University
Temp: 34 F
Dewpoint: 32 F
Total Trip Mileage: 504.8 miles
Synopsis: We couldn’t find the warm front because it was moving more easterly than north. The storm motion was not that of what was progged. We expected the Low to track NE just south of chicago which it never did. We had noticed that the vorticity that morning was located behind the low but we never put two and two together. With the vorticity behind the low it was not going to move very fast (that much we figured) but it was also going to have the tendency to track east instead of northeast. Overall we did the best possible that we could with this storm. There were no tornadoes reported and SPC really blew this one by overlooking the location of the vorticity too. There were few severe thunderstorms reported, two of which we were on. We could not have chased this situation better. We saw all we could and left satisfied.