STORM TRACK: July 31, 1987 (Volume 10 Issue 5)

Stephen Levine was watching mid-afternoon thunderstorms blossom across the sky in southwest New Hampshire on June 13th. "Conditions appeared right for tornadoes--something rather unusual for this area. A 100 mile chase netted me three funnels, a rainbow, and spectacular lightning. The first funnel formed under the towering cumulus where it connected with the westernmost Cb tower. The second funnel formed at the rear of the updraft and was lit white upon a dark background. After the funnel disappeared, the cloud where it came from rotated and slowly raised into the overcast. Within an hour, this storm produced a hook echo in central Massachusetts, about 45 miles south. Although there vere no confirmed tornadoes, a warning was issued, and some areas reported golfball-size hail. The third storm exploded near sunset just north of Peterboro. It looked like a classic tornado producer and included an impressive tail cloud. A tiny, needle-shaped funnel was produced and lasted a few seconds. Within 15 minutes, the storm lost its base due to lack of support, and leaves a funnel-shaped anvil with mammatus lit pink in the twilight."

Dick Blattenberger is in search of the film "In Search of: Tornadoes" narrated by Leonard Nimoy. If any subscribers have information on where to get a copy of this film, please write him at 418 St. Cloud Terrace, Allentown, PA 18104.

Robert Welch III sent in an interesting newspaper article about a tornado which struck Hatteras Island on April 1st. The tornado struck the outer banks of North Carolina at dawn injuring five people. It first touched land two miles southwest of Cape Point and traveled northeast about a mile unroofing homes and destroying a boat yard. One eyewitness saw a big, dark, V-shaped cloud approaching. Large turbulent balls of water were coming out of the sound he estimated at 200 mph. At Mike Scott's boat yard, 16 commercial boats were damaged including a 30 foot cruiser which was tossed out of the water. A home impacted by a mobile home was pushed 10 feet off its foundation. "That house was built in 1936 and has survived all those hurricanes", said the 64 year old owner. "For all these years, we've been worried about hurricanes, and now it's a tornado that gets us."

G. Zmijewski noted a small tornado touched down in St. Mary's County, MD, on June 9th. The tornado destroyed a few barns. He says most tornadoes in Maryland seem to touch down on the eastern shore instead of the west.

Jim Leonard saw his share of tornadoes this year. May 26th, Gene Moore and I saw a tornado near Cotton Center, Tx, northeast of Lubbock. A clear slot wrapped in at the back edge of the cloud base. Strong rotation was evident in the occluded portion of the base, with condensation fingers extending downward. At one point, scud formed near the ground and roared upward to cloud base. The tornado was brief. I flew back home to Miami, FL on the 29th, then came back to chase Colorado storms on June 17th. I saw a funnel south of Denver and a tornado north of town on June 20th. A pair of tornadoes, side- by side, was filmed on the 23rd near Hudson. The best tornado footage, I obtained was the next day when a tornado formed near Pumpkin Center. A cone shaped funnel protruded from the rain free base which tapered down to a churning dust column. I was in excellent position with good lighting.

Tim Vasquez and his group STATIC had five chases in Texas this year, On Feb 14th, we chased to Meridian, and saw a squall line. Better luck was obtained on April 12th, when an isolated multicell storm formed near Graham, TX. We saw excellent detail of the storm's development documenting it from the cumulus stage. Multicell storms were observed May 15th near Gainesville and May 31st near Plano. A broken line of severe storms was photographed on June 23rd where a wall cloud developed near Garland.

C.L. Vlcek left Washington D.C. on May 15th and drove west toward Iowa. I took I-74 across Indiana. It was a lousy road, filled with things that go bump all day. In Iowa on the 17th, the weather report on TV indicated a cold front would pass the area leaving me with a dry day. On the 18th, I noticed it was getting rather warm behind the front as I was having a picnic on the University of Iowa campus. I went back and turned on the TV at 5 pm, and was dumbfounded to learn it was indeed a chase day! Severe storm mania across east Kansas and Western Nebraska with several tornadoes. The front was actually west of me. I was really disgusted, When I finally saw a weather map for that morning, it had storms written all over it for SE Kansas. Basically, I blew it. The next several days I drove around searching for storms and visiting several weather services, On May 20th, strong cells formed to the south of Sioux City, IA on an old outflow boundary. No further strengthening resulted. I drove on to Grand Island, NE to set up the next day's chase. But I overcompensated as the front passed during the night. On the following day, I found myself roaring eastward playing catch-up with a storm which developed northeast of Iowa City, IA. I settled for some pretty pictures of a rainbow and anvil mammatus at sunset, I drove on to Norman, OK before heading home on the 25th, That's the day Texas lit up with storms.

Here's Marty Feely's chase account: "Bob Slater, Doug Curry, and myself observed a storm near Hobart, OK on May 14th which drifted slowly west. An inflow band on the southeast aide of the base had three funnel shaped clouds side-by-side. No rotation was observed. It was not virga, and no towers were seen above the cloud band. Ten minutes later, a small wall cloud developed under the cloud base to the west but did not rotate. On May 18th, we tracked a severe storm near Enid, OK seeing just heavy rainshafts. That was the day tornadoes struck central KS. The next day, Dan Zacharias joined us to survey the tornado damage at Toledo, west of Emporia. The day to get really excited about was May 21st. Many storms developed across central OK. We observed a thin rope funnel above Lookeba at 6:35 pm. The system eventually lined out. On May 6th, we saw a severe thunderstorm near Clinton, OK. Upward moving scud had converged and ascended into a small hole in the cloud base. On May 28th, Dan and I saw two cells develop near sunset at San Angelo, Tx. The next day, we headed west and tracked an isolated "LP" storm 12 miles south of Crane, TX. Upon our arrival, we saw a spectacular giant wedge shaped anvil. The next day, Dan and I saw severe storms near Jal, NM. Our last day, we got squall-lined along the OK-KS line on June 2nd."