Top 5 storms you wished you were on.

[Mike Hollingshead]

I'm bored and this wondered through my head today. What would be the top 5 storms you can think of that you wish you had chased? Only rule would be they had to occur after you started chasing. No tri-state tornado stuff that way. Just storms you remember seeing/hearing about after you either didn't chase, or did and weren't on it.

I'm sure I'll forget some really good ones, but here are my top 5 "wish I were there" storms.

1: May 29, 2001 TX Mothership
2: May 27, 2001 KS/OK Derecho(I was on it but didn't stay on it...sigh)
3: June 23, 2002 Brown CO. SD
4: June 24, 2003 Manchester SD storm
5: May 22, 2004 Hallam NE storm from the start

[Dan Robinson]

Here are 5 off the top of my head.

1.) May 29, 2004 - Harper/Argonia KS
2.) June 24, 2003 - Manchester
3.) July 13, 2004 - Roanoke, IL
4.) June 10, 2004 - Big Spring, NE
5.) November 10, 2002 - Van Wert, OH

[Danny Neal]

May 3rd, 1999 - any storm that day
October 4th, 1998 - OK
May 10th, 2005, Motherships in NE.
May 4th, 2003 - KS
July 13th, 2004 - IL....100 miles away from me and I was in the doctors office :SIGH:

[Chris Wilburn]

Here is my top 5 list: Many of these are before I really knew how to chase. I started chasing in 2004, but knew very little. A few of my top 5 storms will actually be from 2004.

May 3, 1999 (before the tornado hit Moore)
May 4, 2003 (Girard or Pierce City)
May 29, 2004 (Harper Co. Madness)
May 22, 2004 (Hallam wedge storm from the start)
June 24, 2003 (Manchester tornado, which is one of the most awesome tornadoes I have ever seen on film)

[afischer]

1. Hallock MN July 2, 2005
2. Kennett/Caruthersville MO April 2, 2006
3. Girard KS/Stockton MO May 4, 2003
4. Barnard SD June 23, 2002
5. Roanoke IL July 13, 2004

I'd have a different list if I could go back before 2001 ;-)

[Scott Taylor]

May 30, 1998 Spencer, SD
May 3, 1999 Moore, OK
June 24, 2003 Manchester, SD
April 2, 2006 Caruthersville, MO (1 hour south of this!!)
May 11, 2000 Waterloo/Dunkerton, Iowa tornadoes

[Dustin Wilcox]

1. May 22 2004 Hallam NE, Probably always will be #1, I spent too much time near home on the Columbus-Blair storm, warranted though as it wanted to destroy my hometown, doesn't make missing the largest tornado ever so close to home any easier though.

2. May 4 2007 Greensburg KS, After spending all day in the area getting a tan playing catch under blue skies, we were suckered into dropping South into OK, still saw a decent storm during day light hours but missed the big one.

3. March 12 2006 I-70 MO, Don't recall what I was doing that day, all I know is from the stories I missed a hell of a show along I-70

4. April 23 2007 Protection KS, After just traveling South for the 4/21 event missed the 4/23 event because of class, Not often you can see that many tornados in 1 area

5. June 6 2007 Badlands SD, Not that I missed all that of an impressive storm but while I was screwing around in Central NE I did miss a tornado in the Badlands, Seeing a tornado in the bad lands is up there on my list of things to do before I die.

I can remember a lot of summer evenings as well, looking at the radar here at home wishing I was out in Cherry Co.

[Andrea Griffa]

May 3, 1999 (Moore)
May 4, 2003 (Pierce City)
May 29, 2004 (Harper County)
May 12, 2005 (Plainview,Tx)
June 8, 1995(Pampa,Tx F4)

[Shane Adams]

June 13, 1998 (OKC tornadic mothership)
May 24, 1998 (N Oklahoma mini-outbreak)
May 8, 2003 (Moore/OKC F4)
May 7, 2002 (SW Kansas multiple tornadoes)
June 12, 2005 (NW Texas tornadic storm)

I chose these based on the level of pain they caused when I either screwed up or couldn't chase and missed them. That June 13 date will never be surpassed. I didn't expect much and I was promised to attend a wedding reception from 5-10pm that evening. My chase partners came by at 3:30pm and I said I wasn't going because of the reception and it didn't look that great. My ride to the reception didn't show up until 8:30pm, so I got to sit at home and watch all the tornadoes happening live, 30 miles from me. My chase partners saw three that day.

[Kory Hartman]

I can remember a lot of summer evenings as well, looking at the radar here at home wishing I was out in Cherry Co.

Except if you were there, you wouldn't be able to get to the storms for the 2 roads they have in Cherry County, NE...

[Chris Hayes]

1: May 22, 2004 Hallam storm
2: May 29, 2004 Harper County storm
3: May 8, 2003 Moore tornado
4: June 9, 2005 Hill City, Kansas tornados
5: May 4, 2007 Greensburg

[Jason Foster]

1. May 3, 1999 - Moore, OKlahoma
2. April 28, 2002 - LaPlata, Maryland (was chasing this storm, but didn't see the tornado
3. May 27, 1997 - Jarrell, Texas (was just departing Maryland to chase for the season)
4. August 11, 1999 - Salt Lake City Tornado
5. May 30, 1998 - Spencer, South Dakota (stuck in OKC...said it was too far to drive)

[J.B. Dixon]

5/3/99 Moore, OK (Of course!)

5/24/04 Chester, NE Tornadofest --Still on a rush from getting a look at the Hallam beast two days earlier, I felt okay blowing this chase off for a couple of hours. I was late to the show for this one, as I was in the dentist chair in Lincoln too long! About the time the last one roped out, I was looking at it backlit from 6-7 miles away. Sadness. Quite the show that one was.

6/13/04 Alvo, NE Supercell/small tornadoes. -- I think Hollingshead was the only one on this storm, as my wife and I were on the golf course in Seward, enjoying a quiet Sunday afternoon. I saw the lone tower go up and drift to the east, and thought to myself, "Nahhh, no way." Who knew Hurricane Katrina would make landfall in western Cass County, Nebraska?? ;)

6/9/05 Hill City, KS -- Looks like from the footage, I really was the only chaser who didn't see this storm. These could be my favorite images of all-time. Ugh.....

11/12/05 Woodward/Ames, IA Tornado(es) -- Only because it was so late in the year, and the area is so familiar to me. I remember calling buddies tailgating at the Iowa State football game asking them what they were seeing. Ha! ((Add the local yokel's Woodward tornado video from a block away to my list of all-time faves. Him yelling at his dog to come back.......priceless!))

[Stephen Levine]

Alot of mine were relatively local.
1.The first, seen from a safe distance would be the Tri-State tornado. There was a great imagination article on this several years ago in the hardcopy S.T., as to what it would be like chasing that storm then.
2.Two others are in Ohio. I would have loved to see the Xenia OH tornado of 4/3/74. I was living in Athens at that time, about 75 miles SE of Columbus, the state capital. Though we had a spectacular hurricane-like windstorm later that night, to see the twister would have been awesome. A runner up would have been any of the twisters that hit Cinti. that very same afternoon. All this was before my storm chase days.
3. In the Summer of 1972 or 1973, I think in July, there were three Tuesdays in a row that tornadoes hit a part of Columbus, totally unpredicted. It would have been quite cool to see that! In Athens, it was sunny, hot and humid all those days, with nary a storm.
4.And, the Andover KS twister '91 makes my list as well.
5. I grew up in Pittsburgh, PA. The common phrase there was "there are never tornadoes in Pittsburgh". In May,1967, a funnel cloud passed almost right over our house, and dissipated like a watch spring unbinding. That was awesome. However, in 1998, a real bonified wide twister moved SE down the valley and hit Mt. Washington which is literally across the river from Downtown's skyscrapers. The whole thing was captured on the local "skycam", and made major news, causing up to F-2 damage. I would have LOVED to see this one, since it's where I grew up and is where they are "never" supposed to happen.

[scott r currens]

1. June 24, 2003 Manchester, SD
2. August 24, 2006 Southern MN
3. June 23, 2007 Elie, MB
4. June 23, 2002 NE SD
5. June 24, 2007 SW, MB

These are all chases that I did not chase and didn't have the option to chase. I could make a longer list of chases I could have chased but didn't. I'm not sure what the deal is with the June 23th & 24th. I guess I should always chase those date.

[Mike Hollingshead]

Alot of mine were relatively local.
1.The first, seen from a safe distance would be the Tri-State tornado. There was a great imagination article on this several years ago in the hardcopy S.T., as to what it would be like chasing that storm then.
2.Two others are in Ohio. I would have loved to see the Xenia OH tornado of 4/3/74. I was living in Athens at that time, about 75 miles SE of Columbus, the state capital. Though we had a spectacular hurricane-like windstorm later that night, to see the twister would have been awesome. A runner up would have been any of the twisters that hit Cinti. that very same afternoon. All this was before my storm chase days.
3. In the Summer of 1972 or 1973, I think in July, there were three Tuesdays in a row that tornadoes hit a part of Columbus, totally unpredicted. It would have been quite cool to see that! In Athens, it was sunny, hot and humid all those days, with nary a storm.
4.And, the Andover KS twister '91 makes my list as well.
5. I grew up in Pittsburgh, PA. The common phrase there was "there are never tornadoes in Pittsburgh". In May,1967, a funnel cloud passed almost right over our house, and dissipated like a watch spring unbinding. That was awesome. However, in 1998, a real bonified wide twister moved SE down the valley and hit Mt. Washington which is literally across the river from Downtown's skyscrapers. The whole thing was captured on the local "skycam", and made major news, causing up to F-2 damage. I would have LOVED to see this one, since it's where I grew up and is where they are "never" supposed to happen.

Only rule would be they had to occur after you started chasing. No tri-state tornado stuff that way. Just storms you remember seeing/hearing about after you either didn't chase, or did and weren't on it.

lol, not that it matters.

[Dustin Wilcox]

Is it too late to add January 7 2007? Not that chasing 50mph storms through the hills of SW MO is all that fun, but its not every year you get the oppurtunity to add a January Tornado to your list!!

[Shane Young]

Awesome topic!
I really would have wanted to have been out on May 3 99, but didn't start chasing until fall 2000, so that axes that. Pampa, Andover, Jarrell, and even the historic Union City storm all would make the list too probably.

That leaves:
May 29, 04 - Harper County, KS (had to be in Florida, going crazy, knowing I was missing the show)
June 12, 04 - Harper County, KS (in Tallahassee on my way back to Norman, basing people, and knowing I was missing the show once again)
May 22, 04 - Hallam (about to leave for Fl, and had made some recent long hauls, decided it wasn't worth it :-/)
May 29, 01 - Tx Panhandle (Turkey) (back in Florida for the year already, but really wished I had been able to see this)
March 12, 06 - "Quad state supercell" (NE Oklahoma to NW Indiana... at school in Florida)


I'm sure there's others. I repeat, great topic!

[James McCormick]

1) June 27, 2005 - Nebraska Panhandle. Must not have been anticipating this beauty.
2) March 28, 2007 - anything in the high plains. School commitment.
3) April 20, 2007 - Moorefield/Gothenburg, NE. Not sure why I didn't chase this night.
4) June 10, 2005 - Big Springs, NE. Didn't even think about heading that far west.
5) June 9, 2005 - Hill City, KS Tornadoes. Left late and took a bad angle on the storms. Just didn't get there in time.

[Jay Barnes]

In chronological order:

1. March 1, 1997 - Arkadelphia AR
2. May 27, 1997 - Jarrell TX
3. May 30, 1998 - Spencer SD
4. May 3, 1999 - OKC
5. May 4, 2007 Greensburg KS

[Darrin Rasberry]

Who'd wanna chase the Tri-State tornado, or even a carbon-copy of it nowadays? That thing was moving 70+mph!

If "since I've been chasing" is a rule, which would now include anything from June 1 onwards, I'd say:

1) The Manitoba tornadoes
2) Today's and yesterday's tornado event - I'd planned and even stocked up for a trip to Northern Missouri to set up watch for tonight, since it's in my self-designated "night watchman" boundaries (as you can see by the time of this post, I very often have nights I stay all the way awake through due to day-night reversal syndrome). However, I was locked in by fog - and before you laugh, it was dense fog, and frozen fog, and blocked routes to both Missou and Indiana. There's about an eighth-inch layer of ice on EVERYTHING here now :(
3) October's main show.

[Bill Tabor]

May 27, 1997 - Jarrell Tx F5 - Had chased the day previously, and gotten nice tubes in OK the day before (26th) was on my way back home on this day. I was a clueless forecaster back then, and delayed because of showing my video to my brother in law, having a leisurely lunch, and then getting stuck in construction traffic and detours in Denton, Tx when the event began warming up. I attempted to race home - literally racing a Porsch down IH35 in my BMW 535is almost all the way to Waco. Still caught some action in Waco - I believe I saw a tornado east of town, but missed the highly touted unusual event. Perhaps this is good, because I probably wouldn't have understood a backbuilding storm then anyway. Plus traffic on IH35 could have been a safety issue so near the metro area.

May 3, 1999 - OKC F5 - A day that will live in chase infamy for me. I knew how to forecast somewhat by now, and all day since at least early morning had my bullseye set to OKC as the target. This may have been mainly luck for me, and the fact that at the time I thought OKC was the center for all severe weather. Anyway I had a major software release going into production that day and I was the primary database administrator responsible for doing it. All day I kept telling my team mates something extraordinary was going down - and turns out I was right. I was pulling out my hair and chomping at the bit so much to go. They probably thought I was crazy, though they did think tornadoes and chasing was cool.

June 12, 2004 - Mulvane, KS F4 This was a tough day for me because I felt I made a great forecast and was further north awaiting a big outbreak. However when it started happening the Mulvane storm became primary and I believe cut off much of the flow and action to the north. I was amazed, but eventually recovered and raced south as the storm developed an atomic mushroom cloud. I did get on this storm as dusk began setting in and saw much of the features and extreme lightning, but missed the tornadoes though I did film some night features - perhaps possible embedded, rain wrapped tornado further east. It was made even more of a loss later when I saw all the beautiful shots others chasers got of this storm.

June 3, 1999 - Almena, KS F3 Ah, yes, almost forgot this infamous (for me) tornado, that made quite a bit of news the next day on TWC. I was hanging out this day with the MESO crew and allowing them to forecast. Back then they weren't always so good, and forecasting is a bit tricky sometimes. Anyway we ended up in a blue sky bust about 75 to 100 miles south of Almena, KS. We were all hanging out everyone trying to figure out what to do next. About this time I look north and on the horizon I see the huge supercell top just sticking up. About 2 secs and I decide I know where I am going. They couldn't make up their minds and thought they couldn't catch but I knew I was quick. I raced north at 'chase speed' unfortunately running into about 25 miles of detour / construction. To this day I swear I would could have made it. The whole time the radio was saying large, 1/2 mile tornado on the ground!! Ah!! But the construction did me in. I got a spectacular view of about 3 super large supercells to the north each around 60k to 65k in height with Almena being the furthest south. To add insult to injury I once again ran into Gene Moore at a Hotel with the Discovery team and he asked if I got any tubes. Well, I started to say and then heard what he caught. Oh well. Almena was up to 3/4 mile wide at times. http://www4.ncdc.noaa.gov/cgi-win/wwcgi.dll?wwevent~ShowEvent~357367 (http://www4.ncdc.noaa.gov/cgi-win/wwcgi.dll?wwevent%7EShowEvent%7E357367)
http://www.chaseday.com/tornado-almena.htm
http://www.chaseday.com/tornado-almena2.htm

May 17, 2000 Brady NE F3 This was another chase with the Meso team. I saw this event coming and drove up from Austin leaving the previous evening at 11pm and drove all night and day to reach the area near Brady, NE sometime that afternoon right when the storms were firing and ginning up and coming across from CO. The MESO team was distracted and at first primarly concerned with finding a hotel to stay in. I waited as storms were developing. Later we stopped at a gas station and everyone was going to the bathroom and getting snacks. I was monitoring the severe weather the whole time, and was telling Geoff Mackley that a big tornado was likely in progress nearby just across the county line on the other side of the core of another storm cell. I was advocating leaving immediately to him and the Meso crew. They ignored me for quite awhile. Eventually when I was going to break and head for it anyway, that reluctantly decided to go ahead. The result was the famous Jeff P footage of the Brady torn. However we missed it because we screwed around too much. We did catch all the damage, and assisted some victims of the tornado.

[Matt Ziebell]

I'll go chronologically as I'm unable to rate these by importance.

May 31, 1999: "Forgotten" CO tornadoes I'm surprised no one has listed CO yet (not even the 10 May 2004 event!), so I need to give this state some much overdue credit. Everyone remembers the Meade/Sitka tornado this day, fewer recall the southwest OK tornadoes, and even fewer know of the tornadoes in CO. I was chasing with the university crew this day and we ended up too far northeast of the Sitka supercell, but decided to watch what would become the Russell supercell to our north at sunset. This storm did have some great structure and even produced a tornado after sunset, but the real sting was seeing TWC show footage that night of the tornadoes in CO. I had no clue that area was even within a favorable setup and I guess it's these overlooked targets that weigh so heavily on my mind. Someone was out there chasing and getting footage, but I have yet to discover who.
July 5, 2000: Northeast CO monster supercell and tornado Yes, another CO event. This storm needs no explanation...just look at Ian Wittmeyer's photos and mind your drooling!
May 10, 2003: Lima, IL wedge I was returning to IL from having chased OK the day prior, but if it wasn't for work this afternoon I could have easily made the jog northwest to chase any one of the supercells that developed. Two of my co-workers on the midnight shift were able to chase this tornado and their accounts were nothing short of Scott W's awesome footage.
May 15, 2003: Stratford, TX tornadoes I had just finished a midnight shift this morning and was well aware of the chase potential, but if it wasn't for a mandatory post-shift meeting I could have easily made the haul out to the TX Panhandle for a chase. I think Mike H was on to something by quitting the rat race! :)
May 30, 2003: Clinton, IL wedge tornado Finally a day when work didn't interfere, but instead I was stuck waiting for UPS to deliver my digital camera...which didn't arrive until 5pm. I was so upset by that time that I wrote off the day's chase. For that stupid move, I deserved what happened next. I ended up missing out on this evening's tornadic supercells near Lincoln (multiple tornadoes were viewed by the NWS staff) and the wedge later on near Clinton. This supercell was only two hours away from where I was living at the time...ouch.

[Marko Korosec]

Here is my list...

1) Manitoba, Canada - June 23, 2007
2) Manchester, SD - June 24, 2003
3) Stafford Co, KS - May 5, 2007
4) Greensburg, KS - May 4, 2007
5) Mulvane, KS - June 12, 2004

Oh man, if only...

[Michael O'Keeffe]

Here are just a few of the storms I wish I was on.

1. March 13, 1990 Hesston, KS Tornadic Supercell that produced not one, but two F5 tornadoes.

2. June 8, 1995 E TX Panhandle Tornadic Supercell Outbreak

3. June 23, 2002 NE South Dakota WedgeFest

4. June 24, 2003 E South Dakota Tornado Outbreak

5. July 13, 2004 Roanoke, IL Perfect stovepipe F4


There are some notable storms as well: May 5 2007 Macksville, KS Tornado Machine, we headed south towards it then turned around and stayed on the storm we were on, Stupid move!!! January 7, 2008 SW Missouri Tornadic Insanity my dad couldn't get outta work, but if he could have we would have gone...thats a stinger.

[Ben Prusia]

April 15, 2006 - KC Metro Area
Where in the world was I? Several tornadoes reported near Bonner Springs, Kansas and in Ray County, Missouri.

February 28, 2007 - Mound City, Kansas
Nothing beats a local chase, and I was in Gardner at the time; at most an hours drive from the action.

April 23, 2007 - Protection, Kansas
I had the day off too. But it was made up the next day at Nickerson.

May 4, 2007 - Greensburg, Kansas
I told my co-worker that I might be calling out on that day, 8 days in advance. But I showed up to work, and without a doubt, called out the next day!

January 7, 2008 - SW Missouri
Yes, I could have went.

[Bryan Smith]

1. March 18, 1925 Tri-State Storm
2. April 11, 1965 Elkhart Co., Indiana double wedge
3. May 29, 2001 Turkey, Texas striated mothership meso
4. May 27, 2001 Fort Supply, Oklahoma - People Chaser Derecho
5. May 24, 2004 Nuckolls Co., Nebraska supercell (12+ tors)

[Dean Baron]

1. August 24th, 2006 Southern Minnesota
2. March 12, 2006 Missouri
3. May 5, 2007 South Dakota/Nebraska
4. August 5, 2006 Abeerdeen Storm OR late afternoon Fargo storm
5. June 7, 2007 High Risk in Wisconsin

[Fabian Guerra]

1. Hallam, NE - May 2004. We were in Nebraska but on the wrong storms. The day before I witnessed my first tornado after 3 years of busting.
2. Utica, IL - April 20, 2004. Sadly, I was in front of a computer working all day but decided it would be a junk day after looking at morning data. Had I done even a quick check in the early afternoon I would, could and should have been on this one.
3. Roanoke, IL - July 13, 2004. Close but no cigar...
4. Mulvane, KS. You guys know the one. I was unable to chase this day but it looked like such a perfect tornado. Wish I was on it.
5. Central IL, May 30, 2003. I don't think there were any long lived tornadoes but a lot of them were reported and I didn't get any of them. Chalk this one up to inexperience.

[nickgrillo]

Here's the top 5 storms and days that I wish had captured since I've started chasing (May 2003).

1. Greensburg, Kansas -- 5/4/2007:
I couldn't chase at all in 2007 due to personal stuff (as in totally uncalled for retarded stuff). I missed out on a seemingly decent year for quality setups leading to a healthy number of tornado days.

2. Roanoke, IL -- 7/13/2004:
I missed out on an incredible tornado, but then again I probably wouldn't of gotten it even if I did decide to target central IL that day.

3. Hanover, KS -- 4/6/2006:
After driving a total of about 5,000 miles in less than a week -- only for it to have yielded absolutely nothing besides me chasing after moisture-starved / high-based or elevated convection which moves at incredible speeds -- I decided not to drive out to KS again from Detroit. I had gotten a good looking supercell in OK just a few days prior, but then watch it go to crap due to shallow moisture in the BL (again, from convective mixing earlier). Moisture was forecasted to be halfway decent, but I had a bad feeling it would get mixed out by the early afternoon, and even though the moist layer was incredibley thin, there was still this storm (Hanover) that yielded great results for numerous different chasers.

4. IL/WI/MO -- 1/7/2008:
Personally, I hadn't paid much attention to anything wx-related since last summer, up until around 10am that day. No clue on where my exact target would have been if I had actually chased and driven out to the area the night before.

5. Mulvane, KS -- 6/12/2004
!

[Linda Kitchen]

6/8/95 Pampa texas tornado. This was the second year we were chasing. We left on 6/5 and missed it. We had made a friend, Clenny Brown at the NWS in Amarillo, and he called to tell us we should have stayed!! Does anyone else miss the days of going to the NWS for data?

5/27/97 Jarrell, Tx. We had chased the day before and caught tornados, we were driving to Amarillo on the 27th, wish we had gone south!

5/30/98 Spencer, SD. We blasted across Neb. and stopped at a hotel in Souix City to see radar. We went north to De Smet and caught a small tornado but missed the big one. We couldn't believe it!

5/3/99 Moore, OK. Kathy and I had airline tickets for May 15th. Now we both have SW Airlines credit cards, when we charge a certain amount we get free tickets. The beauty of this is when we see a good system comming, we can fly out to meet it. We have made reservations the night before and have been able to get on a plane the next morning.

6/3/99 Almena Ks. We had Drew Smith from Pioneer Productions (Discovery Channel) riding with us for 8 days. We had seen some beautiful storms and one night tornado but had failed to get him "the Big One". Kathy and I left for home on 6/2 and he called the next day to let us know that he and Gene Moore had got the Big One in Almena!! Wish we had been there!

[Brian Stertz]

Since I have started chasing:

1) June 15, 1990 Stratton-Culbertson NE F4 (see Storm Data June 1990 - wow)
2) June 24, 2003 Manchester SD F4 (enough said)
3) April 26, 1991 E.Wichita-Andover KS F5 (enough said)
4) May 29, 2004 Harper-Sumner Co. KS (tornado blitz)
5) Tie
June 23, 1998 Columbus NE area wedges (crazy farmer tornado)
April 2, 2006 Marmaduke AR - Caruthersville MO F3 (long tracker)

**Greensburg would have been on the list had this been a daylight scenario**

[Darin Brunin]

Since I have started chasing:

1) June 15, 1990 Stratton-Culbertson NE F4 (see Storm Data June 1990 - wow)

I have talked to Dean Cosgrove about this tornado several times. While he didn't see it, a farmer sent him some photos and I must say it's one of the most, if not the most impressive looking tornado/overall structure that I have ever seen. If there was video of it, it would probably blow away Columbus in 98. Think of the big Hill City meso this past year on May 22nd with a huge wedge under it. He swears that if there has ever been a tornado that hasn't been an F5 but deserved it, this is one and from the photos I have seen, rightfully so. I will see if he can post the photos because this was a big event that hasn't gotten a lot of attention.

[Brian Stertz]

Yeah it was truly a Great Plains monster...here is the link to Jonathan Finch's 21z surface map from that day. Pretty impressive setup on June 15th, 1990.

http://bangladeshtornadoes.org/UScases/061590/06159021zsf.gif

[Dustin Wilcox]

Yeah it was truly a Great Plains monster...here is the link to Jonathan Finch's 21z surface map from that day. Pretty impressive setup on June 15th, 1990.

http://bangladeshtornadoes.org/UScases/061590/06159021zsf.gif


No doubt, check out Imperial NE 82/72 Nice ESE wind, thats pretty amazing surface obs for that corner of SW NE. Even though I know I have been through there, I couldn't recall exactly where Stratton was, so after looking at that Surface map I checked google maps, and sure enough Stratton is just South of Imperial. Given the location and size of the tornado, I certainly wouldn't mind adding it to my list, though I'm afraid I wasn't chasing way back then.

[Dean L. Cosgrove]

I was living in Morgan County , CO when that event hit SW NE. It is always hard to ignore dews near 70 at AKO as shown in Brian's sfc map ! To this day that is the storm I most wish I had been on. To my knowledge there were no chasers on this event . Darin's post reminded me that I need to look through some of my old VHS-C and 8 MM chase tapes to try and find the damage footage I shot after this remarkable event and transfer it to DVD.

The following photos are of incredible tornado damage from the tornado June 15, 1990 in Hitchcock County, NE. In my opinion this tornado was a very strong F5 not an F4 as it was rated. I base this on the following damage shots that I took . I have been unable to find pics from --ANY-- tornado that equal the damage shown below .

I have observed damage from "officially" F5 rated tornadoes. These F5 tornadoes did throw vehicles for long distances and tear them into several pieces. The June 15, 1990 tornado went beyond that. It tore vehicles including very heavy farm equipment into small and in some cases almost unrecognizable pieces.

The following pic shows debris that I collected from the path of this tornado. Shown here are pieces of cars, farm equipment , a piece of a fence post twisted severely on both ends and a cast iron skillet. The small green piece of metal is from a vehicle that I documented finding pieces of over a 2 mile path through hilly terrain. I was unable to locate any piece of that vehicle larger than about 2 feet long.

http://www.windsweptchasetours.com/June_15_1990_04.jpg

I'll let the rest of the damage pics speak for themselves.
Link to page I just finished

http://www.windsweptchasetours.com/June_15_1990_damage.html

Dean Cosgrove
http://www.chasetours.com/index.html

[Matt Chatelain]

6-22-07 Elie, MA
6-23-07 Pipestone, MA Wedge
4-2-06 Caruthersville, MO
3-28-07 Beaver county, OK (I had a afternoon dynamics test, a part of me died that day)
8-24-06 Nicollet, MN Multi-vortex wedge

[jeremy wilson]

1. may3, 1999(duh)

2. june12, 2004, was 50 miles south looking at the A-bomb

3. greensburg

4. manitoba, just to say i caught a wedge in canada

5.pampa drillbit tornado

[Brian Stertz]

Agree Dean...this bad boy seemed to vastly underrated given types of extreme damage that was done on the 28 mile path across Hitchcock & Red Willow Counties NE. I crossed the damage path a few times chasing out that way years after the fact and it was a mammoth violent tornado. I can only imagine the giant hailbombs that were being thrown downwind of it. The structure on this was amazing. I will scan a few pics in from that Storm Data June 1990 edition. It is jaw dropping stuff. :eek: