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August 26, 2004 - College
Springs, IA -
Tornado - Supercell
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(Multi-vortex
tornado with incredible storm structure)
(Click on pictures to view larger size.) |
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Jonathan Garner and I had an
intense chase yesterday in Southwest Iowa. We caught this
multi-vortex tornado by College Springs, IA at ~ 6:40pm. We
watched it as it moved within a 1/4 mile of my sister and
brother-in-law's house. Their neighbor's acreage was damaged, my
sister and brother-in-law lost a canoe and a few trees got
topped off. I couldn't believe it as I saw the vorticies dance
around their house!
Special thanks goes to Jim Kaiser for some great now casting
getting us through a nasty splitting cell. We almost had to
paddle are way down HWY 2 to M48.
The picture
above on the left was taken from a friend in Lincoln. What a
great picture showing the anvil and updraft. At the time this
picture was taken, Jonathan and I were investigating the
happenings under the mesocyclone.
-Brian
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Chase Account by Jonathan Garner:
Brian Thalken and myself left Omaha at about 5pm today
(somewhat of a late start). A thunderstorm had rapidly developed
in southeastern Nebraska before we left, and was moving east
into southwest Iowa, where a very unstable and highly sheared
environment existed. I was aware that the storm had gone through
a split right before we left, and we encountered the northern
split as we went south on I-29. After entering the northern
split, we exited off of the interstate and headed east. As we
got gas in Sidney, IA (~5:45pm), the Omaha NWS issued a tornado
warning for the southern split. We were "embedded" within the
right-turners forward flank precip core. During the next
30-minutes, we drove east down highway 2 battling the heavy
rain, then went south toward the town of Coin, IA. Just before
reaching Coin, we exited the precip core and a massive
mesocyclone towered above us. The storm was highly sculpted and
rotating hard. We headed a mile or so west of Coin in order to
observe the base...a strongly rotating wall cloud was present
with an impressive clear slot wrapping toward it.
We were soon forced to go east in order to stay ahead of the
low-level mesocyclone. As we approached College Springs, IA, the
low-level rotation began to intensify even more, taking on a
skewed horseshoe shape with an area of agitated cloud tags in
the middle. We soon found a place to park as the mesocyclone
slowly moved east. Soon, a long condensation tube reached for
the ground (~6:35-6:45), followed by a 5-10 minute period of
suction vortices dancing around an invisible origin. An
incredible weird twist of fate had suddenly developed. Brian's
sister and brother-in-law's house was right in the path of this
multiple vortex tornado. Luckily, the tornado missed their house
by a few hundred yards, but unfortunately, their neighbors house
was hit. We could easily see trees and debris getting sucked
into the tornadoes inflow as it passed by their house. After the
mesocyclone passed by and slowly dissipated, we let the storm
move on to the east and went back to check on Brian's family.
Everyone was ok...what an intense chase!
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