GUESS WHAT WE SAW?! ANYONE HAPPEN TO CHECK STORM REPORTS FOR FRIDAY?????

Have I got a story for you! I don't have much time, as we are planning some chaser convergence with Jeff as we had out of town, but I have an exciting story to tell you about Friday.

First off, I have a boatload of pics from this incredibly awesome visit to south Florida, and I am not able to share those right now, but I am going to share this story... since I finally have an Internet connection. It started on Friday morning, when bf and I headed to the National Hurricane Center to take some pics outside, since we knew that we wouldn't be able to tour it during the season, you know, outside of the off-season, not on the Tuesday/Thursday 10-2 tour schedule, but we went in anyhow to try, and the security guard didn't know what to do with us... uh, you're not supposed to be in here... lol. More pics of that in a later post... but, some beautiful convection was building even while we were at the Tropical Prediction Center.So, that, in and of itself was pretty awesome!!! I got some great shots at the NHC and then, we headed on to Key Biscayne, at this point not having seen weather reports in a full day and not having access to anything weather... and apparently, no one saw to let me know that I was under a TORNADO WARNING at one point (thanks to Chris Collura for telling me that when I talked to him this morning to see about hooking up, which he can't... darn). Well, it just so happens that the tornado warning produced!!! Well, even better than that is that the tornado warning produced a water spout reported by local law enforcement... No, no, even better than that is that I saw the BEAUTIFUL cone funnel at the tail end of the water spout as it made its way inland. We were traveling up the main strip in Key Biscayne in moderate and very cranky horn-blowing traffic, looking for some place to eat, when I look up ahead of us along this very ridiculously tree covered drive, and there it was smack dab in front of me, seemingly out of the blue, just a little spin-off forming in the sea breeze... a beautiful grey solid cone funnel piping down (well, actually piping up), which was actually dipping down pretty low at the point I saw it, but I could see at that point that the base was well above land. I exclaimed to bf, "IS THAT WHAT I THINK IT IS?!" He said... "No way. You're imagining things." I shouted, "PULL OVER, IT'S A CONE FUNNEL!!!" By the time we got a spot where we could see it and I could shoot pics, it was dissipating, losing its beautiful cone shape, but you can clearly see it in my shot, and then, it was gone. Just like that!!! I was able to snap only two shots of what I now know was a dissipating water spout that had gone TORNADO.Who says Friday the 13th is unlucky. I think my chase partner is a magnet for this stuff!!! :O)

Anyways, a HUGE thank you to Chris Collura who let me know that the cone funnel I was telling him about was actually a tornado just moments before!!! That rocks!!! Here is the storm report showing the tornado report on Miami Beach, you know the one that we saw!!!... and here is the local storm report. :O)

PRELIMINARY LOCAL STORM REPORT
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE MIAMI FL
317 PM EDT FRI JUN 13 2008

0203 PM TORNADO 3 NNE MIAMI BEACH 25.85N 80.12W
06/13/2008 MIAMI-DADE FL LAW ENFORCEMENT

MIAMI BEACH POLICE OFFICER REPORTED A WATER SPOUT MOVING ONSHORE NEAR 64 STREET. WATER SPOUT LIKELY DISSIPATED AS IT REACHED THE SHORELINE WITH NO DAMAGE REPORTED.

Until I get home from this beautifully picturesque place, when I have more time to blog all about my wonderful trip, I leave you with yesterday's sunset.It's a beautiful day!!!
~Dewdrop

Storm Chasing Dew Style in South Georgia... the Dewvoid is dead!!!

This was written by Alabama Mike to me. All true...

Dew HERSELF witnessed a few wall clouds and a funnel cloud. She reported that to the NWS Tallahassee but they issued no tornado warning as far as I could tell. They dropped the ball by not using her report.

Finally, there is irrefutable scientific evidence that the Dewvoid was a myth and it happened in her own county...

Mike also had a great account of my chase on the team blog from the radar perspective. Awesome, Mike! Thanks! Meso Mike emailed a storm report that was related to the rotating wall cloud I saw:

HAHIRA, GA 3099N 8337W SEVERAL TREES AND POWER LINES WERE DOWN.

Based on that report's lat/long, I might be returning to a powerless house. Anyways, on with my story...

It was my lunch hour, and I asked bf if he would be interested in going out and shooting some lightning on the squall line that was coming through, so we got set up in a decent-sized sod field, well to the east of the approaching squall and waited for the lightning to start flashing, while we ate sandwiches. A few frequent flashes (none of which caught) preceded a heavy downpour with ferocious wind. Luckily, we were chasing in a Jeep (yes, yes, I know I just preached all about how we shouldn't do that... but we did it anyway, so :OP), so when the water covered the dirt road access back to the highway, we just went bogging through that. (Gotta love a Jeep for the off-road chasing opportunities. My minivan would have been stuck there...)






Yes, in south Georgia you get John Deere tractors in your chase pics. It was while we were bogging out of there, headed back to the office that I got the call from Alabama Mike "DID YOU KNOW THAT YOU ARE UNDER A TORNADO WARNING?!" Uh... no! (Remember that I forgot my weather radio today... bad storm chaser) So, a quick about-face and we were chasing a tornado warned cell, where a tornado had been spotted by a trained spotter in the southern part of my county.

CLYATTVILLE, GA ROOF LIFTED OFF HOME ON JOHNSON ROAD . POWER POLES AND TREES SNAPPED.

This is what that area to my south looked like... (where I estimate that cell was) So, bf and I were headed east on Highway 84, trying to get ahead of the tornadic supercell, which we could see to our southwest. We were awaiting the opportunity to make a southward turn for an intercept opportunity. Finally, that chance arrived. We turned south on Highway 129 and headed for some action... but along the way had to stop and take a picture of the doppler radar site that I have come to rely upon. (How cool is that, getting a picture of your actual radar during your chase?!) We were driving steadily south, and we saw the storm was racing along to the east, but appeared to be dissipating. Mike suggested an east turn early on along the way, but my gut told me to keep going south. With the way these storms were flying by, we never would have caught up to that one, and the next one was right behind it, so if we journeyed south... it would come to us, theoretically. Mike seemed to agree with that line of thinking, but soon we came to another east/west decision. Alabama Mike and I talked through options and we jointly decided that we should head west toward a cell that looked powerful with some signs of rotation that was three counties over at that point, and we planned for an intercept in Valdosta up by Highway 84. We were traveling west on Highway 94, racing (not speeding, just hurrying along...;OP) toward a potentially tornadic supercell. Yeehaw! Finally, we hit a perimeter road in Valdosta that cuts from Highway 94 over to Highway 84, but there it was. We were just in time for the main event, so we pulled into the center median on a bridge on that road (where two sheriff's deputies--seperately--stopped with lights to check on us, one asking us to move to a safer viewing spot--deeper into the storm with less visibility... ok, Einstein... I think not!). So, we were watching this monster roll by about 5 miles to the north, when suddenly... this wall cloud descends from the cloud base, beautiful wall cloud, showing definite rotation. I was on the phone with Alabama Mike at the time, and I had to go to call it in to the guys... Spotter duty, don't you know? Parks... who didn't issue a warning... on my trained spotted rotating wall cloud (lol, I wrote eye wall, intially... is it cane season already???). :OP Whatever, Parks! That same cell produced wind damage in Thomasville and in Hahira, probably at the time I was calling it in (more on that to come)... Well, after getting off the phone with Parks, who didn't issue a warning (did I mention that?)...bf and I both saw the funnel drop from it and pop back up. I am still digging through the video, to see if I can find it... (Update: I found that tonight..., and let me say that my video capability on the camera I have stinks big time!!! I am actually about to get one of Rick's reject video cameras, for a great deal, so that should help. Thanks, Rick!) Anyways, as a warning, this video accidentally contained a wordy dird. Sorry, I guess my language gets a little less than PG when faced with exciting weather... It's hard to make out, and I have no editing software (another thing to add to my list) to enhance the sharpness, etc., but I promise, a funnel cloud descended for a few seconds and popped back up and dipped again, before a wall of rain from another approaching cell covered us in a blanket of torrential downpour, and I did not feel comfortable being in that mess because I figured we shouldn't play with rain wrapped rotation, so we headed back east to get ahead of it again, and we were riding parallel with it because when Alabama Mike suggested we turn north, we traveled about 5 miles up a tree covered windy dirt road before we came out RIGHT UNDER a rotating wall cloud!!!! Then, I was trying my hardest to convince bf to turn us around and get us the heck out of there because we were in DANGER!!! He reluctantly did without anything dropping on us... whew.... (we have talked about this, and he said that he promises that the next time we end up under a rotating wall cloud, he will get us out of there faster--he was just excited. lol. At least, we survived to tell about it. Thank God.) and we decided to just let it pass on by so we could both get back to what we needed to be doing... work. Mike indicated that the cell lost its umph, and time was working against us. So we stopped and watched it roll on by... until it started to pour on us, a cold pounding rain. Awesome chase! Great intercept! Off to pain and torture!!!

~Dew