First Chase of the 2009 Season

Tuesday 10th February was the first storm chasing day of the 2009 season and was a very good day with 6 tornadoes dropping in Oklahoma during the day.We set out south to go chasing past Ardmore. We spent ages looking for a good storm to follow but storms kept dissipating and around 6 we were just about given up for the day and were about to set out home when about 5 minutes later the storm we were hoping to follow flared up again and we set off chasing it. We stopped to watch the formation and were so excited about it that we missed that actual tornado forming by about 10 minutes, then it crossed the Red River and the road we were on wasn't any where near a bridge- it's a very wide river- so we missed actually seeing the tornado but we did see the tornado funnel lifting from the ground and die. And so we stopped to watch the storm. There was a huge anvil cloud and in it there were constant flashes of lightening as lots of hail was being produced inside. Satisfied we set off back home trying to follow the squaw line so that we could have a light show of lightening as we drove home. we stopped in Gainsville in Texas for some food and found out that 2 of the stroms behind us has dropped tornadoes in places we'd been earlier in the day.

Late on in the evening as were were on the final stretch home we heard reports on the radio about a town we'd passed earlier in the day and it had been hit by a tornado and 3 people had been killed and more people unaccounted for, it now stands at 7 people dead so it was a sobering report to bring us back to relaity and remember that tornadoes are violent and that our excitement has masked this. I believe that the tornado was measured at a category 4.

Here are a few pictures of the scenes that we saw ourselves.