Weather, Storms & Hurricane Blog

Eastern Kansas Tornadic Supercells - Taking Cover!

Thursday evening, a line of embedded Supercell thunderstorms tracked through the eastern parts of the central Plains states from central Oklahoma, much of eastern Kansas and northwest Iowa. Storm Chaser Jim Edds was on the tail-end line of storms in southeastern Kansas from the start to well after dark. I was nowcasting for Jim throughout the day and evening, giving radar, and warning reports. Jim first jumped on the developing possible tornadic Supercell near the town of Fredonia, KS, (see storm picture ) where he saw a short-lived funnel and wall cloud, with banding storm structure.

Chanute Kansas Under The Gun - Storm Chasers Film

Jim then shifted northeast with the storm that was cycling through several time before reaching up near Chanute, Kansas, where the storm wrapped up once again. As you can see in the above picture, people taking cover and hunkering down in the local Chanute

Fire department building. Women and children lined the hallway as tornado sirens blast outside. I was on the phone with Jim when he was shooting at this location, and everyone in the background was calm and listening to Jim’s updates. You could clearly hear the tornado sirens in the distance, letting you know something bad might be on the way.

Jim was not the only Chaser in the area, actually, there were dozens and dozens on this storm. My fellow chaser partner Chris Collura was also on this storm, although I was not in contact with him since Thursday morning. Chris overnight sent in some outstanding pictures of the Chanute, KS tornadic Supercell. You can view this photos to the left and here. I was impressed to see how many tornado reports there were up and down the eastern Plains for Thursday. There were 19 tornado reports as of 3:am today, and some of them were confirmed tornadoes on the ground, especially in Oklahoma.

Severe Weather Continues Today Further East

As for today, all the severe weather is shifting eastward, and another moderate risk for severe storms and tornadoes now is in place over much of the central Mississippi valley. I will be monitoring today’s storms, and chasers that might be in the target area.

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