6/14/08: Good to be Back in the Panhandle
I left OKC this morning around 11:45 AM targeting Clarendon, TX. I took I-44 W to US-62 W to US-83 N to TX-256 W to US-287 W and stopped in Memphis for food/data (the Island Fire Burger’s back, baby!). Storms had gone up to the north and west, but they weren’t painting on KAMA radar yet, despite their apparent size. I decided to go after anyhow, continuing west on US-287.
I turned N on FM-294 from Goodnight and drove under the leading edge of the baby storm that would eventually be the big HP beast of the day. When I got north of I-40, I expected the storm (which was no longer looking so nice on radar) would turn around to move southeast as I approached it, so I turned west on FM-293. On the way into Panhandle, I watched lots of persistent dust plumes kicked up from the outflow.
I made it to town in time to watch the storm threaten. The original storm that I drove under the southeast started to look better and was barely moving, so I hooked it back south (US-60 E to TX-207 S to US-287 E).
Got between the storms and sat at a nice little pull off between Claude and Goodnight, taking pics of both. They didn’t do much but rain and hail lots, but it was fun to watch them anyhow. I ended up sequencing a wet microburst and nabbed some nice structure shots while I fought to keep rain off my lens.
Finally called off the chase around 6:45 PM and started back the way I came. I reached the core of the storm just west of Altus around 8:15. As I was drove through town, the storm killed the power, taking the traffic lights with it. I was amazed that it didn’t cause traffic pandemonium.
Of course I stopped east of town to take advantage of the day’s magic light and the lightning storm that was now to my south.
I wrapped up around 9:00PM and made it back to the house around 10:45.
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