An exceptional setup for strong to violent tornadoes developed over Kansas and Oklahoma on May 10.  Unfortunately, at least 2 people lost their lives, as tornadoes ripped across the Plains of Oklahoma. 

 

We positioned ourselves over southern Kansas, which would end up on the northern edge of this tornado outbreak. 

 

We left Olathe Kansas around 10am, with a target between Wellington and Medicine Lodge Kansas in mind.  For several hours we drove through a cool, and drizzly landscape until we finally punched through the warm front near Wellington.  Man did it feel good to see the sun and feel the warmth after driving through all of that dismal fog and drizzle!

 

Here's a photo east of Attica shortly after punching into the warm sector.

 

 

 

Supercells were already firing at this point, so we had to make a decision as to which one to go after.  Initially we thought we could make a run at a strong supercell in northern Oklahoma near Wakita, but after mulling over all of the options we felt our best bet was a powerful supercell approaching Medicine Lodge Kansas.  We continued west towards Attica, and could see the supercell on the western horizon.

 

 

 

As we approached Attica, we passed the house that was damaged by a large tornado infamously captured by Scott McPartland.  

 

 

 

As we continue on west of Attica, the supercell to the west began to look more and more impressive, both on radar and in person.

 

 

 

We stopped just east of Sharon Kansas, and observed a few very distant and weak funnels beneath the gigantic updraft base.  

 

 

 

The supercell was approaching pretty quickly from the west at this point, but we decided to head north out of Sharon and captured some amazing structure shots of this beast as it approached.  These still images don't even come close to doing this justice, as it can't capture the incredible motion this storm displayed.  The whole storm was rotating, and quite quickly at that.  Absolutely surreal experience!

 

 

 

Still in the same location, looking northwest here.  The clouds on the far right of the image are screaming right to left, into the center of the rain-free base.  The whole rain-free base/mesocyclone was rotating very quickly at this point.

 

 

 

Soon after the above photos were taken, we quickly pushed north, and then east to keep up with the storm.  Storm speeds were well over 50mph, so keeping up with this storm was a big challenge.  

 

A few miles down the road a wall cloud quickly developed, and within a matter of a minute or two already lowered a large funnel.

 

 

 

Soon after it made contact with the ground.  Tornado!  This was just southwest of Zenda, Kansas.

 

 

 

The tornado very quickly grew in size, and became a large cone-shaped tornado.  Luckily it was over grassland, and we never saw it hit anything.

 

 

 

We followed the tornado east, and within a few minutes it began to weaken quickly. 

 

 

 

Soon after the above photo was taken, the tornado went through a brief, but very impressive rope stage.  The rope stage is basically the last "hurrah" of the tornadoes life cycle.  Unfortunately I didn't snap any stills of that, as I was manning Jeremy Ludin's video camera.  

 

 

After the above tornado lifted, we followed it all the way to just west of Wichita, but we lost visual of the additional tornadoes this storm produced, due to rain wrapping around the meso.  

 

Here's a few pictures looking north-northeast as the rain-wrapped tornado/meso west of Wichita.  

 

 

 

Just west of Wichita we finally gave up on the above storm.  There was a new supercell approaching from the southwest, as we pushed south towards Clearwater.  We caught a brief tornado on video camera in the distant southwest around this time.  It was several miles away, and compared to the above tornado it was not impressive at all.  

 

The storms began to line up pretty good by 6pm, so we decided to call it a day as the tornado warned supercells in Oklahoma were too far to intercept.  

 

As we were heading northeast out of Wichita we saw a pretty cool line of thunderheads to the west near the setting sun.  These storms weren't tornadic, but were severe warned.  Made for a picturesque view to the west over the Kansas Plains.

 

 

 

So in summary, May 10 2010 was a pretty successful day.  Storm speeds were extremely fast, so tornado intercepts were much more difficult than you'd expect with such a good setup.  Jeremy and I were both pretty happy to capture such a picturesque, high-contrast cone tornado on a day like this.