A great day with a stunning tornado in open country that we were able to track from start to finish.
It began in Fort Stockton, and we initially considered making a longer journey North back towards Amarillo to chase the larger instability up North. Eventually we decided to stay south and track I20 to the ENE.
After a Mongolian Barbecue and some, ahem, baby shopping, we headed East to Big Spring as the towers started to form. We were practically under the most promising and were fortunate to get in to perfect position to watch the whole tornadogenesis cycle. Ultimately we tracked the updraft for 30 minutes, until it started to weaken, disrupted by the now larger storm to the North East.
The most memorable aspect of this storm was, other than the tornado, how peaceful it was. It was also very low precipitation which gave it great visibility.
After the storm died, we headed North East, tracking the large storm until it gusted out and we continued up to Childress in North Texas to prepare for the following day.
The “short” version
The full tornado lifecycle
