So for day one proper, there was not much to chase. But we had two options, one to go north east to Arkensas where there would be the hope of some large hail, or to drop south and play with a marginal risk, but a decent north/south highway. This was important as by end of day we needed to be back in Dallas because our Mifi wireless adapter had been ‘lost’ by the hotel and we needed to stay around for a new one. The south route gave us the best chance of getting back easily so we opted for that. It was time to dust off the cobwebs, check out our gear and see if i was still able to position us well for initiation.
With all things considered it was a successful day. Storms initiated near Austin, Texas, about 50 miles to our left and we had a fun time driving through the intense downpours. We experienced some impressive ‘shotgun’ thunder too, with cloud-ground strikes dropping all around us.
Composite of 2 GoPro frames showing lighning hit a pylon under 1/2 mile away
Before long though it was time to head back.
So on the one hand it was an 8 hour round trip for a few flashes and bangs but… the GoPro works, and we proved that you can chase with nothing more than a single mobile phone (on roaming) and still get on top of the storms.
With Chris really enjoying our first taste of storms, my though to myself was “you ain’t seen nothing yet mate!”.