Photos, Videos and Full Recap of Storm Chasin' from July 17

As promised, here are a few shots (finally uploaded!) from my storm chasing travel adventure west of Minneapolis on July 17, 2010. This first image, one of the last from the trip, was of a rapidly approaching shelf cloud south of Anoka, MN. In one of the videos (link below) you see me drop the camera and hear my car racing away to take cover. Pretty scary stuff for a California native.

Here is a map and summary of the severe weather events of the day, and specific incidents reported to the National Weather Service in Minneapolis.

This blog from the Minneapolis Star Tribune provides outstanding graphical updates throughout the day (latest entry first) as the storms progressed throughout the region.

Video to my YouTube site with a few videos including footage of the shelf cloud approaching and sitting it out (in both fear and excitement) as severe weather passes overhead.

Half-dollar sized hailstones pounding on my windshield will be a sound to never forget. The helpless feeling and thought the windshield might shatter at any moment was enough for me temporarily withdraw from this particular storm chase. On my escape out, I captured these after-the-fact shots of golfball size hail lying around on a baseball field near Rockford, MN. There were reports of baseball, even SOFTBALL size hail in the region earlier in the day. (Yikes!)

Although I fared well, other windshields in the path of these severe storms provided little to no barrier as shown in this image from the Minneapolis Star Tribune.

Off.... Storm Chasing in Minnesota

Even the first time chaser knows Minnesota is not in the heart of tornado alley. But they do receive their fair share of severe weather each season. The Storm Prediction Center has hatched a 30% probability of an organized severe weather event across the southern part of the state for Saturday. Severe weather is defined as hail 1" or larger, winds greater than 58 m.p.h, or a tornado.

As I do each season, I plan on flying out for a weekend of enjoying nature at its finest. The strong and severe storms rarely seen or heard on the west coast, are a welcome treat for me. Supercell storms, wall cloud (pictured below), funnel clouds or even tornado's are simply icing on the cake. =)

Current plan is to depart on a red-eye tonight. Stay tuned for updates.

Vacation Idea: Storm Chasing

Not for the faint-hearted, storm chasing vacations allow one to get up close and personal with severe storms, and on a "good" day, even encounter tornado's.

Tornado alley as it's known, stretches throughout much of the Midwest and west of the Appalachian mountains of the United States. Although tornadoes can occur almost anywhere in the United States, including right here in Northern California (the picture to the left was taken at Sacramento International Airport), during the early summer months, storms are particularly severe and plentiful in Tornado Alley. As such, professionals and amateurs alike gather in the "alley" awaiting the opportunity to encounter the awesome power of mother nature. Speaking from personal experience, it is a feeling unlike any other.

Forbes Traveler recently wrote on professional tour operators dedicated to those interested in partaking in storm chasing. Many of these operators are well-versed in meteorology and storm chasing, and chase storms equipped with the latest high-tech equipment allowing them to identify regions storms are most likely to break out.