Written by Hello to those few who read my blogs!
I wanted to write about my storm chasing experience and those of this year. I have been chasing since I was about 14. When I first started doing it, I could only go when my friends wanted to and we really didn’t know what we were doing. Once I turned 17, I started driving and really got into it. Shortly after I became a Skywarn storm spotter and did some local emergency management stuff as well. After that, I usually only chased when it was very local. It was about 2009 when I started going out of my county to chase. I saw a historical derecho rip southern Illinois apart that year and thought that was my greatest chase year yet. I was wrong, lol.
I am writing this blog today to nominate 2011 as my greatest chase year, ever. I have seen more this year than I have in the past 10+ years chasing before it. It started out with myself and Kevin Askew barely escaping a storm with over 100 MPH winds while chasing in the jungle (AR/TN area). Then we had some crazy experiences up north near St. Louis with hail and all sorts of RFD. I met Katelyn Pfeister this year and she is one of my best chasing buddies I could ask for. Me and Kate went to Lincoln, NE this year as well. We went for a severe weather conference and decided to chase that day. I had never been to the plains before (let alone chased them) and I chased the Mapleton, IA EF-3 wedge tornado all the way into town and then helped with search and rescue once we got into town.
I have seen a lot of freak accidents this year as well and avoided all of them from affecting me. These usually happen when Kate is with me, haha, she reminds me of that. I have met a lot of chasers this year too. I even chased with John and Brad from Australia who came here to chase for a few months. That day we intercepted several funnel clouds and I got lost in IN near a funnel trying to touch the ground. It was one of the most scariest storm chases I had been on but I am really glad it happened because it reminded me of what I get myself into, hahaha.
This year has been a freaking blast and its not even done yet. I just wanted to write this blog to share my thoughts. Please comment to this blog telling me what your favorite chase year is and why. Feel free to share blog, photo and video links if you want.
