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July 4, 2001 Storm Chase

July 4th is one of those days were a storm chaser may experience several different emotions. Unfortunately, I was at work for most of the day. As usual, I started at 8:30 am and got out at 5:00 pm. It is just too bad that a majority of the activity had occurred in the late morning and early afternoon hours. I overheard some employees in the office mention that there was a severe thunderstorm warning for the area. Dang it! Why does it have to happen now? I was all excited about this event the day before. But, I had to set my priorities straight. I had to work, storm or no storm, even though I really wanted to get out early. And asking my boss to get off early would look rather ridiculous. So, I had no other choice but to update myself on the weather at lunch hour. Tornado warnings had been issued. A supercell thunderstorm was to the north. I was starting to feel anxious. Finally, after what seemed like eons of waiting, it was time to go home. My mother picked me up from work. I looked up at the sky and noticed how humid the air had felt. There were some TCU as well.

As soon as I got home, I ran upstairs and gave myself another update on the situation. Radar showed a lot of activity, but unfortunately, a majority of it was east of me. I then noticed a not-bad looking supercell storm running along the edge of Lake Erie in the SW. I gave my uncle, Dave Szozda a call and we decided that we were going to chase. He came over at around 6 pm, while I was trying to finish my dinner quickly. He mentioned to me that he had a strong feeling that today would be a tornado day.

I printed off a radar image, and Dave and I loaded the van at 6:20 pm. We noticed that many TCU were now all over, and we took an interest in one particular storm. This one was a bit east, and we were not exactly sure how we were going to approach it. In that area, hills and trees can get in the way, so I didn't fussy the area. But we took our chances. As we headed east, I took several pictures. We then decided to take a dirt road to get out to Wellington County. We kept driving. We were just not getting anywhere! Hmmm something did not seem right here... it turns out we basically drove around a in loop! AHHH! What a waste of time! Now I know to never try that again! :-) :-(

We gave up on that storm... we'd never get to it in time. So, we started to head in the other direction... west. As we were going down University Avenue in Waterloo, I noticed a mature thunderstorm cell way off in the distance! That's going to be our new target! The previously issued tornado warnings had just ended, however new warnings were now being issued for the SW. At 6:53, we encountered light showers from the TCU above us. Ahead of us, there was a line of towering cumulus. A couple minutes later, we reached the town of St. Agatha. As the sun continued to shine, the distant supercell was becoming clear in view, however we were still quite a distance from it. We took a dirt road to see if it would help us get south quicker and to get better in position, but I didn't fussy the forest surrounding us, plus it seemed this road would never end. Finally, we reached normal asphalt road again. After reaching Harmony at 7:21, we decided to take highway 6, south. We then pulled onto highway 19, just north of the town Tillsonburg. Finally, the storm was much clearer in view, however we were running a bit late. At 8:06, we viewed a rainbow and some mammatus with the storm, but that is what we would only be seeing today. The storm was over Lake Erie and the sun would be setting soon, so there was really no point in trying to get any closer. Shucks, if only we were sooner we would have had time to actually see something. So, we just sat there off to the side of the road and took some pictures and video. Storm cells were also off to our west. Alas, the sun was starting to set, and it was time to head back home. As we neared Kitchener-Waterloo, the distant supercell's anvil had greatly spread out... it seemed even much closer to us than it was before. As the sun started to go down, the clouds turned pink and purple and then disappeared into darkness. We got back at 9:22.

Notes: Congratulations to fellow storm chasers Mark Robinson, Dave Patrick and Jack Kertzie for catching tornadoes that day and reporting them into CANWARN. A job well done guys, keep it up!

Total hours: 2 hours 2 minutes

Distance: 224 km