Severe weather for parts of the Southeast Sunday/Monday

Just a quick blog for our friends over in the SE. Looks like Sunday into Monday could be a severe weather day for you. Looking at latest models, it appears as though TN Alabama and points east could see some severe with all modes possible including tornadoes.

Stay tuned to your local media and NWSFO for details as they unfold. I will try to update later.

DEADLY STORM SYSTEM POSSIBLE!!!!! 1/17/12

As can be seen in the graphics below, a powerful storm system is taking aim on the upper West coast at this time bringing with it very strong winds and major snow.

Current RUC sounding was so enlarged that the Hodo was off the chart! But as we can see below, winds from the basement (ground level) through 200mb) are very very strong with gusts over 80kts!

I looking at the at the surface winds via the RUC for the same time frame (real time) 12z we can see that the winds at the surface could be gusting well over-60-65kts! which is almost Hurricane force winds@ 74MPH at the surface!!! This is going to create a very dangerous situation for the folks in the upper northwest coast, especially people who live right along the coast!

Of course the snow depth looks to be in the 10-20inch range, depending on where you are located so blizzard like conditions will no doubt be a possibility as can be seen in the graphic below.

All in all, this storm system certainly could be deadly if people do not pay attention to the weather. I would encourage the folks living in this area to monitor the weather very close today!

STORM CHASING TOURS

Obviously have not posted in a while but with the latest round of severe weather and this years first Tornadoes, I thought it might be a good idea to post. This time of year we are slowly gearing up for the chase season by updating our website and booking tours. As of right now Extreme Chase Tours already has limited seating available on most of our tours so it looks like it might be a great year business wise....now lets hope and pray that mother nature will also be kind.

So if you are interested in going on a Storm Chasing Tour with us then I would encourage you to reserve your seats ASAP before we book full again this year. You can reserve your seats by going to our website at listed below:

http://www.extremechasetours.com/

As far as the severe weather.....currently we have ongoing severe in KY into TN as this system pushes east. Might be a good idea to keep an eye on the weather throughout the day if you live in the southeast.

Also, got a chance to go out and film our first "snow storm" here in Oklahoma. Not much of a storm so to speak but it was fun to play with. I have posted the video below. I shot this video with my Nikon D90 so the quality is not the best as this was the first time I actually have used it to shoot video with.

Been A While....

Looks like it has been a bit since my last blog and with much happening I figured what the heck....I can't sleep so I might as well post on the blog. So currently the reason I cannot sleep is because I broke my leg in 3 places and chipped it as well. This accident happened about almost a week and a half ago, and was caused by nothing more than a trip on some cables but it has certainly caused some major pain! You can see exactly where all three breaks are at in the X-Ray below, and of course, the resulting full cast. Not Fun times at all.




I am just thankful that it did not happen in the middle of May during chase season! Hopefully it heals very soon and the pain stops so I can get back in the tree stand doing some hunting. Looks like bow season will be a short one for me due to the injury.

Nothing to really report on the weather as of yet.....although it does look like the November 5-7Th time frame we could see some severe, that is if the models are to believed this far out. I am always very skeptical when using certain models this time of the year. Experience has taught me that some models do not do well during this time of year VS other models, especially with moisture return. So for now I will only mention the possibility of some weather during that time frame. Per the GFS 00z for oz Sunday (graphic below) it is painting a pretty decent area of low pressure and some decent moisture return through the central and southern plains. Not real sure I am good with this as I just do not think we will see those kind of dew point returns. But anything is likely and it is a 7 days out....something to keep an eye on for sure though.







With a broken leg I have not had a chance to really do anything except take some pics here and there....nothing real fancy or great but decent fall colors starting here in Oklahoma as can be seen below:





I plan on posting more pics as I get time and hopefully better pictures as well.

Extreme Chase Tours latest production video. For productions/media

A few new pics

Finally got a chance to get the camera back out and do a little shooting the last few days. Thankfully the last couple of evenings have provided at least a few opportunities for some sunset pictures. Nothing that I would write home about but it was good to get the camera out of the bag and actually do some shooting. Hopefully I will be able to keep a little time to do some shooting over the next couple of weeks!

A good day!

After spending some time on the lake tubing with the family yesterday, this morning my daughter, Rylie, and I went fishing. I kinda had an idea that the sandbass might be biting so we loaded up the boat and hit the water at 8am sharp. I had not been to this fishing hole since last year so it took some time looking at the fish finder, but in about 30 minutes we were on the spot and had one heck of a time! Rylie caught her first sandbass and then her second, third and about 15 fish later she was complaining that her arms were sore from catching so many fish! A wonderful day with my little fishing buddy!

A Little Change....

I have been neglecting this blog for some time now simply becuase I have not really had time to really post anything. WE have been so busy with the tours and with life in general from the kids to soccer practice to soccer summer camps, there has certainly not been enough hours in the days to complete everything especially with the tours. I would like to give a big shout out and thank you to Shane Adams and Bridget for helping me with one of our tours. It was a true pleasure to not have to hold their hands and just let them go and do their thing. While the weather did n ot play real nice during this tour I am thankful for both of their help. I want to also thank Mr. Kevin Rider for his help as well. Kevin is a good friend to me and did an fantastic job on the tour especially it being his first tour to go on.

Thank you all for all your help....Jeff, Chad and all of us really do thank you so much for your help. Mr. Reed Timmer....I would personally like to thank you for your help with Mission Of Compassion and Extreme Chase Tours, Jeff Smith. Reed gave a very nice donation to help Jeff fund Mission Of Compassion trip to Ringold GA where Jeff and other members of Extreme Chase Tours and MOC took a very large load of supplies to try and help those folks who were hit by the monster EF-4 deadly tornado. Reed asked nothing in return and has not even promoted this publically but I was amazed and would like to thank him personally and publically for all his help. Heidi this includes you as well! ;)

So much has happened with the weather that it is hard to know exactly where to start....from the Joplin EF-5 and 138 people dead from that one tornado alone, to the violent tornadoes in Oklahoma including the EF-5 down by Piedmont to the deadly outbreak in the southeast, this tornado season has been so very costly in terms of deaths and destruction....it is truly hard to fathom....

So I thought I would try to kinda change the blog up a little and maybe start posting some more of my photography work to swing the mood a little so to speak. I hope you all like the pics and please check back often as I will try to update with more pics as I can. Some of them are older ones and some are new....I will be posting more as I get them processed.

-Lanny

Thanks again for everyones help.

Deaths, severe weather, Osage tornado, MOC, and fishing

It is that time of the year again where I get busy with the tours and the weather and simply do not have much time to blog. I really wish it wasn't this way because I do enjoy blogging and letting my thoughts out to my readers. So to start off with...it has been a very active severe weather month so far with over over 150 tornado reports in the last three days. Oklahoma, Kansas, Missouri, Alabama, Tennessee, North Carolina and many others have seen some very violent weather and sadly some fatalities. Below are just a few radar grabs from a supercell in Greenville NC. The image below is a velocity image taken today (4-16-11) which is basically showing "which way the wind is blowing mode". You can clearly see the "couplet" right where the bright red color and bright green colors meet. This was producing a large damaging tornado at the time it was taken! Thanks to Mr. Jim Sellars for posting this image on his FB page. Jim is the Regional Skywarn Cord. for SW Missouri and is always on top of weather situations throughout the US. This was no exception. Of course this system actually started producing severe weather here in Oklahoma on the 14th. Below is some video I shot while intercepting a tornado in Osage County Oklahoma. I briefly observed a pretty decent cone tornado looking towards the Hominy area from just north of Cleveland OK. I lost sight of the tornado very quickly as it either got rain wrapped or dissipated. The National Weather Service in Tulsa just completed their damage survey from this event and have rated the tornado an EF-1 tornado. After leaving this storm I then raced back south and east to Sand Springs and headed south to Sapulpa OK on the next monster supercell. I had to punch the core of this beast and experienced quarter size hail with a few golf balls. Jeff scored a tornado east of Tulsa and Chad also scored big down in se Oklahoma near Madill. He actually intercepted 5 tornadoes so it was a great day for ECT excluding hearing about the deaths that happened near Atoka and Tuska. Jeff is doing another mission of compassion down to the area later today (Sunday) to try and help the folks out. Seeing some of the video from down there it is very bad to say the least! In looking at the latest model runs it appears that we will have our next possible severe weather/tornado outbreak in the Tuesday time frame from eastern OK through southern Missouri into Ill. I would encourage everyone who lives in these areas to stay tuned to local media for further information . Now on to other news besides the weather.....Laura and I took the twins fishing today at a local pond and had a blast! Brandon caught a small bass and so did Rylie, I actually think we all caught fish with Rylie's being the biggest one. We really had a great family time and I can't wait to go out again. I took some pictures but have yet to process them or even dump them on the desktop. When I have time I will try to post them soon.

Russian now bashing Obama's actions in Libya!

MOSCOW -- In a stinging rebuke of U.S. policy in Libya, the Russian defense minister accused the U.S.-led coalition of killing Libyan civilians through errant air strikes and called for an immediate cease-fire on Tuesday. The comments drew a quick rebuke from visiting Defense Secretary Robert Gates, who said the Russian criticism was based on "outright lies."

Speaking to reporters following an hourlong meeting with Gates, Russian Defense Minister Anatoly Serdyukov said Russia continued to support the United Nations resolution authorizing the creation of a no-fly zone over Libya but made clear that Moscow was increasingly uneasy about the escalating campaign.

"Unfortunately, recent developments in the country demonstrate that it is experiencing real hostilities, destroying civilian facilities, and the killing of civilians," Serdyukov said. "This shouldn't have been let to happen and we informed our U.S. counterparts of our opposition."

Gates, in his own remarks, said the coalition was going out of its way to avoid civilian deaths, noting that most of the strikes have targeted Libyan defensive systems located far away from major population centers. Gates also said he expected major combat operations over Libya to taper off markedly within the next few days; he is the first senior American official to put any sort of timetable on the ongoing offensive there.

Gates fired back at the Russians shortly after departing the Ministry of Defense. Speaking to reporters in his hotel overlooking the Kremlin, the American defense chief said he was taken aback by the ferocity of the Russian criticism of the ongoing American-led military operations.

"I'm a little curious, frankly, about the tone that has been taken," Gates said. "It's perfectly evident that the vast majority, if not nearly all, civilian casualties have been inflicted by Qaddafi... and it's almost as though some people here are taking at face value Qaddafi's claims about the number of civilian casualties, which as far as I'm concerned are just outright lies."

Gates's comments were an implicit rebuke to Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, who on Monday accused the U.S. of causing significant civilian casualties in Libya and likened the entire American-led operation there to a "crusade."

That triggered an unusual public spat between Putin and his nominal ally and successor, President Dmitri Medvedev, about the country's support for the U.S.-led military campaign against Libya. Medvedev fired back quickly, telling reporters was that Putin's comments were "unacceptable."

Russia had abstained in the U.N. Security Council vote that authorized members to take “all necessary measures,” including military force, to protect Libyan civilians from attacks by loyalists to Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi and enforce a no-fly zone.

American officials traveling with Gates said the two Russian leaders had probably been surprised by the scale and intensity of the allied bombing campaign inside Libya. But the U.S. officials said that, at least for the moment, they didn't expect Russia to take steps aimed at bringing the conflict to a close.

Qaddafi-controlled media reported dozens of deaths by coalition airstrikes, while the U.S., France, and Britain reported Monday that they had no indications of civilian casualties.

“We have been very precise in our instructions to the air crews about what they may and may not do, and we are very, very conscious in... limiting civilian casualties,” said commander of the operation in Libya, Gen. Carter Ham, on Monday, adding that the missions to protect civilians will only be conducted with force “where we can safely without risk to other civilians and causing collateral damage.”

Coalition air forces from the U.S., France, Spain, Italy, Denmark, and the United Kingdom flew missions to sustain the no-fly zone over Benghazi to protect civilians from attack by regime ground forces and to conduct further reconnaissance. Only problem is that we are killing inoccent people at this very moment.