Summary: I made another good forecast which was triangulated from San Angelo, to Abilene, to Brownwood. I was delayed a bit and took the scenic route so missed getting on the cell west of ABI, but caught up north of Baird as the rotation was approaching from the sw. Met a few chasers including Bobby Eddins and Michael Cohen plus another car I forget the names. Anyway overall saw tons of wallclouds and funnels, a number of quick needle spinups - the type that shoot to the ground when you have a kind of multivortex torn not quite all the way down. I believe I saw the Breckenridge tornado as I somehow managed to follow it from behind the hook. That was a bit spooky, and at one point had to turn around because there was a solid block on the ground on the back side of the storm. Not sure if that was a tornado but it sure looked like it. As I zig zagged and approached Breckenridge from the wsw I was on a straight headed due east when I came over the top of a hill and saw a lowered funnel and what appeared to be dirt debris blowing all around underneath it. I videotaped as best I could - which wasn't that great. (It's harder than hell to chase alone as I do and multitask 10 different things. With that and cost of gas I'm gonna have to start car pooling. Oh, and I forget before I got to that point and while there were still other chasers around (initially about 5 or 6 vehicles) there was a big nice looking lowered wallcloud with a funnel building for a moment as I recall. However the ne of that feature and kind of shrouded in the precip appeared to be an elephant trunk shape (darker grey and solid) suspended vertically. It appeared to be a possible tornado but because of precip I couldn't see the bottom. It was minutes after that (about the time for radar to update) that they issued a tornado warning for Breckenridge. After all that - like the rest of you I came across the semi that was stretched out left to right completely across the road and lying on it's side. I went into Breck and turned east on 180 after seeing minor damage already mentioned. When I was about to get out of Breck there was a roadblock with broken power poles, power / telephone lines down and the sheriff was turning everyone around. I asked to get through and he gave me some long assed directions on how to get around the mess. I started to follow those but quickly saw that immediately on Delorme there was a road immediately branching off 180 to the south and quickly hitting a road headed east again. So brilliant me...I whipped it around and turned into that road (with the Sheriff nearby) only to immediately slam on my brakes because of the telephone lines I was running into that were suspended in front of me. I hadn't noticed them before. I backed up and went around and continued and then started seeing all the real damage. I agree it was likely F1 to F2 with damage debris scattered in yards, homes damaged, partial roofs gone, bigger broken trees uprooted or broken on their sides and gas leaks. I didn't want any part of the messed but snapped a couple of pics as I was passing by. I hit 180 east and was happy as a clam chatting on the cell with David Douglas. I thought I was past all the debris when travelling 50mph I suddenly see another telephone line across the highway. I slam on my brakes and dodge and it just glances. Whew! Ok, enough of that. I thought I had lost the storm because it took me so long winding around west of Breck, and then getting through town, but once east I found I was quickly catching the rotation and seeing the wallcloud. I took more pics and saw more funnels. Eventually I took hwy 16 from Brad ne approaching Graford. I was under the rainfree base if not just west of part of the wallcloud. A number of miles up the road I finally found a hill with a view apparently to the ne in the direction of Graford. The wallcloud near me had a couple of funnel like larger lowerings. These continued to build as they moved east away from me and got larger. This eventually became a very large wallcloud. I moved to a better vantage and rolled the dashcam. It appeared that I was staring at a very large wedge tornado in the distance near Graford. It was hazy, and hard to tell but it definitely had that large wide V shape with solid walls. I videotaped that until there was too little contrast. I continued fighting my way behind the rotation trying to keep up. At one point east of Graford there was a large metal buildings roof laying across the entire road. Once again it was handy have 4wd because I had to go in the muddy ditch to get around it. I saw more spinups and funnel / wallcloud types on the backside of the main area of rotation. Hard to tell how many were true tornadoes. I finally gave it up in Bridgeport. It was dark and the storm was now to far away in my opinion.

Note: I am disappointed I was unable to stream video. I did briefly on I20, but as soon as I turned north of Baird the signal was lost. Plus, It took me until Mineral Wells to figure out how to get Spotternetwork to go. Yes, I was putting in my handle and not my spotter id. Almost the whole time until further east I had no internet data. Just Threatnet, and David Douglas riding along with me at times on the cell phone. Thanks for the updates David.

All in all, a great chase, but I really wished I could have gotten some more photogenic tripoded stuff. It was one of those days and storms with haze and misty precip often making it difficult to discern features. Eventually the storm became HP like making it tough to see much.

Additional Information After Reviewing Dashcam Footage:

Ok, I have now reviewed the dash cam footage for this day. Interesting. Tornadoes or not tornadoes follow:

1) Initially coming north from the town of Moran somewhere on fm576 there is some type of dark 'block' structure on the ground. It is fairly solid. I only caught part of it on the dashcam as I was backing out of the way at the time until I figured out what it was. I still don't really know. It was perhaps near the area the tornado warning indicated for the torn moving toward Breckenridge but it still seems it may be too far west. Not sure. I don't know what it is, but it did make me turn around briefly. That is how impressive it was.

2) Approaching the town of Breckenridge from the wsw on 576. I begin seeing a fairly large funnel lowering from the large rainfree cloud deck above and almost directly east of me on 576. Time wise I believe it would be a few minutes before the Breckenridge tornado - so it is close in time and proximity. Under the large funnel I see substantial amounts of what I believe to be dirt whirl dust at the funnel. I called it a tornado at that point while chasing. Later as I continue to drive I continue to see other 'dust' which I assume was part of the RFD at the time making gustnadoes, etc. However then it started to possibly look like smoke to me. So I don't know if this was an elaborate hoax to make me think the origina funnel was a tornado or not. Originally I thought it was. I'm not positive.

3) Later headed east from Breckenridge and getting closer to Graford I turn up hwy 16. According to David Douglas I am right under the rain freebase / wallcloud. This is fairly accurate. The wallcloud appears to be just on the right side of the road. Along the way and right before turning onto 16 I see a needle like spin up or two that appears to touchdown briefly in the hills, but I have no photos or video of that.

4) Continuing on hwy 16 a number of miles up I stop and videotape to the east in the direction of Graford. I have a nice wallcloud / funnel forming nearby. It continues to get further east. I see quite a bit of upward motion and some rotation as well. Later it appears a possible small funnel near ground on the left side. I move positions by heading a bit further ne up the road and run the dashcam to the east. The contrast is fairly low, and the air is full of moisture but I can make out a dark silhouette that is tornado shape and fairly large in the distance. From what I can tell, parts of it appear to be on the ground. So this is a likely tornado and occurs about 20 minutes before the Graford tornado strikes.

5) There was another large snakelike appendage from a cloud later. It was after I had gone north of Mineral Wells in the direction of Breckenridge. This didn't have a good laminar look. It was a bit ragged, but it also seemed to emulate a tornado fairly well - over the hills. But I cannot verify what this was.

6) Later, I believe nearing Bridgeport and getting fairly dark, I see and videoptape another feature that appears to be a tornado. It is a tube that stretches from cloud above to ground, and appears a large amount of debris / dirt near the ground around the bottom of this thing. It didn't last long and started dissipating almost immediately.


 

Chase Account from April 9th 2008

Tornado Extreme Storm Chase