During the first week of May, 2001, we monitored the evolution of a weather system that appeared to have the potential for severe weather in our part of the country. Since time to chase is sometimes at a premium, and weekday time is especially rare, we were happy to see that development indicated potential for the weekend.

On May 4, 2001, after reviewing Storm Prediction Center products for the weekend’s outlook, and coordinating with our Storm Chase partners in Lubbock, TX, we decided to target the Childress, TX area for a storm chase the next day. SPC showed a Moderate risk of severe storms, with a good potential for tornadoes for that day, and the Childress area appeared to be a good initial target. For some reason, this area seems to historically be a major initiation point for severe storms. Barb & I wanted to break in our new chase vehicle, our 1994 Crown Victoria, “Vicky” which had served as a police vehicle in Oregon before we “adopted” her. We loaded Vicky up and left Houston late at night, catching a bit of sleep on the way at a truck stop, then freshening up and continuing to the Childress area.

On the afternoon of May 5, 2001, we met up with our partners, Dave and Gayla Drummond outside Quanah, TX, where there was a convergance of storm chasers from all over the country. As often happens when chasing storms in West Texas, we met chasers who had traveled from Ohio, Illinois, Canada, and all over Texas. After a round of introductions and checking out each other’s chase vehicles, we got to the task of analyzing the current surface and upper air data. A thunderstorm cell was developing to the north of us in Southwest Oklahoma, and this area seemed to have the best potential for severe development, so we all headed toward the Cordell area.

We encountered a beautiful supercell between Cordell and Mangum, OK that we followed for a bit while we watched it develop. From a distance we could see cloud towers going up, and as we got closer we observed a very firm, well defined cloud base. As the storm developed, we could see definite rotation in the leading portion of the storm, and other chasers in the group noted both cyclonic and anti-cyclonic rotation in different parts of the storm. Looking at the photos, the area of major rotation can be seen in the right side of the photos. While this cell was strengthening, a second cell was forming to the southwest in an area where it’s outflow and rain appeared to be threatening the original storm we were following. After another group conference, a decision was made to focus on the southern cell as we all figured it might inhibit further development of the original one.

Our group headed a bit south toward Mangum and we watched the southern cell develop a very short lived weak funnel. While the storm gave us a lot of great pictures of a shelf cloud and beautiful sunset lit storms, it didn’t develop like we expected. We then heard a report that spotters had reported a tornado on the ground near Cordell – from the storm we originally had been chasing. We broke off from the group and tried to get into position to intercept the Cordell tornado, but it was already 7:15PM and lighting conditions didn’t allow us to see much of anything. Spotter reports and National Weather Service records showed that there were two reports of tornadoes from that storm, the first at 7:11PM at 2 miles North of Cordell, OK where a spotter reported a brief touchdown, and the second at 7:15PM 4 miles NNE of Cordell, where numerous spotters reported a tornado on the ground. No damage or injuries were reported from these F0 tornadoes.