Day 3: Brush Fires & Ghost Towns (1st Chase Day!)

It was go time! We awoke on our first chase day and model guidance had bumped up the amount of wind shear present with the severe weather setup we were targeting over the Texas Panhandle and Eastern New Mexico, increasing the probability of rotating thunderstorms and a tornado or two. Also, the Storm Prediction Center has increased the severe weather risk for our target area to a Slight risk with a new 2% tornado risk for the day.

The forecasting team of the day looked over the information and we held our morning discussion to discuss it all. The breakdown was that there would be a swath of moisture present, as well as instability and some modest wind shear in the Southern High Plains. The instability would help any thunderstorms grow and mature, and a present upper-level disturbance (a shortwave trough) would give the starting nudge needed for these thunderstorms to develop.

So the team decided to proceed with traveling to Eastern New Mexico and the Western Texas Panhandle. So with our target set, we trekked west. On our way, we passed the expansive wind farms of the Texas Panhandle. I always knew this and that many other areas in the Central US had large wind farms, but seeing it in person gave me a perspective of just how large and expansive they really were.

We stopped at Hasty’s Restaurant in Shamrock, Texas (about 90 miles east of Amarillo) to get some lunch and look at the weather conditions. Looking over the data and eating a decent meal, we noticed that there was an area over Eastern New Mexico that was looking promising. There were storms developing over the high terrain where CAPE (convective available potential energy) and wind shear were favorable for the further development of these storms into organized/rotating storms. So with our target showing promise, we continued trekking west.

We quickly stopped in Tucumcari for fuel, and then proceeded south to get ahead of a developed thunderstorm that was showing some weak signs of rotation.

On our way south, we passed through House, New Mexico, a community that look all but inhabited. It looked more akin to a ghost town and really set an eerie feel.

Continuing south, we passed through the town of Fort Sumner and attempted to proceed further south on a road that led to Roswell, NM. I say attempted because we were quickly stopped by a brush fire that had grown to engulf the road ahead of us. It was likely started from the intense cloud-to-ground lightning with this thunderstorm and was being fanned by the inflow of the thunderstorm (which could be made visible because of the smoke from the fire).

Considering that we had rental vans, we didn’t want to risk driving through and damaging them and we didn’t want to stick around for the hail core of the thunderstorm. So after sticking on the side of the road to look at the storm structure, we then proceeded back north. There was a possible thunderstorm that we could have gone after, but it was quickly diminishing during our drive towards House, NM.

Since it was starting to get late and the sun was getting close to setting, we called it for the day and started heading to our hotel for the night in Amarillo, Texas. During our drive, we started to receive a clear signal on our van’s radio from a radio station in the Upper Michigan Penninsula, which was about 1,100 miles away. This was possibly due to the conditions of the atmosphere between the two locations allowing for the signal to continue further than targeted. It was an odd experience and coupled with the creepy ghost town, it felt like an episode of ‘The Twilight Zone’.

On our way out of New Mexico, we saw some impressive lightning from the few thunderstorms that were still going at this point. I’ll admit, it was hard for me while driving not to look out the window here and there to admire the beautiful lightning show.

We eventually arrived at the Sleep Inn in Amarillo, Texas, and after a long first chase day, we all headed to bed in anticipation of what the rest of the trip had in store.