Saw some marginal storm structure in the red hills along the ok ks border. Highlight of the chase was coming across a few bison on the open range west of Hardtner along Hackberry Road over open range. Contemplated going after northern OK storm about 50 miles southeast of me but thought the potential reward was low. A few photos on my blog later tonight

First storm chase of 2011. I am sitting just north of Laverne
Oklahoma where it is a balmy 76 degrees. Unbelievable after the past
couple of days. I am right along the front in extreme northwest OK.
There are some upper 50s dewpoints within throwing distance of my
location. Woodward is sitting at 57F dewpoint at 1pm. I think the
winds will continue to back to the southeast from Gage to Woodward
through the afternoon. I am interested in the RUC and the HRRR both
showing a small area of convection developing at the nose of the 1500+
J/kg surface-based CAPE around 22z or so in this area. There is
already convection developing in south-central KS but it’s all in the
low stratus for the most part. Nice heating going on out here on the
western Plains. I’ll be hanging out here unless something pulls me in
another direction.

Seeing if this thing still works!

Well I had all but given up on those Hill City storms in favor of
getting to a place to cattch something to eat and maybe watch a little
bit of the Chiefs football game like in Great Bend or something, but
the storm cluster north of I-70 now has grown with low level jet
kicking in and moisture racing back northwest…. decided to do some
distant lightning illuminated storm structure type shots as these
storms approach north-central Kansas. Will hang out up here around
Lincoln, KS for awhile and play with this lightning illuminated
structure stuff. Since I’m here, why not?

I am wrapping up this chase near Concordia, KS. I photographed a
decent looking LP storm that formed west of Concordia with some okay
structure… and am now watching this storm shrivel up and die as it
moves southeast of Concordia. I’ll be heading back west in the
general direction of home now, but on my way, I’ll be approaching more
storms out near Hill City, so I may photograph some lightning later on
this evening.