Sunday, June 8, 2014
Current time: z(11pm EST) (Monday)
z(9am CDT) We have our last
forecast discussion. Conditions look great in eastern NM but it is too far out
of our way for us to be able to make it home at a reasonable time on Tuesday.
(9:40pm
CDT) We leave the Marriott in Amarillo and head east on I-40. Skies are
overcast with sporadic drizzle.
z(10:10am
CDT) we head east on 287.
Approx.
z(1:00pm CDT) We had lunch in Vernon Texas at Bevos drive inn skies remain
overcast
z(1:56pm
CDT) we leave lunch and head to the Storm Prediction Center in Oklahoma given
the fact that there is a very poor chance at seeing severe weather today. (We
head north on 183)
z(2:13pm
CDT) Joe kills a bird.
z(2:14pm
CDT) we enter Oklahoma
z(2:25pm
CDT) we head east on 5
z(2:45pm
CDT) we head north on 36
z(3:05pm
CDT) we take I-44 north
z(3:10pm
CDT) We pass through Lewton, OK.
z(3:54pm
CDT) we run into some very brief drizzle (under 1 minute)
Approx.
z(4:30pm CDT) We reach the National Weather Center at the University of
Oklahoma.
z(6:13pm CDT) we leave the
National Weather Center at the University of Oklahoma in Norman Oklahoma.
z(6:22pm
CDT) we get to Rudy’s BBQ
z(7:43pm
CDT) we leave Rudy’s
z(7:50pm
CDT) we get gas and I see a really nice plant nursery
z(8:05pm
CDT) we leave the closed plant nursery and gas station and coutinue to Tulsa
for the night.
z(8:11pm
CDT) we pass tornado damaged Moore Oklahoma as we head west to the super 8 in
Tulsa, OK
z(9:45pm
CDT) We arrive in Tulsa, OK ending our last chase day!
Journal:
While
today was not much of a “chase” day, it was a really interesting day. I really
enjoyed going to the National Weather Center at the University of Oklahoma. The
building was beautiful, the second you walk in, you feel like you are in a huge
state of the art museum. I was impressed with the lecture room/ storm shelter.
The outlets on the desk were a great idea but what I really liked most was the
fact that the projectors were above the white board. I think allowing a
professor to use both without compromising room for the other allows students
to absorb a lot of different things at once and I thought it was a really nice
feature. I thought all the projects that they were working on there were really
cool too (and I thought it was interesting how their vehicles occasionally got
caught in the storm as we saw with all the hail damage!). One of my favorite
parts of the building was the observation area on the top floor. The elevator
ride up there was really nice since we were able to see the lobby below and
once we got up to the top, the view was really incredible (even on a cloudy day
like today). When I say incredible, that could be a little misleading in that there
wasn’t actually anything too impressive to see at the moment, but I can’t
imagine a better place to watch a nearby storm! We also saw some of the offices
at work. I was a bit surprised that the SPC had so few workers. I expected
there to be a ton of employees working all the time, but only 5 people are in
the room at any given time (but as I expected, there is always someone in the
room!). I thought it was pretty
interesting that the NWS office in Norman was literally down the hallway from
the SPC. I really was very impressed with the NWC and the University of
Oklahoma!