Western North Texas: May 7, 2020
Morning weather data on May 7th was mixed. While there was a strong signal for an intense supercell forming near the southeastern Texas panhandle area, the exact placement and longevity of any such storm was questionable. By mid-afternoon, as temperatures quickly soared into the lower 90s at Childress, TX, it was clear that a storm was going to develop.
After a few attempts at convective initiation, a robust updraft drifted east toward the Red River. The storm was slow-moving and produced a prolific amount of lightning. It was not long before the storm split, with the left split drifting into far southwestern Oklahoma. The dominant supercell began to turn to the right, moving in a southeasterly direction across western North Texas.
As I watched the storm near Quanah, I noticed that strong low-level winds were kicking up a lot of dust. At the same time, frequent lightning strikes from the storm were producing grass fires all over the place. My plan was to stay at least a few miles away from the storm, to have a clearer view of storm structure.
Near Crowell, TX is where the storm really started to take on a sculpted look to the northeast. It was around this time that storm chasers were reporting hail around three inches in diameter in the core of the storm. With windshields getting broken left and right, and low visibility for those immediately south of the storm, I kept distanced several miles to the southwest.
I followed the storm a bit, but through an area with trees and large power lines, there were not too many other noteworthy photo opportunities. As started to get dark with the storm gradually weakening, to some degree, it was time to call the chase off.
