Storms and Jazz: A Late Summer Update for 2015

A few months have elapsed since my last post, which covered the Great Galesburg Earthquake.* I’ve been quite busy with book editing and copywriting and with a move in June from Caledonia to Hastings. So storm chasing this year has once again been mostly theoretical. If there’s anything good about that, it’s that missing out on yet another chase season hasn’t bothered me as much this year as it has in the past. There’s a lot to be said for loving what one does but not being owned by it. That’s not to say, though, that there weren’t times this spring when memories of past chases washed over me, and thoughts of towers punching up into the troposphere, of gorgeous storm structure, and of the smell and feel of Gulf-moistened inflow whisking across the prairie grasses toward an updraft base, made me wish like anything that I was out on the Plains once again.

Well, one takes life as it comes, and part of its lesson is to look for and appreciate the good one has rather than bemoan the good one is missing. Lack of chasing has been compensated, at least somewhat, by an increase in musical opportunities. And at this time in my life, I think it is important that I take those opportunities, which are rewarding aesthetically and which augment my finances and pave the way to more gigs, more musical involvements, and a broader future doing the other thing besides storm chasing that I love.

Don’t misconstrue this to mean that I’ve died to chasing. That’s not likely to happen; once chasing is in your blood, it becomes a part of you, and it has been in my blood for many years. No, it’s simply to recognize times and seasons, and to refuse to be shaped by the obsessiveness that is a very real aspect of storm chasing culture. I’m too old not to know better by now, and I’d be a fool not to live by the wisdom I’ve gained. One of what Paul the apostle called the “fruits of the Spirit” is self-control. Restraint. The ability to judiciously govern one’s impulses—not squelching them, but rather, choosing not to let them run roughshod over other very important things in life.

With that little preamble . . . severe storms are in the forecast for later today, and playing my saxophone has been very much in the foreground of my life lately, and this post will cover a little bit about both storms and jazz.

Weatherly Speaking

Yesterday evening I gave a presentation on storm chasing at the William P. Faust Public Library in Westland, Michigan. It was a great time with a small but engaged audience of roughly twenty people. My presentation runs around an hour-and-a-half, including time for questions at the end. However, I encourage my listeners to ask questions during the presentation as well, as I think an interactive format makes things more interesting and develops a connection with my audience.

This presentation was my second at this library and my fourth in all, and in my opinion, it was my best. With each one, I feel more familiar with my material and more at ease and spontaneous as a public speaker. Once I share the ten-minute clip of my March 2, 2012, chase of the Henryville, Indiana, tornado, I’ve got a captive crowd, and I can then move on to basic storm forecasting, supercell structure, and tornado safety, with a strong emphasis on safety. In the process, I make a point of advocating for NWS forecasters, explaining why weather professionals in Michigan have a particularly tough job protecting the public; and of debunking the largely mythical mantra of “We had no warning,” strongly insisting that the responsibility for safety rests in people’s own hands.

My sister, Diane, came with me and in fact did the driving, and it was a blessing to spend time with her. She’s a busy gal these days, and I’m a busy guy, and we just don’t get to spend much quality time together. So the chance to get away with her for an afternoon and evening was a gift. Plus, now she knows what my presentation is like, and how it can be adapted if the school where she teaches, Forest Hills Northern, wants to bring me in sometime.

All in all, yesterday went beautifully. And now today the potential exists for severe storms this afternoon and evening, contingent upon sufficient CAPE and adequate shear. The SPC even indicates a 2 percent tornado risk, but that’s Michigan for you—just enough to tease, and maybe there’ll be a spinup or two on the east side of the state.

As I write, noon is at hand, a brisk southerly surface wind is playing through the tree branches in the backyard, and breaks in the clouds and a dry slot moving in from the west suggest a buildup in instability. Time will tell, but I anticipate some kind of local chase and am ready to roll.

Music

These past few weeks have been filled with more music than I’ve seen in I don’t know when. I played my first gig as a strolling saxophonist for the VIP pre-grand opening of Tanger Outlets here in Grand Rapids. That was fun, and a nice piece of change, and it was all the more enjoyable thanks to a chance to sit in with Mark Kahny and Bobby Thompson, who were performing onstage at a different location in the outdoor mall.

Then two days later came the first of two Saturday evening gigs with My Thin Place, a collective led by bassist Dave DeVos and featuring Mike Dodge on guitar, Dave Martin on vibraphone, and Ric Troll and Fritz von Valtier alternating in the drum chair. The venue for both dates was the outdoor patio at Sandy Point Beach House, a restaurant right by the lakeshore between Grand Haven and Holland. It’s as idyllic a setting as you can imagine for a jazz gig, and the music this combo performs—a mix of ECM-style tunes, original compositions, and American songbook charts—was the perfect complement to outdoor dining.

After the gig at Tanger Outlets, Mark Kahny contacted me about joining him and Bobby for a gig at the What Not Inn in Fennville. I was delighted! These guys are superb, not only musically but also as entertainers who know how to engage their audience, and we gelled beautifully in that small but popular setting. The result was musical magic. Guys, if you read this, please bring me aboard again real soon. I love making music with you!

Now let’s talk about Big Band Nouveau. Whew! Three major gigs in a week in Grand Rapids, starting with the West Michigan Jazz Society’s Monday evening Jazz in the Park concert at Ah-Nab-a-Wen Park on the riverside; then Thursday night at Bobarino’s at The B.O.B., with a wonderfully supportive audience; and concluding with a Sunday afternoon encore performance at the GRand Jazz Fest on the Rosa Parks Circle stage. What can I say about this band? The charts are contemporary, challenging, and tasty, giving soloists plenty of room to stretch; and the musicians are outstanding—a bevy of strong soloists with individual voices. No wonder this band gets standing ovations! Its star is rapidly—and deservedly—rising, and I am privileged to be a part of it.

To top it all off, later Sunday afternoon I attended Mark Kahny’s annual music bash at his house in northeast Grand Rapids. This was my first time there, and I had an absolute blast. Mark clearly designed his outdoor deck with the idea that it would serve as a stage for performances, and I joined him and Bobby to provide music for a legion of Mark’s fans. He’s been doing music for a long time, and people love him because he loves them. The party is for them, and they come, and it’s a beautiful thing. My old friend Freddy DeGennaro was also there with his guitar, as were several vocalists, and the music just flowed. I left Sunday evening feeling both tired and elated, appropriately depleted yet also energized. It was a great time, and an inspiring ending to a hot, humid, sweaty, and totally fantastic August day.

Speaking of which, another such high-humidity August afternoon is unfolding, and it’s time for me to unfold with it. Dewpoints are ranging from 68 to 72 degrees and the first line of storms has organized east of I-69/US 27. I bid you sayonara, dear reader. I’ve got a shower to take, a book to edit, and, in a few hours, storms to enjoy.

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* Update: reports of prehistoric reptiles released from magma-spewing fissures remain unverified and should be viewed as suspect.

Thoughts on the I-94 Pileup near Kalamazoo

By now, the whole nation has viewed a blizzard of video clips of the massive and deadly 193-car/truck pileup on I-94 in Galesburg, Michigan, between Kalamazoo and Battle Creek. The incident occurred just forty miles straight south of where I live. Since I’m well-acquainted with both that highway and what yesterday’s weather was like, I’ll share a few thoughts.

First, winter storm warnings were in effect, and people were cautioned not to venture out if they didn’t have to. No one can say they weren’t warned; the NWS and media did their jobs. Moreover, some sections of highway were closed due to extreme driving conditions, something that just doesn’t happen in this state.

Second, and significantly, I-94 is a major east-west truck artery. Whenever I’m on it, I’m struck by the number of semis I see. There are a lot of them, considerably more than on I-196, I-96, and US-131. Of course, there are plenty of big rigs on those highways as well; there just seem to be more on I-94, to the point where I feel like truckers own that particular interstate. This is nothing against truckers and not some kind of moral issue; it’s just my observation. If an accident happens on that road, then if it doesn’t initiate with a semi, it can easily and almost immediately involve one .

Third, roads yesterday were extremely icy. On my drive to and from Caledonia to my part-time job in Hastings down M-37, a major secondary route, I averaged around 35 mph and often less. In open areas, the blowing wind created “road smoke,” and on the way back, trucks coming from the opposite direction blew up massive clouds of snow, creating temporary whiteouts. Trucks are really good at doing this, particularly during weather like yesterday’s, when extremely cold temperatures makes for fine snow rather than big, chunky flakes.

If the conditions on I-94 were anything like what I encountered on M-37, where people were driving at an appropriate speed for conditions, then I have to wonder what on earth folks were thinking to be clipping along at much faster speeds.

It’s rarely the weather conditions that get people in trouble; it’s how people respond to them—or more exactly, fail to respond. Unfortunately, responsible drivers suffer as well. You can be driving 30 mph, putting plenty of distance between yourself and the guy ahead of you so you can stop in time to avoid either rear-ending that person or going off the road, only to have the idiot behind you slam into you at 60 mph. I’m sure that scenario repeated itself multiple times yesterday.

Road conditions can change fast and catch you and other drivers unaware. Yesterday, M-37 through Caledonia wasn’t bad; a combination of road salt and local traffic had rendered much of the pavement wet rather than icy. But on the south end of town, beginning at 100th St., conditions changed abruptly from driveable to treacherous.

One fatality is a tragedy, but after watching video of the pileup as it occurred, I’m amazed and glad that more people didn’t die. In addition, twenty-three were injured, and again, that figure could easily have been higher. The bottom line is simple: Don’t drive too fast for road conditions, and sometimes don’t drive at all. I would add, avoid routes with heavy truck traffic such as I-94, as trucks can create whiteouts in their wake.

For outstanding, well-researched  insights and safety tips on winter driving, visit Dan Robinson’s website, Icy Road Safety.

An Interview with The Weather Channel

Henryville High SchoolYou’re looking at the Henryville, Indiana, high school, photographed from across the street on September 30, 2014. By all appearances, there’s nothing remarkable about it. But if you’re aware of its recent history, then you know differently. Two and a half years ago, on the evening of March 2, 2012, there wasn’t much left of this building or, for that matter, a good part of Henryville. Roaring out of the southern Indiana hills and across I-65 to the west shortly after three o’clock that afternoon, a large tornado inflicted EF-4 damage in this small community, leveling much of the school and residences east of it.

Like many a tornado-ravaged town, Henryville pulled together, took care of its own, and rebuilt. Today, the resilient spirit of its citizens shows not in any marks of the devastation that transpired there that afternoon but by the lack thereof. Where piles of Henryville Hillsidedebris once lay, new houses and commercial buildings have sprouted. The school is in full sway, with new buildings in place of the ones flattened by the storm. The only evidence I could see that Henryville is a tornado town–and the clue is noticeable, chiseled into the landscape–is a swath of shattered trees where the wind blasted the hillside east of the school. That memento left by the town’s dark visitor is not soon expunged.

On Tuesday the 30th, I made a side trip through Henryville on my way down to Clarksville, just north of the Ohio River from Louisville, Kentucky. I and my friend and long-time chase partner, Bill Oosterbaan, had been asked to do an interview with Karga 7, a production house for The Weather Channel, for a show spotlighting the Henryville tornado. A couple months ago, Nichole, a producer with Karga 7, contacted me to inquire about using my footage of the tornado, which Bill and I had caught at its formative and maturing stages north of Palmyra, Indiana. I directed her to my video broker, Kendra Reed of KDR Media, and Kendra negotiated agreements for Bill and me, and  now here I was, heading down I-65 toward Clarksville’s Clarion Hotel, where the interview was to be held.

I felt both pleased and nervous at the prospect of being featured on national media. I’m a low-key kind of guy, and while, as a professional wordsmith, I can communicate colorfully and descriptively when I need to, I’m not by nature a showcase personality. So I wasn’t sure what kind of interview material I’d make. Writing allows me to edit my words till they reflect my thoughts to my own satisfaction, but an interview doesn’t afford that luxury. I hoped to shed a realistic and positive light on storm chasing and chasers, neither of which I think the public understands very well; and I wanted to give a strong message for people to take personal responsibility for their own safety and that of their loved ones by paying close attention to severe weather forecasts and warnings and not depend on sirens.*

Nichole, her two camera persons, and the guy who greeted us at the door seemed like great people. They were professional, courteous, and enjoyable to work with. The actual interview lasted at least an hour and a half, and I think Bill and I did a good job answering the questions, playing off of and supplementing each other’s responses. In a couple instances, our answers differed. For instance, Nichole asked, “Did you know when you first saw it that this was a killer tornado?” I said no. We had caught the funnel at its inception and stayed with it through early maturity, and I felt comfortable saying it was a violent and potentially lethal tornado; however, “killer tornado” isn’t about storm strength but verified human impact, something quite different. All tornadoes have the potential to kill, but most don’t, and that includes the relatively few violent ones. Not until later would I learn of this storm’s heartbreaking toll on New Pekin, Henryville, and Marysville.

Bill said yes, but he had processed the question differently from me. He does business frequently in nearby Louisville and knows the area. He was aware of towns to the northeast that the tornado might impact, and he knew it could cross an interstate highway. Bill evidently felt comfortable with calling the tornado a killer at the onset, based on its violence. It boils down to a matter of how each of us interpreted the question. I think he and I would agree that neither of us knew what the storm was going to do, but we did know what it could do if it hit a community, and we very much hoped that wouldn’t happen.

Between Bill and me, I think we did a good job of communicating two messages: (1) the tension storm chasers experience between their passion for storms as the magnificent forces of nature they are versus the concern we feel for those who lie in harm’s way; and (2) the excellence and limitations of severe weather warnings, and the need for people to be proactive in safeguarding themselves against violent weather.  I hope those messages will come across clearly in our part of the TWC episode. We did our best, and from here, our content rests in the hands of the film editors. I look forward to seeing how it all turns out. Interview aside, the footage Bill and I got of the tornado was spectacular and affords a unique perspective of the tornado. I chalk that up to good forecasting, serendipity, and Bill’s knowledge of the area.

On March 2, 2012, Bill and I had been chasing together for sixteen years, beginning well before technology improved the odds of seeing tornadoes. We had logged thousands of miles, busted many a time, gradually improved our forecasting skills, seen some amazing storms, and had a blast overall. The thing that kept us going was, and remains, sheer love for the storms, not money or media attention. But it’s nice to think that a little of both has finally come our way. Many thanks to Kendra Reed for her invaluable role in negotiating with Karga 7. Kendra, you are the absolute best!

The show will air this coming spring, probably sometime in April.

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* Civil defense sirens are the least dependable of warnings. When tornado victims say they “had no warning,” what they often mean is that the sirens weren’t sounded. I’ll reiterate here what I said in the interview: don’t count on sirens. They may or may not sound, depending on the judgment of your local civil defense; and if they do sound, you might not hear them for various reasons. Sirens are of limited effectiveness, and to rely on them as your primary warning is to live in the last century and jeopardize your safety. Today’s warning system harnesses everything from local television to mobile phones to social media and more, and while it’s still possible for the occasional rogue tornado to slip in under the radar, the big storm systems such as the one on March 2, 2012, are invariably well-forecast and well-warned.

August Tornado in Macomb: A Lake Breeze Landspout

Monroe TornadoOn Wednesday afternoon, August 20, 2014, a small tornado spun up beneath a seemingly garden-variety summer thunderstorm and did EF0 damage in Lennox Township on the eastern side of the state. I first became aware of it courtesy of a Facebook post by fellow Michigan-based storm chaser C. J. Postal. He wrote, “I give up. You win, Michigan.” Underneath was a photo of  an unmistakable, nicely shaped funnel cruising over the treeline.

My first thought was, What does he mean? The photo couldn’t have been taken in Michigan. No way. It simply wasn’t tornado weather–no ripping jets, no curved hodographs, just weak westerly winds and, here on the west side of the state, beautiful, cloudless skies. Over on the east side, the radar showed just a scattering of small red zits around the thumb and down by Ann Arbor: bland, pulse-type storms capable of squeezing out a few bolts but certainly not a tornado.

Yet as you can see from the photo,* one of them did spin up a tube. The National Weather Service logged the following report.

A BRIEF EF0 TORNADO TOUCHED DOWN AROUND 204 PM ON PLACE ROAD BETWEEN 29 MILE AND 30 MILE ROAD IN LENOX TOWNSHIP. PATH LENGTH WAS ESTIMATED TO BE 0.25 MILES WITH A PATH
WIDTH OF 100 YARDS. WIND SPEEDS WERE ESTIMATED TO BE 75 MPH. FIRE OFFICIALS REPORTED SEVERAL TRAILERS BEING BLOWN OVER AS WELL AS A ROOF TO A GARAGE BEING TORN OFF.

What the heck happened?

Michigan happened.

Seriously. Not only does this state not get tornadoes when conditions look ripe for them, but it does get them when no one expects them. It happened a couple years ago in Dexter. It happened last month just a few miles from me in Cutlerville. And now, two days ago, it happened over near Macomb.

Wind profiles were unimpressive. Bulk shear was negligible. About the only things in place, as I recall, were adequate surface-based CAPE and moisture, but this was by no means supercell weather. “Severe” just wasn’t in the picture.

However, one easily overlooked element unique to the Great Lakes probably was present and might well have been the culprit. That ingredient? The onshore breeze blowing off of Lake St. Clair.

Twenty-six miles long and twenty-four miles wide, with 430 square miles of surface area, the lake is the largest body of water in the Great Lakes region after the Great Lakes themselves. It is easily large enough to generate its own lake breeze. On its western shore, that breeze is an easterly breeze which, backing against an overall westerly wind regime, can enhance low-level helicity or even produce it when none would otherwise exist.

That’s my theory, anyway, and I think it holds true not just for Lake St. Clare but even moreso for the western sides of Lakes Huron, Erie, and Michigan, where the lake breezes blow inland from the east. Storms moving into such an environment may, under the right conditions, get just the added low-level twist they need to turn an ordinary updraft into a tornado.

That, I believe, is what happened last Wednesday. The mechanism was probably that of a landspout. It certainly wasn’t that of a supercell thunderstorm. None of the storms I saw on the radar that day looked capable of producing a mesocyclone; they were non-severe little blips on the radar. But they were surface-based. And that combination of an updraft with preexisting vertical vorticity evidently did the trick.

I’ve seen enough other examples of storms in this state that went tornadic, or at least developed rotation, as they approached the eastern coastline to think that the lake breeze plays a role in a good percentage of cases. No doubt the same holds true for the northern Chicago area north up into Wisconsin inland from Lake Michigan.

What I’m saying may be nothing new to NWS meteorologists, but I don’t recall ever seeing it discussed. Then again, I rarely read KDTX’s forecast discussions, so maybe that’s why. I’m a KGRR man, but here in West Michigan, while our westerly lake breeze creates convergence, I doubt it contributes to helicity in the same way as the easterly breezes coming off of Lakes Huron, Erie, and St. Clare.

I’ve never seen the lake breeze’s possible role in storm rotation and tornadogenesis discussed to any great extent, and I think it merits recognition as a uniquely Great Lakes phenomenon. So I’m throwing it out here, with the caveat that I’m just an amateur forecaster, not a trained meteorologist. It would be great to get the thoughts of professional forecasters as well as other Great Lakes storm chasers who have considered how the easterly lake breeze may sometimes enhance storm severity.

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* I would like to credit the photographer, but having exercised due diligence, I’m unable to locate that person. If you took the picture, or if you know who did and how I can reach them, please contact me.

Crumpophonist Irving Freen Debuts His New CD, Aaaarrrggh!

Back in my heyday as a college music student, I had a subscription to Down Beat magazine. I was a Down Beat junkie, and among the things I eagerly looked forward to each month were the record reviews. It has been a long time since I’ve riffed through a Down Beat, but I just peeked online, and the legendary jazz magazine looks to have successfully made the leap into the digital age and appears to be going strong. Moreover, I’m pleased to see that the recording reviews are still a mainstay for the publication—and why not? With links to Amazon, CD Baby, and iTunes, they ought to pack plenty of marketing muscle.

But what happened to the ratings? Looking at these online “Editor’s Picks,” I don’t see the old, familiar five-star system that I knew and loved. Has that gone away, or am I just missing something? Boy, am I out of the loop. Back in the 1980s, every album got a rating of anywhere from zero stars (Translation: “This CD sucks so badly, your room may implode”) to five stars (“Transcendent. The artist qualifies for sainthood”). How could I forget?

I wrote the following piece years ago as a spoof of a Down Beat review by a hard-bitten jazz critic giving his take on the first album by crumpophone wizard Irving Freen. Rarely does the F# crumpophone attain the splendid heights to which Irving takes it. For that matter, few are those who play the crumpophone or have even heard of it. There are reasons whybut I’ll let you find out for yourself. Read on.

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CD REVIEW

Artist: Irving Freen

Album Title: Aaaarrrggh!

Rating: ˜˜˜˜˜

Let me say up front that I’m not easily impressed. What passes for jazz today is pabulum to the ears of one suckled on the fiery wine of hard bop, and the current crop of artists has for the most part had little to say that hasn’t been said before and said better.

So when I first heard of a young lion by the name of Irving Freen, my gut response was indifference.

“Ya gotta hear this guy,” they told me. “He’s incredible!”

Yeah, right. “Okay, so let’s hear Mr. Incredible’s CD,” I grunted, yawning politely to conceal my boredom.

I changed my attitude as soon as I heard the first cut.

Irving Freen is a crumpophone player of the highest order. Of the few who have wrestled with the quirky instrument, Freen is the undisputed king. Flawless technique, awesome creativity, and a haunting tone that reminds me at once of the cry of a curlew and the mating bellow of a bull hippo . . . it’s hard not to wax rhapsodic over this thrilling new artist. Where has he been up till now, I wondered?

Well, for one thing, purchasing the space necessary to play the crumpophone. Probably one reason the instrument has had so few practitioners is that most musicians simply can’t afford the acreage. The F# crumpophone humps over approximately two-and-a-half acres of real estate. Toss in scaffolding, a small shed for generators, and a neckstrap, and you’ve got one pricey instrument. And that’s not even counting the eighty-acre buffer zone required by law to keep the neighbors from complaining. Or the manpower involved in getting everything into a gig bag in time for rehearsal.

Then there’s the matter of expression. It’s hard to forge a truly compelling voice on an instrument with a range of only half an octave. Freen has conquered this limitation by augmenting his tonal palette with a remarkable series of “found sounds,” ranging from screams and howls that arise spontaneously whenever he gets his lips stuck in the mouthpiece, to assorted bird songs and animal calls provided by numerous sparrows, chipmunks, owls, elk, frogs, space aliens, and other life forms that wander into any of the horn’s nine bells and get lost in the mile-and-a-half of tubing.

Freen has also met the technical difficulties of the crumpophone with astonishing ingenuity. The spacing of the keys at thirty-foot intervals has long posed a problem for crumpophone players, who have never been able to improve their technique beyond the speed with which they can sprint from one key to the next. This limitation has made tempos above 4mm impractical and is the reason crumpophonists prefer ballads to bebop.

Freen, however, has met and mastered the challenge, paving the way for a new order of crumpophonist. Directing a powerful stream from a fire hose, Freen is able to shift pressure instantly from one key to the next without moving from his position, achieving a dexterity hitherto considered impossible. Not only so, but by using more than one hose, he is able to depress multiple keys, expanding the capabilities of the horn by a breathtaking three notes. Since these notes lie seven octaves above the normal range of the horn, they are unfortunately well beyond the realm of human hearing; however, they do allow the crumpophone to double as a highly effective dog whistle.

Well, all this is fine, you say, but can the man play?

Do bears eat popes in the woods?

Just listen to Irving Freen’s first cut on this album. “Ground Midnight” ought to convince the most skeptical listener that here is a crumpophonist who knows his way around a ballad. Granted, it would be nice to hear a crumpophonist who knows his way through a ballad, instead of sidestepping things like chord changes and well-connected lines. Still, “Ground Midnight” is instructive to anyone who wants to find out just how far a single note held for an entire tune can take the listener into the realms of sheer, soul-dripping expressiveness. Not too far, it turns outnot so far, say, as the sound of a blown tire flapping on the highwaybut still well beyond where other crumpophonists have ever gone.

Having demonstrated his way with a ballad, Freen next gives us a taste of his “new music” chops. “Come Out With Your Hands Up!” is an apt name for the foray into frenzy that is cut number two. Here is well-organized pandemonium at its best, as the crumpophonist delves into his seemingly inexhaustible found-sound storehouse.

Against a backdrop of swirling bop harmonies, Freen delivers a masterful, almost overwhelming barrage of bent notes, cacophony, screams, animal noises, explosions, machine gun fire . . . all ripping along at the inconceivable tempo of 400 beats per minute and climaxing with an exceptionally effective howitzer bombardment. The sound of rending lumber is a brilliant touch, capturing the poignant moment when Freen’s pole barn is blown to pieces by a cleverly aimed note.

The arrival of the police provides a timely and sensitive vocal element. A command barked through a megaphonesubtle, yet crisp and authoritative in the backgroundsuggests the origin of the tune’s title. The shattering-glass effect was achieved by the tasteful introduction of tear gas canisters into the sound mix through the living room window.

If I have one complaint, it’s a minor onea slight muddiness to the sound at the precise point where the door is broken down. It kept me from fully enjoying Freen’s ensuing scuffle with the SWAT team before being ultimately dragged away. Still, this is unquestionably a five-star performance, and Freen is to be congratulated as soon as he’s allowed to receive visitors.

Incidentally, the above explains the brevity of this CD. Fifteen minutes is admittedly not standard album length, and for that reason some may balk at the price. The truly discriminating, however, will consider $29.99 a trifling sacrifice to pay for a taste of crumpophonery at its finest. Those who like their jazz served hot with adrenaline will look forward to the next offering from this young firebrand. Don’t hold your breath, thoughI’ve a hunch it won’t be coming any time soon.

 

 

July 6, 2014, Cutlerville Tornado

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Tornado damage southwest of Division and 54th St.

It is a weird feeling when a tornado strikes the neighborhood where you used to live, particularly when you weren’t expecting tornadoes at all that day. That’s how it was two-and-a-half weeks ago on Sunday, July 6. No one saw it coming–not anyone who lived in the stricken area, not the National Weather Service, not any Michigan-based storm chasers I know of, and certainly not me. All I thought was, “Dang, that’s some crazy lightning coming out of that cell to my northwest!” even as an after-dark tornado chugged its way from Byron Center across Cutlerville and Kentwood toward its last gasp near Breton Road south of 28th Street.

Turning onto Andover St. from Eastern Ave.

Turning onto Andover St. from Eastern Ave.

I’m writing about it only now because I’ve had my hands full with other things. It’s no longer news, but it certainly deserves some kind of writeup in this blog. After all, it was the most significant tornado to hit the Grand Rapids area in years, it caught the NWS by surprise, and it missed my old apartment by only a block. (Come to think of it, another tornado in 2006 also missed my present apartment by only a block, but I wasn’t around to see it. I was heading home from my previous day’s chase in Illinois. Lots of irony there, but I’ll leave it alone and stay on topic.)

The Storm

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Tree uprooted along Division Ave. south of 54th St.

It was evening, and I was parked by the railroad tracks out near Elmdale, practicing my saxophone–which, if you know me, you understand is a regular habit of mine. The heat and humidity of the day had built to a slow boil beneath a capped atmosphere, but it appeared that the cap was breaking. Through the haze, I could see what looked like mushy towers off to my north. Right around sunset, I saw lightning streak through a cloud bank moving in from the west and thought, Nice. Bring it on. With mid-level winds forecast to be weak, I wasn’t expecting more than garden-variety storms, but given this year’s largely stormless storm season here in Michigan, any kind of flash and boom would be welcome.

With my practice session not feeling particularly inspired, I decided to call it and head home. The storm didn’t appear to be moving fast–not surprising, given the weak steering winds–but just north of my path . . . wow, that lightning was ramping up something fierce. I contemplated intercepting the cell, which clearly was quite active, but I had neither my laptop and radar with me nor my camera, nor, frankly, much desire. Sometimes it’s nice to just sit at home and let a storm rumble overhead.

By the time I arrived in Caledonia, the cell was flickering like a strobe light, and for half a minute, with more lightning advancing from the west, I thought I would sit in the church parking lot on the west end of town and let myself get eaten. Then I thought, Nah. Slow-moving storm with a lot of precipitable water–I just wasn’t into getting drenched during the mad dash from my car to my apartment. Besides, something in me really wanted to take a gander at the radar.

Meso Kentwoo

Mesocyclone over Kentwood, Michigan.

Once inside, I fired up GR3. Base reflectivity showed an amorphous clump of cells surrounded by lots of green: pretty much the disorganized, high-precipitation mess I expected. Then, out of pure force of habit, I switched to storm-relative velocity. Hmmm . . . what was that? Weak rotation just west of the airport radar seven miles north of me? That seemed odd. Curious, I back up a scan, which showed that the rotation had been stronger over Kentwood a few minutes earlier (see image.) Time for a look at the VAD wind profile. Well, now: mid-level winds were stronger than I had expected, around 40 knots, with southerly winds veering nearly 90 degrees through the lowest 4,000 feet. That would explain that. Going by reflectivity only, I’d never have suspected, but there it was, a definite mesocylonic signature. What did the previous scan show?

Yikes. Really? There over South Division Street, sitting on top of Cutlerville–that was one potent-looking couplet.* Kind of scary, really. Surface-based CAPE was something like 2,000, and forecast low-level helicity was more than adequate, over 200 m2/s2 in the lowest kilometer. Still, reflectivity looked like crap, the storm was wrapped in rain and not even severe-warned, and besides, this was Michigan. And that was two scans ago; the rotation had weakened considerably as it approached the airport. That would be the end of things.

Supercell organizing near Ionia.

Supercell organizing near Ionia.

But it wasn’t. As the storms moved east, the low-level jet spiked considerably, and even the 500 mb wind got a brief burst of 50 kt. Over by Ionia, a cell began to organize, and this time there was no mistaking the telltale look of a supercell in the reflectivity product. KGRR issued a severe thunderstorm warning with mention of the possibility of a tornado.

A scan later, storm-relative velocity shows pronounced rotation. Base reflectivity (not shown) also showed a well-defined hook.

A scan later, storm-relative velocity shows pronounced rotation. Base reflectivity (not shown) also showed a well-defined hook.

There were in fact four tornadoes according to the SPC’s final tally. The last three off to the east were brief EF0s, but the first one, which had initially caught my attention, did high-end EF1 damage in Cutlerville and injured six people.

Damage in My Old Neighborhood

IMG_2745

This used to be a warehouse on the west side of Division Street.

After doing its worst damage on the west side of Division Street, the tornado moved northeast through my old neighborhood, Leisure Acres. The second photo at the top shows the view that greeted me as I turned off of Eastern Avenue onto Andover Street. Halfway down Andover, my old apartment was untouched, but just a block east (and no doubt to the south, though I didn’t look) was a trash heap: trees snapped and uprooted, big branches torn off, here and there part of a roof missing–all the signs of a weak tornado. But of course, weak is a relative word; a wind that can do that kind of damage is anything but weak, as those in its path would be quick to point out. Nevertheless, there’s a significant difference between a 100 mph wind that does mostly minor structural damage and a 180 mph wind that levels homes completely.

House on Andover St. with its roof and side ripped off.

House on Andover St. with its roof and side ripped off.

Half of the photos in this post were taken in the Leisure Acres neighborhood along my old street, Andover; the rest were taken on the west side of Division south of Fifty-Fourth Street. The damage on Andover was primarily tree damage, though that was obviously significant, and as you can see, homes didn’t escape unscathed. The worst appeared to have been the house shown to the right with part of its roof and side ripped out out by the wind.

I was told that much worse damage occurred to the west along Clay Avenue, and while I didn’t try to enter that area, a brief jaunt down Division Street revealed places where the damage was more intense. The most significant was what appeared to have been a large warehouse building that got completely destroyed–just a pile of blocks and steel beams, as you can see in the photos.

One good egg. He just showed up with his chainsaw, ready to help.

One good egg. He just showed up with his chainsaw, ready to help.

In the aftermath of severe weather events, communities tend to pull together and ordinary heroes emerge from outlying areas, bringing with them such skills as they possess and the desire to make life a little easier for those dealing with the destruction of their property. This man with the chainsaw was wandering along the street from house to house, inquiring whether anyone needed help sawing up downed trees. Giving what he had to offer. I asked his name and wrote it down, and now I’ve lost it. In the very slim chance that he should happen to read this article: Bravo, sir! Generously played.

“We Had No Warning”: The NWS’s Dilemma

Of course the NWS got hammered. “We had no warning,” storm victims said–and while most of the time that’s untrue, in this case they really had no warning. But before anyone makes the usual foolish comments about the NWS’s ineptitude and how they never get anything right–which is simply not the case–it would pay to understand a few things about tornadoes in Michigan.

Let’s start with this fact: The typical tornado-breeding systems of the kind that produce significant (EF2 and higher) tornadoes get forecast quite effectively here in West Michigan, as elsewhere in the country. Meteorologists are on top of such setups; they watch these systems develop days in advance and are most certainly monitoring each one closely as it arrives, with varying degrees of concern depending on its characteristics.

Nothing left but a pile of cement blocks, wood, and steel.

Nothing left but a pile of cement blocks, wood, and steel.

That leaves the atypical tornado-breeders: systems whose features wouldn’t automatically trigger alarm, whose storms may occasionally produce brief, weak tornadoes that spin up with little or no advance notice. Storms like these–often squall lines and sometimes, as in the case of July 6, unremarkable-looking rainy blobs–produce no persistent, telltale circulation in a storm’s mid-levels that a radar can detect twenty minutes before a tornado forms. Such storms are difficult to impossible to warn. In the case of a squall line, small circulations can hop around from scan to scan on the radar, now here and now there, and most of them never produce. The rare tornado that does occur can materialize between radar scans, which until very recently have taken four-and-a-half minutes to complete in severe weather mode. A lot can happen in that time, and on July 6, it did.

Without going into details that most of my readers are no doubt familiar with, the lads at KGRR deal with proportionately more of these atypical scenarios than forecasters west of the Mississippi. The difference between a Great Plains supercell and the kind of stuff we normally get in Michigan is substantial, and for forecasters here, that means fewer opportunities to look like heroes and plenty more situations in which they’re damned if they do and damned if they don’t. When they issue a warning and nothing happens–which is frequently the case with squall lines–the public accuses them of crying wolf; when they don’t issue a warning and a tornado pops up out of nowhere, the public thinks they’re idiots.

Debris festoons a tree and litters a yard on Andover St. a block from my old apartment.

Debris festoons a tree and litters a yard on Andover St. a block from my old apartment.

They are far from idiots. They are experts who deal with factors in the warning process that most people know nothing of. Their job is not an easy one, and anyone who believes he or she could do better is woefully ignorant of the complexities of severe weather and warnings. Think otherwise? Fine. Go ahead and spend a few weeks at the peak of severe storm season, trying to nail that volatile blob of Jell-O called the atmosphere to the wall. It’ll be an eye-opening experience as, equipped with state-of-the-art technology, you discover the difference between forecasting and fortune-telling.

Ironically, the Cutlerville tornado occurred shortly before KGRR was slated to implement the new SAILS update to their radar software. It’s amazing to see how drastically this software reduces scan times in severe mode–I now get level 3 downloads in as little as a minute and always substantially less than the nearly five minutes of pre-SAILS days. Had SAILS been operative on July 6, the tornado might well have been detected in enough time to issue a warning. Or not. Microscale conditions can change so rapidly that some tornadoes will still slip through the cracks. But the odds of detection have just improved significantly.

——————

* The image shows the meso over Kentwood. I have tried unsuccessfully to render the more vigorous Cutlerville scan on both level 2 and level 3 data from NCDC archives on GR2AE and GR3. After several hours of fiddling with the data files and consulting with chasers who are more technically gifted than I, I’ve concluded that I need to get some hands-on help figuring out how to use NCDC’s archived data. Sorry–I’ve done my best.

How to Practice the Giant Steps Cycle: Video Tutorial and Supplementary Material

My preoccupation with John Coltrane’s tune “Giant Steps” now ebbs, now flows, but always continues. I’m not the most fabulous alto sax man who has ever played the changes, certainly not in the league of Kenny Garrett, but I have my own approach, which I strive to make less digital and more lyrical. I’ve even had the temerity to write a book of licks and patterns on “Giant Steps” titled The Giant Steps Scratch Pad, available for instruments of every key.

In the following video tutorial, I share a couple approaches to practicing the Giant Steps cycle that I have found profitable in my own practice sessions. The video begins with a bit of theory; however, the theory behind “Giant Steps” is more than adequately covered elsewhere in greater depth, as in this excellent article by Dan Adler, and it isn’t the thrust of the tutorial. Rather, I address a more pragmatic concern: How do you wrap your fingers around the Giant Steps cycle? The tips I share in the tutorial certainly aren’t the only way you can or should tackle the cycle, but I think you’ll find them helpful. Briefly, I explain how to run both a one-bar pattern and a more extensive two-bar lick through the cycle.

The two patterns used in the video were taken from The Giant Steps Scratch Pad. For your convenience, I’m supplying them for you here. Note that these excerpts are from the Eb edition, suitable for alto and baritone saxophonists; if you play a C, Bb, or bass clef instrument, you’ll need to transpose (though editions of my book are available in your key). Click on the images to enlarge them.

One-bar pattern:

002

 

 

One-bar pattern through the cycle:
003

 

 

Two-bar lick:
004

 

 

Two-bar lick through all three keys of the cycle:
GS 1-Bar Pattern

 

 

 

And now, here is the video. It’s obviously a homespun effort, so please bear with its flaws. I haven’t figured out how to read from my PowerPoint notes and still look directly at the camera, and as for that stupid deer fly that lands on my forehead while I’m signing off and roams around like an astronaut exploring the lunar surface, I wasn’t aware of it till I got home and viewed the clip. You think I’m going to do a redo just for that? It’s part of filming outdoors: mosquitoes setting up drilling operations on my nice, pink flesh, deer flies exploring my noggin—I deal with it and you can too.

Go ahead and chuckle. But if you’re a jazz improviser who’s tackling “Giant Steps,” then I think you’ll nevertheless find this tutorial worth your while.

 

Book Review: The Scale Omnibus by Francesco Balena

Francesco Balena operates the website Saxopedia, a tremendous resource for saxophonists and jazz musicians of every stripe. If you play the sax—or, for that matter, any instrument—and you are not familiar with Franco’s site, then I highly recommend that once you have finished reading this post, you go directly to Saxopedia and acquaint yourself with it. The exhaustive collection of links to solo transcriptions alone is enough to place Saxopedia in the upper echelon of saxophone resources. But there’s much more besides, and that now includes Francesco’s new masterpiece, The Scale Omnibus: 392 Scales for Instrumentalists, Composers, Vocalists, and Improvisers. The amount of material covered in this 429-page, downloadable book is simply staggering. And it’s free.

Did you get that? Free. In the author’s words, “The primary objective of this book is making in-depth knowledge about scales available to the largest number of people as possible. For this reason The Scale Omnibus is free. Free as a free lunch. No strings attached.” There are a few commonsense stipulations in the use of the material, but the bottom line is that Francesco, in keeping with the spirit of Saxopedia, has created what has got to be the most comprehensive repository of scales ever assembled, and now he is making it available to musicians at no cost whatsoever.

It’s a fantastic accomplishment on Francesco’s part, the fruit of considerable time, research, insight, and plain, solid labor; and it is an equally remarkable gift to jazz musicians in search of fresh ideas for improvisation.

Organization

The Scale Omnibus is well-organized and easy to use. Following a thoughtfully written, insightful introduction, the book plunges directly into the material, beginning with the common major and minor scales and their modes and then progressing, per the table of contents, through

  • Symmetrical Scales
  • Jazz Scales
  • Pentatonic Scales
  • Modal Scales
  • European Scales
  • Asian Scales
  • Indian Scales
  • Miscellaneous Scales

Every scale is allotted its own separate, full page. Scales are presented in ascending form in all twelve keys—with the exception, for obvious reasons, of the chromatic scale—and in descending form as well for a few of the Indian ragas whose ascending and descending forms differ. Each scale is preceded by brief, helpful notes that cover its alternate names, modes, construction, harmonic applications (i.e., which chords it works well with), and in some cases, its country of origin.

Following the presentation of the scales themselves, the book includes four appendices that provide a scale index and scales by name, interval, and chord. The last appendix, Scales by Chord, strikes me as particularly useful, providing a quick match-up of chords with scale options. Many of the options will be familiar to experienced improvisers, but there are surprises. For instance, until a short while ago, I had no idea that the Romanian scale could be used with a minor seventh chord. (For that matter, I had no idea there was such a thing as a Romanian scale.) This particular appendix is by no means exhaustive, given the vast array of possibilities covered by the book, and Franco might consider expanding the list of scale choices in a future edition. However, the amount of time required to do so would no doubt be considerable, and the appendix as it stands is an eminently useful tool, furnishing a greater selection than similar lists such as Jamey Aebersold’s chord/scale syllabus.

About the Scales

The Scales Omnibus gives all scales, both the everyday and the exotic, equal coverage. But while it begins with the major and minor scales all Westerners relate to, whether trained musicians or everyday listeners, it goes far beyond those scales into territory most of us aren’t familiar with. For instance, turning to the first page of the section on Asian scales, I come across something called the Honkoshi scale, which, I am informed, originated in Japan; generates, as its modes, the Raga Hamsa Vinodini, the Raga Manavi, and the Insen scale; and works well with a half-diminished chord. Following it is the Ichikotsucho scale, also known as—are you ready?—the Major-Lydian Mixed, Gregorian 5, Genus Diatonicum Veterum Correctum, Kubilai, Raga Bihag, Raga Gaud Sarang, Raga Hamir Kalyani, Raga Kedar, Raga Yaman Kalyan, and Raga Chayanat. Stick that in your horn and play it (preferably over a Cmaj7 or Cma7#11).

Does this book cover every possible scale under the sun? No. Francesco has screened out scales of fewer than five notes; such scales exist, but when tones become so sparse, the use of the term scale becomes questionable. Also, significantly, the book covers only scales that fit easily within the twelve-tone, well-tempered system. Francesco writes, “Microtonal scales, scales that use just temperament, and scales that use equal temperament obtained by dividing the octave in a different number of intervals—as is the case of some Arabian scales—are not included.”

In Summary

A book so vast in its scope as this can only provide the basic scales and insights on their use. From there, it’s up to you to determine which scales interest you most and develop exercises that will help you master them. No way will you or anyone ever internalize all of them. But even one new scale is a tremendous acquisition for the improvising musician, and to that end, The Scale Omnibus is a treasure trove of possibilities. Franceso could easily ask $25.00 or more for this volume; instead, he’s offering it for free, and in so doing, he has added even more value to an already immensely valuable website for jazz instrumentalists, particularly saxophonists.

A work of such excellence and heart as Francesco’s book, given so generously to others, deserves support, and it is in that spirit that I have written this unpaid and unsolicited review.

Bravissimo, Francesco! You’ve given a gift to musicians everywhere. Thank you.

Rhythm Changes: An Etude to Build Jazz Technique

rhythm changes, jazz improvisation, jazz etude 001Here’s a little bop-style etude I created to help build your chops for rhythm changes. No surprises here; I wasn’t striving for cutting-edge ideas but for simple building blocks of jazz vocabulary. Me being an alto sax guy, I’ve written the material in the key of G, which is the alto transposition for the standard “Rhythm” key of Bb. Tenor players, flute players, and so on–sorry for the inconvenience, but you know how to transpose, right? Or just play it as written and hone your facility with the key of G. Click on the image to enlarge it and then have at it. And have fun!

I’ve written in the past about my predilection for rhythm changes as a means of developing a fundamental jazz vocabulary. In their essence, the changes can be construed as simply a succession of turnarounds with a bridge based on the cycle of dominants. You can get as fancy with that as you want to, but the basics are just as simple as the word basic implies.

For more on rhythm changes, click here. I also encourage you to read the point-counterpoint between Kurt Ellenberger and me which evolved out of that post. Whether you love rhythm changes or, like Kurt, hate them, you’ll find food for thought.

If you enjoyed this post, click here for plenty more articles, exercises, and solo transcriptions. Also, a quick plug for my book The Giant Steps Scratch Pad. If you’d like a practical, hands-on practice companion to help you master “Giant Steps,” well…that’s why I wrote it.

How a Late-Season Storm Chase Nearly Ended in Tragedy

With this year’s severe weather season ramping up–as I write, Missouri and Arkansas are primed for supercells and tornadoes later today–I want to share the following with my fellow storm chasers. Many of you are people I know and care about, and some of you are quite close to me. I know some of the risks you take because I take them myself; we all do, to varying degrees. To my thinking, tornadoes are usually at the lower end of the risk spectrum. At the top is what happens on the road. That’s something over which we have considerable control, and with it, a responsibility for our own safety and the safety of others.

In a heartbeat, an exciting chase can turn into a second or two of horrified disbelief followed instantly by noise, violence, injury, and perhaps death. I know because I’ve lived it, and I hope no one else I know ever has to. That’s why I’m sharing the following account, written last December. Perhaps it’ll inspire you to exercise greater care and awareness on the road. Please take it to heart. I’d like it to be a long time before the next set of initials gets outlined on the radar by Spotter Network icons—and when that day does arrive, I don’t want those initials to be yours.

——————————-

Saturday, December 7, 2013.

A short while ago, I was lying on my side on the living room couch, giving Lisa’s cat a full-body rubdown and listening to her purr. Siam is one of the sweetest, best-behaved little creatures you could hope for, affectionate and enormously tactile. Being held and petted are things she takes for granted as her natural due, and she gets plenty of such treatment. So there was nothing remarkable that I should be stroking her soft, cream-and-chocolate fur.

And yet, there was everything remarkable about it. When you’ve nearly had your life suddenly snuffed out just before the holidays, the most commonplace act can strike you as extraordinary.

The fact that I am still here to pet this vibrant, blissfully thrumming little motor . . . that I am here to see Lisa smile, and to hear her laugh, and to look into her sparkling eyes as I hold her in my arms . . . that I am here to tell my dear eighty-eight-year-old mother and my sister, Diane, that I love them, and to share more beers with my friends, and to turn the ignition switch in my “new” used Toyota Camry which, as of yesterday evening, has replaced the one I lost three weeks ago . . . these things are remarkable. Never fool yourself into thinking that the simple and the everyday are anything less than a gift and a miracle.

Things could have turned out very differently. By now, my body could have been lowered into the cold earth, leaving my loved ones to face this Christmas with broken hearts instead of warmth and gladness. Instead, I am still here and blessed with,  surrounded by, reminders that the simple act of petting the cat, or lifting this mug of hot chocolate that Lisa whipped up for me a little while ago, or watching downy snowflakes dance in the air beyond my balcony slider, or even feeling the diminishing but still-present pain of a cracked sternum, is an extraordinary thing.

The Setup

On November 17, I was chasing storms in eastern Illinois and western Indiana with my friends Tom Oosterbaan, Rob Forry, and Shawn Kellogg. The occasion was an unusual late-season setup featuring a vigorous, negatively tilted trough digging into the Midwest. On its eastern side, a surface low was pulling in moisture-laden southerly winds from the Gulf of Mexico as it tracked northeast through the Great Lakes.

SPC Day 1 Convective Outlook, 13Z, November 17, 2013

SPC Day 1 Convective Outlook, 13Z, November 17, 2013

For a good week, I had been following the forecast models with both skepticism and growing excitement as they progressed from the meager CAPE one expects this time of year to unseasonably high instability, mid-60s dewpoints, and some truly rabid wind shear. On November 16, the Storm Prediction Center issued a moderate risk for its day 2 convective outlook, then upgraded it to a high risk on the morning of the 17th. The ingredients were falling into place for the kind of high-shear/low-CAPE tornado outbreak that is typical of the Great Lakes. It would culminate in the deadliest, most violent November outbreak on record.

The setup bore some disturbing similarities to the notorious April 11, 1965, Palm Sunday Outbreak. And it wasn’t happening in Oklahoma or Texas. For a change, it was all coming together in my backyard, so to speak. Chasers from all over the map had converged on Illinois and Indiana–hardly the heart of Tornado Alley, but the most chaseable terrain in the world when it does produce.

Although Rob was willing to drive his Jeep, I volunteered my 2002 Camry. I had acquired it last February, and it was in great shape and was a comfortable ride. At last I had a roadworthy vehicle, and having benefited so often from other chasers driving their vehicles, I was pleased to be able to provide the transportation for a change.

We left Grand Rapids around 8:00 a.m. and met briefly for breakfast with Bill Oosterbaan and Kim Howell down at Kim’s house in Niles. Kim had prepared a generous spread for us (Kim, you’re the swellest!), but we were in a rush and had to just wolf it down, then Rain-X our windshields and hit the road. We did, however, make time to do one last thing before we took off. Joining hands, all six of us prayed, asking the Lord’s protection for us and for those in the areas that would be impacted by the storms. I believe that prayer was providential. None of us in my vehicle had an inkling of what lay in store for us a few hours later.

The Chase

November 17 6Z NAM hodograph for NW IN, forecast hour 18Z

November 17 6Z NAM hodograph for NW IN, forecast hour 18Z

Our target was northwest Indiana around Rensselaer, where the 500 mb jet max looked to nose in over substantial low-level instability. With storm motions forecast at 60 knots (see NAMM hodograph–click to enlarge), the storms would be rocketships, and it seemed that our best bet would be to set up east of them, watch the radar, and then jockey into position and hope for the best.

I wish we had stuck with that plan. But the big, discrete supercell which proved to be the day’s main player showed strong, persistent circulation, dropping a string of strong to violent tornadoes–including the deadly Washington, Illinois, EF-4– on its journey northeast from Peoria toward Chicago. Bill and Kim decided to go for that one and wound up intercepting a rain-wrapped tornado.

On our part, the storm looked mighty tempting, but we chose to let it go, not wanting to chase it in urban territory. That left us with the other storms which were approaching from the southwest, and we made the mistake of heading out to meet them rather than letting them come to us. It was a defensible decision: the storms were beginning to congeal into a line, and we wanted to catch them while they were still reasonably discrete. As it turned out, we’d have done fine had we simply exercised patience. But instead, we headed west into Illinois, then dropped south and ultimately wound up backpedaling east back across the border to intercept an HP supercell that was showing rotation on the radar.

Rob was driving and I was sitting in the front passenger seat with my laptop on my lap, monitoring the radar and navigating. I’ve mentioned that Illinois and Indiana easily comprise some of the best chase territory anywhere. Their flat, wide-open stretches of agricultural land let you see for miles, and their regular grids of paved country roads make for easy driving. Even the wet gravel roads are generally far easier going than the slippery gumbo out west. You just can’t ask for a better road network or better topography.

Southwest of the town of Oxford, Indiana, our storm appeared to crap out on us on the radar. The echo weakened, and while the storm just to the southwest was tornado-warned, the base reflectivity suggested a comma-head on a small bow echo, not a supercell. That was the last radar scan we got before we lost Internet connection. And storms can reorganize rapidly, and–well, ours did. Shortly after, an inflow jet shot across the road in front of us from the south and then rapidly enveloped us. What the . . . ? Rob rolled down the window, and we could hear a roar to the north. What was causing it? An updraft region had to be over there. But it was wrapped in precipitation, and telltale storm features were utterly lacking. Yet logic told me that somewhere within that bland-looking sky, a mesocyclone was buried, possibly even a tornado. At the very least, some kind of high-wind event had to be taking place nearby.

Not only so, but a dark shadow was moving along to our south, heading tangentially in front of us. Tornado? Just a darker cloud in that unremarkable sky? Impossible to tell. I shot some video, hoping that the camera would reveal features that my naked eye couldn’t discern, but there was no such luck. All it gave me was my sole record of our chase that day.

A look at the reflectivity on Rob’s cell phone app a couple minutes later revealed that our storm, which had appeared weak and disorganized in the previous scan, had in fact morphed into an embedded supercell. We had been on the southern end of the hook.

As we headed into Oxford, we began to see signs of significant wind damage–nothing tornadic, just straight-line, but still a handful for the residents of that town to have to clean up.

We were losing our storm, and once we were on the other side of Oxford, Rob picked up the pace. By then, though, I think our chase was effectively over. The storms were beyond us and moving too fast for us to catch up.

The Crash

Not quite two miles east of Oxford, the road we were on, eastbound SR 352, intersects northbound US 52. We were traveling at a good clip–too fast for conditions, as I know Rob will agree.

Ahead of us lay a hillock where a railroad track crossed the road. It was a blind rise that blocked our view of the other side. Rob slowed down for the tracks, but we were still probably doing 40 mph when we crested them and got our first glimpse of what lay beyond. To our horror, a stop sign and a divided highway were situated downslope no more than 200 feet away and probably closer. And to make matters worse, a vehicle was pulling out of a service road on the right into our lane. Rob swerved and braked instantly, but the pavement was wet, we were heading downhill, my nearly new all-weather tires failed to grab, and we skidded into and across the southbound lane on a collision course with a northbound van.

I remember watching the grill of the other vehicle looming toward me. The next instant, there was a bang, and our vehicle careened across the rest of the lane and came to a stop on the far side of the highway. I don’t remember the airbags deploying, but they did, and no doubt they saved Rob and me from serious injury.

For a second, the four of us sat there, stunned. Then we piled out of the vehicle. As I stood up, I could tell that something was wrong with my chest. While I don’t recall its happening, presumably the airbag had driven my laptop into my ribcage. At the moment, I was experiencing only discomfort, but I knew that I had been injured, and it was only a matter of time before the pain would set in. In that expectation, I was not disappointed.

My Camry after the Crash

My Camry after the Crash

The point of impact for the two vehicles had been headlight-to-headlight at right angles, my Camry’s right headlight connecting with the van’s left headlight.

I won’t go into all the details from here. I will just say that we and the people in the van were very, very blessed. God preserved us, sparing us any real harm, and Shawn pointed out that the prayer we had prayed before we left had been no mistake. What went wrong was obvious, but there was also much that went right, more than we had any reason to expect. It was amazing that we had made it unscathed across the southbound lane in the first place. And the angle of collision couldn’t have been more merciful. Just a second faster or slower for either vehicle would have resulted in a T-bone and almost certainly in serious injuries or fatalities. It was a busy highway; had a semi been coming . . . I don’t even want to think of it.

Huge thanks to fellow chaser Eric Treece, who gave Shawn, Rob, and me a ride back up to I-94, where Rob’s wife picked us up; to Bill Oosterbaan, who came to help and to retrieve his brother, Tom; and to Holly Forry for dropping what she was doing in order to make the long trip out and then drive her husband, Shawn, and me all back to my apartment.

Above all, thank you, Father, for sparing us. Thank you for protecting the innocents in that other vehicle, and thank you for protecting us. Thank you that this Thanksgiving, we have all had much to be thankful for, and that this Christmas, we all will celebrate the birth of your Son, Jesus, once again with our families, as we have done for so many years and hopefully will do for many more.

Accident Corner

About the intersection where our accident occurred: If you go there, you will see that the setup is an accident waiting to happen, and many accidents have in fact occurred there. At least, that is what we were told by both the sheriff and one of the ambulance drivers. I don’t recall seeing a “Stop Ahead” sign, and the other guys maintain there was no warning. Logic tells me that surely there had to have been one, but all I remember seeing was a yellow RR crossing sign as we approached the tracks. That was it.

The tracks were at the top of a rise, and only upon crossing them do you see the stop sign, the side road, and the highway down below. The proximity of the intersection to the tracks comes as a shock (unless, of course, you live in the area), and you’ve got little room to respond. In other words, it’s a horrible setup that is perfectly engineered to catch motorists off-guard. It’s lethal in wet weather and has got to be a terror in the winter. According to one of the guys, the sheriff had mentioned that his department had been after the county to improve the intersection because of the danger it posed, but so far the county had done nothing about it.

So I can’t be too hard on us. But I can’t be too easy, either. We were going too fast for conditions, and I wish I had told Rob to slow down; it was my car and my responsibility to say something. I’m so glad everyone came out of it okay. Banged up and hurting, definitely, but  no one in our vehicle or the other one sustained serious injuries or went away in an ambulance. I thank God, most sincerely, that all of us experienced the very best possible outcome of a very bad scenario.

A Word to the Wise (and the Not-So-Wise)

Now, here is what I want to say to all of my fellow chasers: It could have been worse, and it could have been you.

Watch your driving.

My main fear in storm chasing has never been the storms. It has been hydroplaning or otherwise losing control of the vehicle on wet pavement. It is the thing that happens to people who think it won’t happen to them.

I consider myself a cautious driver. Next to some of you, I come across as the little old guy wearing the brown suit and hat who putters along at 45 miles an hour down the Interstate. However, most of the time, I’ve been a passenger, not the one who has driven on chases, and over the years, I have witnessed driving habits that frankly have scared the crap out of me: Chasers rocketing along at 80 miles an hour down wet, curvy, hilly, unfamiliar backroads. Drivers multitasking with cell phones, laptops, and so forth. I can say something about these things to the guy behind the wheel, but that’s the extent of it. I can’t control another person’s behavior. The only thing I can control is whom I  get into a vehicle with. And that decision is one I will be taking very seriously in the future, because the attitude that person has toward safety can have huge implications for me, those who love me, other passengers, and other motorists who share the same road. Sitting in the passenger seat three weeks ago, I took the main force of the collision, and never again do I want to go through the pain I’ve experienced these last few weeks as a result. And never again do I want to put Lisa through the shock and fear of that awful afternoon, let alone something far worse.

Some of you take huge risks both with the storms and with your driving. And yes, I know: You’re big boys and girls and it’s your decision. It’s a matter of personal choice. Rah, rah and a fist bump for rugged individualism. We’ve all heard it. It’s like a mantra among today’s chasers.

But when something serious happens to you, trust me, you’ll be singing another tune. Because you don’t really know the the implications of your choices until one of them blasts past your bulletproof attitude and inserts itself into your life with jarring and possibly irrevocable immediacy. There goes the storm you were chasing, receding to the east. But what has just happened to you–that may never go away.

Most of you are in your twenties and early thirties. Lots of life still ahead of you. Many chases still in store for you. Don’t blow it. Because if you wind up in a wheelchair for the rest of your life, the best of your chases will leave you with just a handful of memories and decades of wishing you’d been wiser in the way you went about doing things.

Am I saying you shouldn’t take risks? Of course not. Everything worth doing involves some kind of risk. You can’t truly live without risking. But there is a difference between taking judicious and necessary risks versus taking irresponsible, selfish, and totally avoidable risks. Risks that could get you killed. Risks that could get your chase partner killed and leave you haunted with guilt the rest of your life. Risks that could leave you or someone else paralyzed. Risks that could devastate those you’ve left behind–your spouse or significant other, your children, your parents, your siblings, your friends.

The people you say you love and care about.

Other people and their families.

It ain’t all about you.

When I arrived home at 11:30 that night, Lisa greeted me at the door. I’d never seen her act the way she did–one minute laughing, the next minute crying. Gently, she helped me remove my shirt, a painful operation. We stood in the bathroom in front of the mirror. I was pretty banged up. She kept touching me and kissing my shoulders. She laid her head on my shoulder, closed her eyes, and smiled, and I looked in the mirror and smiled back at her from the glass. My woman. “You’re here with me now,” she said. “That’s all that matters. You’re here with me now.”

I knew then just how much she really loves me, how much I mean to her. I can say, in all truthfulness, that it was worth the loss of my car to experience how much closer the accident has drawn us since that awful day. We almost lost each other. But we didn’t. And during the course of my healing, she has taken care of me beautifully. We have laughed (Ouch! It hurts to laugh!), and had deep, heartfelt conversations, and walked with each other through yet one more stretch of deep water. God has brought us through, and as I emerge on the other side, it is with the certainty that he has given me a truly wonderful, beautiful woman who loves me with all her heart. I have much to be grateful for.

To sum it up for you, my fellow chasers: Chase with passion. But also chase responsibly, with wisdom and an awareness of just how vulnerable you are. Because you are vulnerable. And I think that many of you don’t understand what that means. You say that you do, but do you really? Your life truly is a vapor, as passing as those towers of convection which seem so indomitable in the moment but vanish within hours. Today’s chase will be only a memory tomorrow. Chase in a way that does not become a lifetime of regret, whether for you or those who love you.