The SPC highlighted a 30% hatched tornado risk. Headed out towards Sioux Falls, SD around 9:00 in the morning with Rich, his mom, and Mike for what was hyped up to be a big outbreak from Minnesota down through Oklahoma. We drove through a morning storm around Jackson, MN that went on to produce tennis ball size hail shortly after we got out of it. We continued to Sioux Falls and decided to head farther south towards Sioux City, IA and drove through rain almost the entire way there. We got to Sioux City around 4:00 or 5:00 where the temp was 81 and the dewpoint was 70, things were finally starting to look better. Sat around till about 5:30 while storms struggled to stay severe out to our west in Nebraska, made the decision to go south and try to intercept a cell that was coming out of Kansas. The warning said it was moving at about 50 mph but after a good 2 hours of driving towards it we were still another hour away from it and it was starting to die plus it was getting dark so we headed home. A very dissapointing bust for what was supposed to be one of the biggest outbreaks in quite a few years. 816 miles, 15 hours, 4 tornado watches (3 of them were PDS tornado watches) and not a single chaseable storm. It was one of those days you could tell it was going to bust but you still had to chase it because it was a HIGH RISK and you listened to the SPC more than you listened to yourself.

 

 

The only pic I took the entire day was when we gave the good luck cow some punishment with the windshield wipers for getting our hopes up: