The 2008 Chase Season

Well it has been a damn good year, besides all the fast moving storms, HP monsters, and wrain wrapped tornadoes, all in all it has been a record setting year for me ( Erik ) and the Mesosearch.net team.
Ricky and I set out on our first chase this year in February in SE Texas. It was a major bust, but was great to get the equipment out and chase after a 55 mph tornado warned storm.
My last chase of the 08 spring season ended for me on May 22nd in Central Kansas with a nice last catch right before heading home, A tornado off of Highway 4, NW of Ness City.

Ricky and I caught out first tornado of the year on April 09 when the town of Breckenridge Tx, got hit by a EF2 tornado, We too got hit by this tornado in it's early stages, A memory to never to be forgotten. I will never forget the images set in my mind that day as the 18 wheeler in front of us flipped over and whole trees fly across the road around us. I will never forget that insane moment in my life. I have never been so scared. I learned alot that day about being around rain wrapped tornadoes.

I have made some great friends this spring. Chris Harrel, We chased together for the first time on March 2, I also took my bosses from work to becuase the didn't believe me that I was a storm chaser. A couple of hail cores later they were believers. March 2nd was a day that broke the ice for the season. First chaseable storm motions and amazing structure. The background on the MesoSearch.net myspace is from March 2nd. Chris and I are good friends now and has joined the MesoSearch.net Team. March 2nd was his first storm chase as well, but has studied severe weather for a good while before his first chase, he is also a ham radio opertator, and one hell of a photographer. Also got to meet one of my influnces and inspirations to storm chasing , Amos Magliocco. Thanks for the awesome caravan!

March 17 2008, another great day of amazing structure, good storm motions and great friends. The whole team chased together this day. We met up with TornadoVideos.net Reed Timmer, Joel Taylor and co near Abilene Tx. Awesome chasing with you guys. You guys rock and chasing with you guys is like a big party on the highway. Good laughs, excitining moments and awesome storms.

March 30-31, Chris Harrel, his wife, friend Jeff and myself went on a 2 day chase in Oklahoma and Texas. After the long drive to W Oklahoma, long only because of flat tire we got in Altus, and the damn carnival we got stuck behind in the middle of nowhere We again met up with TornadoVideos.net .. Amazing chase. Our original target was dead on, but netoworking with other chasers had us get off course a little bit, then come to find out, we had to turn around to go back where we were already sitting waiting for initiation. Jeffs car met its fate on that exciting March 30th day.. His new just paid off Scion met it's fate as baseball size hail fell from sky. Props to Jeff for being a good sport about it.The next day of the chase we passed up several supercells to haul ass back down to TX to chase the event that was going to be taking place in North Texas. Subsidence proved to take these storms before they could really mature.

April 23 was a super awesome day over in West Texas . Everybody else in the team had to work and wouldn't try to get out of it. I begged them, told them it was going to be an awesome day. So I had to play it solo and it was not easy. I thank Chris so much for Nowcasting for me that day. Your Dominating!! I broke my record for most tornadoes seen in one day, 7!! Most of them were crappy and didn't last very long. But one of them was truly awesome and bagged it on video.. I Would like to thank Reed Timmer for this day as well for texting me about the outflow boundry. I made an awesome friend this day as well. Aaron Dooley, we met when I was heading east on 20 and We both pulled over to examine data and the storm. We chased for the rest of the evening together. I had gotten a flat as we were heading out. He came back to give me a hand with it. Bro thanks for all your help that night, Your a hell of friend and an awesome person to chase with.

May 1st was a hard forecast. Most everybody else went to SE KS but with Aarons and my forcast was showing that further south on the dryline we could get a very discrete cell. After long waiting in Ardmore OK it happend. A masssive tower was in sight and it was exploding. INCREDIBLE Classic supercell structure!! Aaron had some friends meet up with us, one of them was Tony Cook, it was nice meeting you. I forget the names of the other 2 guys ( I am just really bad with names.). This was Rickys first time to meet Aaron as well. Well the cell was tornado warned and it looked like it was going to produce for sure. The cell split and the left split carried north and developed into a tornado producing machine. Our cell was just pretty and making huge hail. No tornadoes that day but another chase I will never forget.

The 22nd of May was my last chase day for the 08 springs season. Awesome is all I have to say. Again Chris and Ricky couldn't get off of work.. So I made the long drive to SW Kansas by myself. I left at 5:30 am that morning, and 9 tornadoes later got back home at 4:30 am the next morning. 23 hours of driving by myself. I thought I was going to die but to see tornado after tornado, that left a very sweet taste in my mouth. I Watched a young tower go up near Sublette Kansas. I had it all to myself for a 2 hours and observed it's first tornado with nobody else around that I know of. Truly amazing. One on one with one of the most powerful forces of nature. With storm motions that day moving a bit faster then expected it was hard to get close. Alot of tornadoes were brief, but almost all of them had full condensation to the ground. It was a trip well worth it. I would like to add a big thanks to Aaron Dooley for nowcasting for me in this event..

It was a good season, full of good friends, good storms, making friends, and learning alot. MesoSearch.net is also became the Chase Team for WFAA Channel 8 news in Dallas. The 4th largest market in the US. That was a big accomplishment for us. That happend to us in the beggining of April.

I would like to thank:

Ricky Price, for being an awesome driver and having a good spirit when the waiting gets long and all the late night chases.

Chris Harrel. for awesome nowcasting, excellent navigation (and good spirit for putting with my ass.. LOL.) Also to the work he has put into the website and forum ( still being worked on, it's going to be sweet).

Jeff, for being an awesome spirit for sacrificing your car in that insane hail, and all the hours of driving you have done.

Aaron Dooley, for helping me out with nowcasting, being an awesome chase partner, hell of a forecaster and helping me out with my flat that crazy day.

Reed Timmer and Joel Taylor, for the awesome networking in the field, chasing with Tornadovideos.net team, helping me with forecasting and last but not least all the goods times.

Amos Magliocco, for having us join you on March 2, and all the good converstaion.

Lanny Dean, Thanks for your nowcasting help, awesome conversation, helping with my forecasting and networking in the field.

I would also like to thank the people who visit the MesoSearch.net myspace. I hope you find our pictures and video awesome and enjoy them.

Currently we are working on several projects. New vehicle set ups, equipment upgrades, LIVE STREAMING IN A WAY YOU HAVE NEVER SEEN IT BEFORE!! It will be dominating.. Also we are developing a tornado interceptor device that will give us a new view and information about tornadoes. So hang around for next season. Because we are going to dominate 2009!!

Thanks to everyone that reads this.
Erik Burns
MesoSearch.net