Date: June 11, 2016
Time: 4:00 - 8:30 PM MDT
Place: Miles City, MT
Distance: 1269 mi (1026 positioning, 189 chasing, 54 to hotel)
Camera: T3i, GoPro3 Black, Sony RX100ii
Warnings: SVR
Rating: S3

The Chase

June 10, 10:15 AM MDT: Just got the oil changed and we're on the road for one of our most ambitious storm chases ever - MONTANA AND WYOMING! It's going to take a whole day's drive to get into position, but it looks like we might have at least two good looking days of high plains chasing - with some normal vacation plans in between.

June 10, 1:58 PM MDT: In Walsenburg, CO for some gas, and I might have just discovered a dangerous new storm chase snack - Maple Bacon Kettle Chips.

June 10, 7:11 PM MDT: On I-25 north and we just passed into Wyoming - Toni's first time ever in the state!

June 10, 10:38 PM MDT: Just arrived at the Gillette, WY Home2 Suites. Almost 12 hours of driving and we probably have another 4-5 tomorrow to get into position. AMBITIOUS.

June 11, 10:45 AM MDT: After a great night's sleep, we are heading north out of Gillette with a target of Miles City, MT. The setup on tap today involves an upper level low swinging from Washington/Columbia into Alberta. This will spread some decent 500mb winds over Montana, but the main jet core will stay further west. A surface low should strengthen over south-central Montana during the day and pull some high-50s to low-60s dew points into eastern MT. Great lapse rates should create some beautiful, crisp convection later this afternoon. And if we're lucky, a storm could root down to the surface layer and drop a brief tornado. Here's hoping.

11:37 AM MDT: On Hwy 59 and we just crossed into Montana - Toni and my first time ever in the state!!

12:44 PM MDT: Driving through these rolling fields and spotty forests reminds me a little of the Colorado foothills, but there is something uniquely Montanan about this awesome terrain. Different from any chase landscape we've ever seen.

1:38 PM MDT: Grabbing some lunch and coffee at the Main Street Grind in Miles City. Surface low is directly to our south back in Wyoming. East winds are pulling in richer moister into the area as we speak. Now we wait.

2:22 PM MDT: Some towers have gone up way to our ESE in South Dakota. Just because I get antsy waiting, we are gonna head east from Miles City on Hwy 12 to get a little closer. Definitely not committing to those young storms yet, though.

2:40 PM MDT: Oh man, the hills east of Miles City have some stunning terrain with beautiful red-yellow clinker outcrops mixed with the lush green prairie grass and dark pines - very distinctive.

3:20 PM MDT: Flying the Phantom along a dirt road beside a tiny, perfectly clear pond. A new mesoscale discussion went out about 30 minutes ago followed by a SVR watch for all of eastern Montana. Looks like we have some brand new cells popping up about 70 miles just to our south and moving this way.

4:19 PM MDT: How many times have I cursed myself for not being able to wait in one spot? Well, we are now headed back towards Miles City. The arc of storms to our south matured nicely over the last hour, but it looks like the dominant sell is moving NNW directly towards town. We have about half an hour of driving to do, but we should beat it there.

5:04 PM MDT: This is the life - sitting about 8 miles south of Miles City capturing timelapse and flying the quadcopter. The dominant cell is headed directly at us with a beautiful blue hue. Base is still way too high for tornadoes, but that could change as it moves into a little richer moisture.

5:36 PM MDT: Very dramatic high-based shelf cloud directly over Miles City. Underneath we can see lots of dust being kicked up by the outflow. Not good for tornado potential, but this is still quite a spectacle. Road options look tricky to keep up with this storm movement, but we might have a few options as we head NW of town.

5:56 PM MDT: These are the moments we chase for - sitting on a lonely dirt path named Deadman's Road with no one else in sight. Our original storm is a few miles to our east - looks to be fully gusting out. A new cell is building to our SW and drawing in a band of inflow from the dying storm. A magical moment in the middle of nowhere.

6:34 PM MDT: The new cell we've been watching has put on a very nice show. Some low-level rotation is evident just to our west as the cell rumbles north. Positive bolts have been raining down all around us for the last 5 minutes. I still see the afterglow of one particularly bright strike when I blink.

7:10 PM MDT: Deadman's Road was also a dead end road, and now we have some catch-up to do if we want to continue today's chase. Given all the driving we did just to get here, we are definitely going to pursue storms NW along Hwy 59.

7:58 PM MDT: I was suspicious there wasn't much left for us in this chase day, and now I'm convinced. We made it almost all the way to Jordan, MT and some new cells, but now we are sitting in howling outflow blowing back SE.

8:25 PM MDT: We're retracing our steps back to Miles City for the night. I'm capturing a final timelapse for the day - some striking outflow wedging southeast in the darkening twilight.

10:05 PM MDT: Made it back to the Miles City Sleep Inn for the night after grabbing some Wendy's for dinner. There's something oddly comforting and familiar that no matter how far from home we are, there's always a recognizable fast food menu nearby. Maybe that's more sad than comforting.

Recap, Filmmaking Notes, and Lessons Learned

• Turns out, the only weather story of the day was a weak tornado that tore right through the small town of Baker, MT. We were out that direction before heading back in to Miles City to catch what looked like the dominant storm. The Baxter cell basically blew up and died right on top of the town - no real way to forecast that.
• The Nexrad radar spacing leaves a lot to be desired in SE Montana. Miles City is exactly 130 miles from both the Billings and Glasgow radars, so even the lowest scans were slicing well up in the mid-levels of the storm. Don't plan on parsing out low-level storm structure clues on radar in eastern Montana.
• I'm really not that happy with the footage we're getting from the GoPro 4 Silver attached to the Phantom 1. Lights winds are always putting yaw wiggle on the Phantom, and that's precisely the axis not stabilized by the gimbal. Add to that, the GoPro Silver footage seems grainier than it should be and looks even worse after stabilization in After Effects. I really think there's room to improve this setup.