May 2008 Archives
For several years now, Rich Thompson has been mired in a prolonged situation where he sometimes sees tornadoes, but only at a distance, at night, wrapped in rain, in low contrast, while driving and unable to safely pull over, or other settings absolutely not conducive to quality still photography. In some ways, I can relate, because I've had stretches of a few years at a time like that.
In addition, however, Rich has had untimely medical problems that forced him to either miss some great chase days, or in one case, he couldn't hold up a camera well enough to this tornado because of a surgically repaired arm mired in a cumbersome, unwieldy sling. Pneumonia, flu, surgery, suddenly hospitalized relatives, bad patterns, inescapable prior commitments...you name it, aside from the lack of photogenic tubes when able to head out, other calamities of many sorts have dominated his chase vacations. Rich has described the phenomenon to many friends and colleagues this way: "(For photographing tornadoes) this whole decade has been an absolute suckfest."
I am happy to report the suckfest is ending. Rich, chasing with Ryan Jewell, saw a few decent contrast, daytime tornadoes out on NW KS yesterday, and from what I've heard, got a few shots of them. They'll have more opportunities for perhaps even better success today, as stronger storm-relative upper level winds give them a shot at more updraft-precipitation separation.
Outstanding! This is great news, not just for Rich and Ryan, but for the rest of us who have watched this sad state of affairs unfold since 2000. I say this not just because Rich and Ryan are among the photographers for Insojourn, and the possibility of more great images beckons. Instead, as a fellow 23+ year storm observer who has experienced long droughts, it stinks to go extended periods without the atmosphere providing photogenic hoses on available chase days. Rich is as skilled and knowledgeable of a storm observer as there is. But misfortune with timing -- luck still being the biggest factor in chase success -- has had him snake-bitten for the most part. The only cure is a feast on the smorgasbord of atmospheric violence. And so it is.
I'm glad they called with their reports, too. Rich and Ryan didn't have contact info and aren't on Spotter Network yet, so it was good to be able to relay their reports to the right offices quickly and without disrupting official duties whatsoever at my unnamed workplace. It was also neat to be able to see their observations on Ryan's dashboard camera, which will be active again today whenever they have digital cellular telephone connectivity.
I'm watching this whole several-day event unfold in front of computer screens, being on a set of evening shifts throughout. I won't complain, though. It goes that way sometimes, and I actually don't mind as much as it may seem. There certainly are worse things to keep you from observing an event than forecasting for it. Doing outlooks for these events is challenging in a good way, because every forecaster wants to tackle the "big stuff." Work has to take priority anyway..it pays the bills! I'm also saving hundreds of bucks in fuel and lodging that I'll surely spend later when Elke and I go on our June vacation.
So my hope for Ryan and Rich today is a hosefest of epic proportions, to further flush the suckfest down the toilet of history. Go git' em dudes!
I've got an amazing family and I thank God all the time for them. Another birthday comes and goes, with thoughtful gestures and presents from my beautiful bride Elke and both kids. I would be happy just with their wishes and thoughts, because that's what matters. But they got me some great gifts that were inexpensive -- just the way I like it. How did David and Donna know I would like little buckets of microwave pork rinds and a framed Roger Staubach card from 7-11? That's fantastic. They couldn't have spent ten times as much and made me any happier, because it truly is the thought that counts. The best part is that I'm living with three people who are generous of heart and time -- far more important than money or material goods.
Really, there's only so many things you can buy for a dad who doesn't care much for "stuff" and who is about as anti-materialistic as it gets in modern America. What do most folks get for dads... High-end electronics? Don't need them. Ties? Don't own or want any, unless one is strong enough to double as a tow rope. Tools? Got all I need, most for free or at great discount. Fishing gear? I've got what I need for a good while. Storm chase gizmos? Nahh...that stuff usually ends up being frustrating and failure-prone out of proportion to usefulness, with just a very few exceptions. I've heard I'm pretty damned hard to buy for, so most of my friends simply don't. And you know what? I'm absolutely cool with that. Good wishes and good times are OK with me. I don't think anybody ever will go wrong with giving me Dallas Cowboys stuff, though. ;-)
Speaking of the Cowboys, I got another birthday gift yesterday, this one from the sports pages. Marion Barber and Terence Newman each inked long term deals that ensures two more members of the Boys' young offensive and defensive nuclei remain in place. It wasn't cheap, but who expected it to be with either of these guys?
The risk with Barber in particular is that his confrontational and relentless running style -- which I admire, actually -- will wear him down prematurely. Given that, the length of the deal is just about right, perhaps a year long since The Barbarian will turn 31 before contract expiration. [This signing actually makes me all the more glad for drafting both Felix Jones and Tashard Choice.] Terence Newman already is one of the top corners in the NFL, so his deal was on par with market value. That may be overinflated for all players, but Jerry has to deal the deck he's given.
I like the idea of reshuffling the balance sheets on Tony Romo's contract to accommodate this, such that he actually gets more up-front money in the form of a signing bonus and counts far less against the upcoming seasons' cap. I've had problems with the way Jerry has handled the salary cap in the past, especially when he overpaid the back end of veteran contracts in the 90s (a boneheaded strategy that ended up imploding the Greatest Team Ever). By contrast, this and several other deals the past 2-3 years provide considerable confidence that he not only has figured it out, but mastered the shell game. Jerry has led Cowboys fans to the height of elation (3 Super Bowl crowns in 4 years) and frustration (the idiotic ways he fired both Tom Landry and Jimmy Johnson, and his egomaniacal mismanagement of the team in the mid-late 90s). Let's hope these maneuvers keep things on the upswing this time.
Now the attention turns to some of the other core players, like Chris Canty, Ken Hamlin, Terrell Owens and especially DeMarcus Ware. I don't care if Jerry has to wear pink leotards and bend over backward into a barrel of Hawaiian Punch while donning snorkeling gear and waving a copy of the VHS tape of Who Framed Roger Rabbit. DeMarcus Ware must be signed, priority one! He is an absolute terror for opposing offenses, one of the top two or three defensive players in the league at any position, and indispensable to the teams' hope of winning another Super Bowl. Pay him top dollar. Others will restructure to accommodate Ware because everyone and their mom knows he's the best player on that or just about any defense.
Owens? Well, I went on record before he came as being against his presence, but I will admit that (so far!) T.O. has proved me wrong. I hope he continues to, because the Cowboys' lack of depth at wideout has made them far too dependent on him. So get him signed. The guy is a workout warrior and will keep his body in amazing shape for even an NFL player, and wants to bask in the brilliant glory of JerryWorld when that facility opens, but at some point he will lose a step. At least he finally seems to have a quarterback he respects and likes, professionally as well as personally. He's saying all the right things so far also, unlike in his contract years in his previous stations. I say, a 3 year deal with incentives out to 5 is good for his situation.
Canty? Underrated and improving, a surefire Pro Bowler in the future. He can rush from the end or collapse the pocket, blocks passes, and is getting better versus the run every year. He's far better than Marcus Spears, but gives out vibes of wanting to test the market. Ken Hamlin? Another top-5 position player (safety) in the NFL, now that he's healthy again. He is another must-sign. Fortunately he seems to want to stay in Dallas.
Pac-Man? Don't get me started. I trust this guy way less even than T.O., for reasons that are well publicized. He's been an irresponsible, reckless punk and thug, a seeping lesion on the face of society, and I do not expect this leopard to shed his spots. But we've got him, like it or not. Get what we can out of his amazing on-field talents before he starts hitting any of the thousands of strip joints in the Metroplex and gets hauled off to the can again. But don't get dependent on him, because that's exactly when he'll get busted for the last time as an NFL player. At least he comes cheap, with lots to prove, and one last chance.
Geez, I went on another Cowboys tangent. It's why I don't BLOG about them that much. There's way too much to cover about your five-time Super Bowl champions and too little time for it all.
Weatherwise, there won't be any tornadoes for my birthday. It falls on a bizarre and inexplicable climatological minimum in nationwide tornadoes for the month of May (As Doswell 2007 illustrated in his Fig. 3, green line). I'll be on evening and nights shifts through early June, but maybe I can treat Elke to another birthday tornado for her, this year on the day our chase vacation begins. It's the least I could do, atmosphere willing. That amazing woman puts up with me all the time, which surely qualifies her for sainthood.
On 10 May 2008, a long-track, violent (EF-4) tornado crossed parts of Oklahoma and Missouri, and laid further waste to much of the old mining town of Picher, barely south of the Kansas-Oklahoma line. NWS Tulsa has a nice, concise, online briefing about the tornado, which killed six people and injured at least 150 others in Picher before causing even more casualties in Missouri.
The tornado only has hastened the inevitable demise of Picher (AP story). Once sporting a population of 20,000, only around 800 folks remain. Picher lies inside the notorious Tar Creek Superfund site (more information here and here). Federal and state officials are doing the right thing by not funding any rebuilding, and instead directing relief toward relocation of the folks who remain.
While I still wish they had taken this approach on a larger scale with New Orleans, post-Katrina, it seems the lesson has been learned to some extent. Common sense and rational thought prevail over sentimentality, as it should. Government buyouts of homes already were underway, and should accelerate. Evacuating and demolishing the town now is the simplest and most prudent solution.
Now I only will grieve for those whose lives were lost, because I grieved for the long-dying town itself long ago, on my first and only daylight visit. Steve Corfidi and I were on a storm chase trip from Kansas City, back in March 1996, on the way to the Nowata area. As we zigzagged through town, we sat aghast at the deplorable state of Picher. Though it was just a few minutes from 12 years ago, those mental images linger vividly today.
Ramshackle frame houses abounded, some abandoned, others occupied. A few of the occupied homes were in worse conditions than those long vacant, with busted windows, peeling paint, rotting wood, torn screen doors, animals running hither and yon, some porch overhangs leaning downward on the verge of collapse. One entire house had a roof displaced noticeably sideways from the foundation, its walls leaning in the direction of the displacement, clothes on a clothesline in the yard, the glow of a TV shining from within. The only thriving businesses we saw were a bar and a convenience store. We since have talked often of the extreme disrepair and poverty we witnessed, and the status of Picher as part of the Superfund site.
Perhaps the saddest sight was the dirty, shirtless children playing in the yellowish mud that had drained directly off a big heap of mine tailings looming behind one house. This rock detritus (locally known as "chat") comprises mini-mountains in the countryside around Picher, as well as in portions of the town itself. The "chat piles" contain residue of the materials for which they were extracted: lead and zinc, as well as cadmium. The lead, in particular, has been the focus of concern because of its drainage from the tailings piles and into soil, as well as airborne dust contamination, and elevated lead levels in children and adults there.
Whomever that whomever wishes to blame for the situation, the fact is that the area is highly toxic. It needs to be evacuated and remediated, not lived within. Those poor townsfolk have been residing in a festering wasteland (literally!) for decades, and now a substantial chunk of the town is blown to smithereens by a big fat tornado. Some folks didn't want to leave, but I hope this changes their minds. I applaud the notion of just helping the citizens of Picher to get the hell out and never return. Leave whatever's left of the town to the bulldozer and environmental mitigation process. The abandonment of Picher should have happened long ago, and it's terrible that it appears to take a killer tornado to finish off the town, effectively.
This is not an occasion to celebrate, mind you. People perished! But perhaps some good can come from a bad event -- a blessing in disguise, of sorts. If all goes as hoped, a tornado never again will kill Picher residents, and kids never again will play in lead-contaminated mine waste there.
It's never too early in the season for another entry in my longstanding website devoted to the futility and weirdness of the Texas Rangers baseball club. The newest item:
The 2008 season already was turning into a thudding clunker by the end of April, with the Rangers firmly cemented at the bottom of the standings. Seeming somewhat indignant at this development with which we fans are quite accustomed, some national sports writers made the following observations in their respective rags in the same week:
