6/23/23 | Chugwater, WY

Life has a funny way of humbling you throughout the process of pursuing your dreams. Chasing storms has always come naturally to me, but the last 24 months have presented an onslaught of challenges. Life happens – weddings, birthdays, family events – but a collection of poor timing and bad luck has kept me away from more than a handful of beautiful tornadoes since 2023.

That’s why I was so adamant about chasing this event on June 23rd, 2023. Once again my time was short. I had to be on a flight out of Denver International Airport on the morning of June 24th, and I flew in for the event just the night before. These types of high-pressure scenarios can often lend themselves to poor decisions, so I had to make sure that I was focused.

It was clear to me that this had the potential to be a high-end setup from a few days prior. A well timed trough, a perfectly positioned dryline and a beautiful mid and upper level jet streak impinging upon an unstable atmosphere during the late afternoon. The uncertainty? There were multiple targets.

The event initially seemed to strongly favor Wyoming as the focal point for tornadoes, but as time went on it became clear that Colorado would also have the potential to produce something memorable. I sat on a friends couch the night before and debated where to go. He was adamant that Colorado was the right play, albeit more risky. For me, the decision became clear over time: I had to go to Wyoming for a higher probability chance of a tornado given how poorly the season had gone for me before.

The morning of the event, I gleefully drove northward up I-25 from Denver to Chugwater. By late morning and early afternoon (after coffee, of course) the sky looked beautiful. The airmass was humid and warm, cumulus clouds were building and sun was shining. I met up with a few more great friends in Chugwater, WY. There was a brief bump in the road during an interaction with a racist nutjob gas station owner (The Chug-Chug, for those wondering), but otherwise the morning had “the feel” to it.

By early afternoon, I repositioned east of Chugwater in beautiful wheat fields. Storms quickly formed off the mountains and rolled into the terrain closer to us. Almost immediately, we had a supercell and the low level shear led to the development of a mesoscylone. Within 30 minutes, a beautiful tornado was on the ground. It was perfectly lit, it was photogenic, and it was harmless.

I was able to track the storm for over an hour as it moved eastward. The tornado cycled four or five times through different phases, eventually becoming rain wrapped at times as it moved towards the Nebraska Panhandle. I finally lost the storm as it moved closer to Scottsbluff, although it did actually produce another tornado that I missed.

I pulled over on the side of the road for a moment after. The adrenaline was wearing off, but the happiness wasn’t. I finally had a good chase under my belt after over a year of poor luck and bad timing. I was treated to an incredible display of mammatus clouds at sunset, sitting in silence on the side of the road and taking it all in. That’s the magic of storm chasing, really – the quiet moments all alone in a beautiful landscape watching the atmosphere do its thing.

I won’t forget this one any time soon. What a day.