The storm season started off with a vengeance one year ago today when a QLCS storm system moved across the state spawning 6 tornadoes across the Central Iowa area. Including 2 in my home county of Marion County. I still remember this night as it was yesterday. I traveled west to Indianola, Iowa to capture some lightning, which of course ended up dying out as everything was coming together and I got set up. As I traveled back home (attempting to stay ahead of the line), my phone suddenly went berserk as a Tornado warning was issued for Marion County. I quickly pulled up the radar to find a well defined notch in the line coming directly towards my location. Below are screen shots from my phone..
After viewing the radar and having a good “GULP”, I “expedited” my travel down Hwy 92, eventually pulling off about 4 miles west of Knoxville with intentions of monitoring for any development. Thought I don’t have any of my own video / photos to show what I saw, another resident, Chad Hines, captured the small tornado west of Knoxville. Below is that video used with permission. I use this video in my weather safety talks.
Luckily I did mange to stay E/SE of the actual tornado, however I did encounter some extremely strong RFD type winds, that caused several light poles to be blown down just to my East. Luckily, I came out of the event unscathed. There were several homes damaged in the area by this EF 1 rated tornado.
This same storm system also caused EF2 damage to the town of Seymour, Iowa. Luckily, no deaths were reported across the state from this storm system. I cannot stress enough the importance of owning a weather radio and paying attention to the weather. Also – for newbies to the storm chasing arena — This is why one does not chase at night! Not all hazards are visible!
For more information on that night of twisters, here’s the NWS Des Moines’ page: https://www.weather.gov/dmx/6March2017_update
Here’s a few pics I captured a few days later of various tornado damage from Marion County and the town of Seymour.
