On May 3rd, 2003 a prior commitment caused me to pass up an opportunity to chase with some friends who were headed to Kansas for a potentially active weekend. May 3rd turned out to be a bust for them but they were VERY excited about the setup for May 4th. After a little prodding, they convinced me to head to Kansas to join them.
I left Eagan at 5am on the 3rd and proceeded toward Kansas City. The plan was to meet up with the gang and maybe have a person or two pile into the Durango to relieve them of the fully loaded minivan as well as give me a break from driving. Poor cell networks turned our rendezvous into 3 hour dance across Kansas where we seemed to keep missing each other as their navigator changed the route (without informing me). We never did meet up (until later that night at the Des Moines, IA Perkins) but I did see their van about 4 car lengths ahead of me on the Kansas Turnpike while the beast pictured below was churning off to our right! This storm caused major damage in the Kansas City area. It was a bit surreal to see bits of insulation raining down from the sky. Many lives changed forever on that day due to Mother Nature's fury.
About this time, the minivan got off the freeway and I lost them again, but we both had about the same vantage point. Since I was in the car alone, I could not drive, navigate and shoot at the same time, so Shawn Hewitt was nice enough to share a vidcap with me (pictured below). His chase account (with photos) is located here. Andy Revering, who was also chasing with Shawn, has an excellent account of this chase (including video) located here. I arrived home at 3am Monday morning - 22 hours and 1252 miles later. This trip was well worth it, but I'll never chase that distance solo again.