A fast-moving little supercell left a 100+ mile trail of hail across southern South Dakota into northern Nebraska, including this wintry-looking accumulation of mostly 1/2 to 1-1/2-inch stones (measured with photo report tweeted to the Rapid City NWS). Hail washed from the hills and accumulated in fence lines and roadsides, as flash flooding drained toward the Little White River, just to my south. After shooting this image from public right-of-way, at one farm where nobody was home, I moved east to another for a better vantage on those secondary storms visible at rear. Once those went by, the neighbor farmer there checked to make sure I wasn’t a cattle rustler, then had a great, friendly conversation once he realized I was “just” chasing and photographing storms. He told me that the hail had ruined his alfalfa and corn, with only the alfalfa insured. Yet like many, he had a levelheaded, pragmatic, “dust-it-off and keep going” attitude that surely was related to his professed faith. One of the best parts of traveling the Great Plains is meeting good, wholesome, common folk like him, even under peculiar and likely stressful circumstances for them.
5 NNE Tuthill SD (9 Jul 19) Looking NW
43.2153, -101.4494Wintry Summertime
A fast-moving little supercell left a 100+ mile trail of hail across southern South Dakota into northern Nebraska, including this wintry-looking accumulation of mostly 1/2 to 1-1/2-inch stones (measured with photo report tweeted to the Rapid City NWS). Hail washed from the hills and accumulated in fence lines and roadsides, as flash flooding drained toward the Little White River, just to my south. After shooting this image from public right-of-way, at one farm where nobody was home, I moved east to another for a better vantage on those secondary storms visible at rear. Once those went by, the neighbor farmer there checked to make sure I wasn’t a cattle rustler, then had a great, friendly conversation once he realized I was “just” chasing and photographing storms. He told me that the hail had ruined his alfalfa and corn, with only the alfalfa insured. Yet like many, he had a levelheaded, pragmatic, “dust-it-off and keep going” attitude that surely was related to his professed faith. One of the best parts of traveling the Great Plains is meeting good, wholesome, common folk like him, even under peculiar and likely stressful circumstances for them.
5 NNE Tuthill SD (9 Jul 19) Looking NW
43.2153, -101.4494