Tony Laubach's Storm Chase Blog

Some weather to actually talk about today! Was awakened from a dead sleep this morning by insane winds which kicked up and blew in near white-out conditions for about 10 minutes shortly after 9am. Big heavy flakes flew sideways through the air as winds gusted as high as 80mph. They continued through the day, subsiding to blustery before going apeshit again after 4pm where winds again hit the 80 and 90mph range. NWS Boulder's severe page didn't list any gusts since this morning (my 75mph report and 64mph at DIA), so I have no idea what else went on, but I did report smoe wind damage as I was driving pies around this evening and came across a lightpole and street sign that did a header into the street near our work. Winds have again subsided and will likely remain on the low side as the system responsible moves east and will create even more insane fire conditions over Oklahoma and Texas this weekend. God be with those people, things are looking very bad down there.




My car was towed to the insurance claim center today, so I figure I'll know something more within a week. I'll let you all know once I learn something.
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Tuesday, December 27, 2005

 

I found out that my car had not been towed from the wrecking yard yet, so I had to go to Aurora to get my belongings from my car. I imagine the holidays have delayed things, so no word on the insurance, however, I was able to inspect the vehicle myself. What looked to be a simple shearing of the front end of the car was obviously not the case; we were definately hit more head on as evident by the folding of the under-bumper into the engine area. The air filter and radiator were crushed into the engine block. See the pictures below. Definately looked worse than originally thought and it pretty well convinced me that it will be totalled out.
























Preliminary damages beyond the car stretch to a couple radios, GPS puck, MP3 player, and items in the trunk damaged when transmission fluid broke open and spilled. The jotto desk also suffered some damage in the trunk due to the crushing of it beneath our bowling balls.

Looking at the car for the first time since the crash, I was amazed with what I saw from the car considering what I thought it initially was. Obviously looking at it more closely, it definately appears totalled and much worse than I originally thought. Makes me much mroe thankful that it wasn't any worse.
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Monday, December 26, 2005

 

Hope everyone had a wonderful holiday this year and party safely into the new year. Lord knows how eager I am to put this year behind me.

Nothing new to report with the holidays keeping most places of interest for me closed today, but hopefully tomorrow, I'll have some new info on the accident situation, including some inventory and reclaiming of my belongings from my car. Still crunching some numbers with the big unknown being the insurance, but I am starting to think that my new and more permanent ride won't be debuted til the 2007 season.

I also wanted to publically thank everyone for their support through this, particularly those in the chasing community. While my incident hasn't been near as bad as other things which have happened to chasers this year, the support from those I share this passion with has been nothing short of great. I've always said how important the people I chase with are to me, and its times like this where that point is strongly supported. The offers of rides, help, and anything else have been really overwhelming and while some would say its cause its the holidays, I think its nothing more than the bond that us as a community share, or at least those who know me best. While I've never doubted this, I again realize that those I chase with are more than just partners and seasonal aquaintances; they are friends. Thanks guys! You mean more to me than anything my car can take me to in Nature.

I'm formulating plans to not only save my 2006 season, but on what to do about the vehicle. While I do have a plan in the works, I won't unmask it just yet seeing as I need to finalize the insurance issues before I can set other plans in motion. Some things that are pretty well set in stone; I won't be chasing with any new equipment. Aside from replacements that may have been lost due to the accident (radios, GPS, etc), there will be no major purchases to prepare for this season. Mapping out my finances and how my extra financial aid and tax returns will play out over the next couple months, I'm working hard to devise a plan to insure some chase time (maybe not the entire month) and get myself into a vehicle. I will hint this by saying that my next car purchase will mainly go towards to chasing aspect. If I am able to make it out this season with help from fellow local chasers and save myself from having to get into a vehicle right away, I'm going to likely stash away as much as I can and go out and buy something that I will use beyond the scope of a car loan.

Between now and May, my only needs for a car lie on a couple days of pizza driving a week. Beyond that, Denver's RTD system gets me to and from school, thus leaving me with little reason to get around other than the conveinience of having a car. With the mass depature of friends who moved out of Denver this year, my social life has greatly diminshed, which in the area of school I am in, hasn't been a bad thing. Again, another point for not needing a car right now. And if... IF I am able to chase for at least two of the four originally planned weeks riding shotgun along with a friend, I may be able to use out the life on the loaner car graciously given to me by my girlfriend's Dad for the second time in a month, its possible I could go the entire 2006 year without having to jump into a new vehicle. With tax returns, financial aid, pending insurance claims, and just saving up, I could almost pay cash for any used car I want, OR put enough down to get into ANY car I choose with monthly payments lower than $200/month. Assuming things unravel that way, I could wait as long as April 2007 before buying, which allows me for upwards of two years of tax returns, up to three semesters of financial aid, and over fifteen months of saving my nickles and dimes. While any chasing I do will likely put a small dent into that savings, with help from some video sales, I shouldn't have much of a problem. Two years in a row, I've managed to break even in terms of expenses thanks to video sales. If that streak holds through this year, I'll never miss the expenses used toward chasing this season.

In preparation for the car financing, and holding on to the possibility that I may be in a new car before the end of the year, I went ahead and paid off my credit card in full. This will hopefully aid in improving my credit rating as well as give me the option to extend my credit limit. With the combination of that and paying off my car back in August nearly a year early, I should be able to get myself into the vehicle of my choice with $5000 down (anticipated amount by May). If I am able to carry out the above stateded plan, I should easily be able to double that amount and possibly more, and with luck, hopefully avoid having a monthly payment all-together. Lots of vehicle searching to come, but if I can hold off, don't expect to see the WX NERD plates again til the 2007 season, even as the WX Nerd himself may be out. As a friend as said to me, his money is on me getting out there. And those that have been around me most of my life will also say that; expect to see me under the meso come Spring time... come hell or high water, I'll find a way. Chasing is my life, and since my life didn't end with the crash, you can be sure as hell that I'll continue to live my life. I'll be out in 2006. How or where remains to be seen.

Stay tuned...

Hmmm... interesting setup for Lubacca 2006, eh? Hehehehe!




And to show that my sense of humor is indeed still alive and kicking... I wanted to post this image made by one of those great friends I mentioned above, Verne Carlson, whose updated blog page has been changed and is reflected in the side blog links.



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Thursday, December 22, 2005

 

Thought this would be worth a mention considering the irony, but the court date which was set for me is on the Tuesday immediately following the storm chaser convention (Feb 21). The sheriff in charge has been great with all of us I am glad I was left with one of the few that have gone well beyond to help make this easier. When this is said and done, I'm going to try and make sure the officer in charge is cited with something as he has been very good with all involved with this.

A side note I thought was funny that I'm going to share... as we were in the line of cars at the intersection waiting for our fateful cycle of the light, I saw the officer pull someone over and cracked something about it. Obviously, I figured him to be the same one to first respond to our accident. So in the midst of our 20 minute converastion, I had to ask if the person he pulled over got out of the ticket. He said yes and told me the story of how she pulled in front of him and saw he plates had expired in August. He had just finished his intro to her when he heard our crash. As he was heading back to his car, the woman stuck her head out the window and said, "Officer, what about my ticket?" I laughed; he said how in his first few years as a cop, that's one of his most memorable lines.

So yeah, he's been cool and its definately made things in the passed few days a bit easier. He seems to think I don't have much to worry about in the ticket issue because of my driving record up to this point and how things have been since the accident. I'm hoping he's right.

So there's the latest.. guess that leaves the insurance tasks at hand the next issue. I gave the release of my car to the insurance company; hopefully I'll hear something by Monday in regards to the car. I'll also go to the center to take inventory of my car to see what equipment was damaged in the accident so I can begin the work on that claim!

Sheesh!
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Wednesday, December 21, 2005

 

The day after the accident started a bit easier than one would think after such an impact. I talked with the Arapahoe County Sheriff in charge and he stated the driver of the other car was fine; like us, though, bruised and beaten. I find my biggest injuries are in my hands and arms, a combination of both the steering wheel and whatever I hit on impact. My left arm is the worst of the two; tightness and soreness from the pinky down passed the wrist. I have a few scratches at the bottom of my pinky and ring finger and imagine that was from hitting something. My right hand is in a bit better shape, only one scrape below the pinky on the hand. Both hands I cannot use to grab much of anything either out of tightness or the injuries themselves. I am having to use both hands for simple stuff like pouring milk, drinking from a cup, etc. Nothing seems broken, so I guess that's good news.

My right knee took a shot, and I think it was from the HAM radio. My pants I was wearing at the time were sliced open at the knee in the same place where the cut was. My first thought was something flying into it, but when I sat and thought about it, the mounting of my HAM radio on the driver's side of the center console was probably the reason behind the inury on my knee.

Several other burns and bumps from the seatbelt and airbag dot my body from my waste up to my chest. I also had a small knick on my head. Nothing serious or anything requiring more than at-home treatment. Obviously I'll be rather useless for a few days. So much for tearing into my Christmas gifts!

My girlfriend had more bruising than scrapes. She has a huge bruise on her lower abdomen (sp) which takes the cake to anything else. A few seatbelt and air bag burns on her chest as well. Again, nothing too serious, thank God.

As for the car, I was able to find out who towed it and where she was brought. After I meet with the officer this afternoon, I'll probably get in touch with the towing company so I can go and make inventory of what I had in the car (radios, etc) and what was damaged. The car itself in all likelyhood it going to be totaled out. I cannot imagine there will be much I can do to save her. I am going to try and fight to get the money I used to get her the new engine replaced, which may help in my quest to purchase something new. I've contacted my insurance company and have set the wheels in motion for the claim process; I should hear back from an adjuster within the next 48 hours. The sooner I can wrap this up, the happier I will be.

The next and more serious issue is the legal aspect. It looks as if I will be held at fault due to the fact I was making a left turn through the intersection. I have full coverage on the vehicle, so that should be taken care of. While I'm not sure what I am going to be cited with, I know I'll have court date pending and hopefully it'll be soon and the end of things. Financially, this may severely limit if not completely eliminate my chasing plans for the 2006 season. Albeit, it'll be a couple months before I have sorted through all this before I can make any determination as to the affect on my 2006 chasing. In any case, be watching for something new on the road in the future.

I'll continue to post updates on the situation as I learn of them, including how this will all affect things to come. On a personal level, this year has bene nothing but one giant disaster after another and I can hardly wait to put it all behind me. Unfortunately, I'll have some carry-over to bring with me before I can completely sweep 2005 under the rug.
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Tuesday, December 20, 2005

 

I posted this in Stormtrack and am copying it here simply because my hand is so stiff and sore, I am literally typing straight down...



My girlfriend and I were involved in an accident this evening which fortunately only resulted in severe damage to the vehicles involved. The driver of the other car was taken to the hospital, but she will be fine. My girlfriend and I suffered a lot of bruising and scatches and I imagine the next 48 hours will be absolutely thrilling, but we should be fine.

The Storm Tracer in all likelyhood, is gone. Pending the results of investigations, and assuming I will be able to financially recover enough to chase (full coverage, thank GOD), will hopefully be chasing in something new.

Again, we're okay and everyone involved survived and will be fine. The fun stuff, I'm sure, is yet to come.



-Tony
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Sunday, December 18, 2005

 

The rest of my Fantasy teams ended their seasons today in the first round of the playoffs. Even with my best combination of scoring players, I wouldn't have beat the scores put up but my opponents. Perhaps it would've made it more interesting, but it wasn't to be. However, something more interesting... ah, well... maybe not... yeah, nevermind. That game was over as quickly as my fantasy games, so I guess it was uninteresting...

Oh come on, like I'm really that calm... we KILLED the Cowboys today who seemed to pick up where they left off 55 minutes into the fateful Monday night game in September. By the end of the first half, the Skins had a commanding 28 to 0 lead and never let up. The game ended 35 to 7, the Skins sitting atop of the Boys in the NFC east facing the first place NY Giants next week, and are deep in the thick of the wildcard race as they're currently the 7th seed pending tonight's game between the Falcons and Bears. If Chicago puts up a W, the Skins make the 6th seed and simply need to win out to get in. Yes, not so simple, but it makes it a bit easier as we control our own destiny. But, to maintain this blog's relation to my storm chasing, I have to throw this in to all my storm chasing Cowboy-fan pals (you know who you are), HAIL TO THE SKINS! You may've owned us for the passed several years... not this one! Not anymore! HAIL!


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Thursday, December 15, 2005

 

I received word that I did indeed pass my Calc 3 class; which leaves me with 2 left to go in my Meteorology degree. Wow... hard to believe that after Intro to Stats, College Algebra, Trig, Pre-Calc, Calc 1, Calc 2, and Calc 3, I only have 2 more classes to go in Probability/Stats and Differential Equations. Yum!

Did some minor changes to the site this morning. Most notably were the addition of the Mayathon 2006 graphic and the cleaning up of my index page which included shifting the current odometer to zero to reflect the upcoming 2006 season. I also did some touchup work on the media page, but since I forgot to bring the DVD-disk with all my images, I didn't get too far in the work.

I also worked out the details in getting my most recent blog entry to show on my chase index page. To see what I am talking about, you can check it out here. You'll see that this blog entry appears below the summery section, which will reduce the amount of time I need to update my site on the fly. I may do some touchups to it, but this will work for now. I have a few months before that page will return to use. Some more changes may be in store as I explore some programs that make auto-updates, so more to come on that later.
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Wednesday, December 14, 2005

 

Some rather unexpected and ferocious winds kicked in last night about 8:30 and lasted several hours, nearly going til midnight and beyond (I fell asleep, so I have no clue). Winds gusted over 60mph at times and did a damn good job shaking us up here in our third floor apartment. Crazy stuff! Winds gusted up again today, but not near as bad as last night's, but things have since calmed down leaving a clear, cold night in their wake.

I'm burning a few more copies of "The Rookie Years" for relatives in Texas as Christmas gifts. One of the perks to doing a highlight video is it really makes gift giving easy (and cheap) over the holidays, especially if your relatives are as into it as I am. I'll be in bed as the final one burns, just doing a few copies tonight; more tomorrow. I am finding problems in burning as my Sony external DVD burner likes to kick out my DVDs claiming their not writable. In any case, I am about to say fuck it and move on to bed as I'd rather not keep inserting blank DVDs til one finally goes.

With the semester officially over and done, I can enjoy a month of free time time away from the load of classwork. I have pretty well figured I'm passing all my classes, just waiting on the official word from Calc 3; everything else was no problem. I'm hoping to have the passing confirmed by tomorrow with grades by late next week. I'll enjoy a couple weeks in January before the Spring semester begins.

Not many projects to occupy the winter break. I have a list of things I want to do with the website, but nothing significant. I am going to work on my media section page, probably focusing more on the digital photos than the video at this time. With my affiliations elsewhere, I figure I can go pretty light on video work and allow my photos to be the main aspect. While I haven't decided the layout for this yet, its something I'll play with over the coming weeks.

Other side projects include the updating of my chasing index page which goes up while I am chasing. I want to add a feature that takes my latest blog entry and puts it up on the page so I don't have to copy and paste an entry twice over. I've played with a couple scripts that do the basic idea, but don't look all that great in the page. I have a concept in my head I'm aiming for, so I'm sure with some code manipulation, I'll get the look I want.

Other things include touchups here and there, including the addition of my Mayathon 2006 graphic while will be included on the side nav bar on all my pages. Again, nothing special, just something with dates so I can remind myself that I'll be doing that! I keep forgetting the exact date of the kickoff, so now at least I'll have the dates tatooed someplace where I'll see them from time-to-time.

I created a blog list in Stormtrack to keep track of all the bloggers. As you can see, I added Karen Rhoden and her new blog to the list and will be following hers throughout the upcoming months via my RSS feeders. Amos wrote a good one recently which starts off witha picture of Bill Parcels screaming! My thoughts were he was bitching cause he knew his Cowboys were about to get another whoopin' this weekend, but it was chase-related. A worth-while entry, so pop on over. However, to go back to my original thought, I'll be buying my chase buddy, Amos a broom for Christmas after the Skins sweep them for the season and take over the #2 spot in the NFC East. Ya know, without football, I would be a mess during the chasing off-season! Now if I could just find something to keep tabs of between February and April.. oh yeah, conferences!

Well, I've given up on the DVD tonight. The noise of the DVD player kicking out my DVDs is going to haunt my dreams now, I'm afraid. Maybe tomorrow or Friday I'll get them done. In all reality, I need to make only 5 copies to get shipped before Xmas; the rest our handouts for the Holidays. Probably while I'm watching football and following my two fantasy teams in the playoffs, I'll burn out another dozen or so copies. We'll see!

Ciao!
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Saturday, December 10, 2005

 

I shipped out the first copies of Lubacca The Rookie Years today; 7 in all, including the five to the Nebraska folks who also bought several of my photos. I'm eager to hear what everyone thinks of the The Rookie Years as I am very excited about it! My first big major production, case inserts and all! I'm very thrilled about it! Beyond that, same ol' same ol'. Enjoying the hangover from last night's 247 game and preparing for a day of finishing projects and football tomorrow! Ciao!
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Some things are just worth posting.. but if I really wanted to stretch this entry to make it more chase/weather-related, I could do it in two ways. First of all, I was able to get a good use out of my new camera phone. And second, fellow storm chaser Mike Umscheid wrote an entry in regards to his latest 300 game in bowling, so with that, I'll post my brag!

This evening, I scored my higest game ever, beating my old record of 245 set back in October of 2000 in Moore, Oklahoma by a pair of pins. I scored a 247 in the midst of tonight's 578 series. This week marked the second time in a row I scored a game over 200 and pulled a 500 series. Been on a streak as of late, and tonight I peaked out with my best game ever! It was quite exciting!



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Friday, December 09, 2005

 

I burned out the first 10 copies of Lubacca The Rookie Years last night and will have most of them shipped out by tomorrow. I have also unveiled the DVD insert artwork which will go out with the DVD.




I touched up the chase videos page to include a TV-14 Rating as well as the multi-packs pricing and ordering information which I've been asked about a couple times. All that can be seen on the page now.

A few more reviews have come in with regards to Lubacca 2005. I particularly liked Mike Umcheid's review; honest and worth a chuckle at his reference to my f-bombs scattered throughout the video. I was asked before about editing out language and my reply was simple; it's part of chasing. I try to bring viewers as close as possible to what's going on; before, during, and after a chase. And that means sometimes the occasional f-bomb. But as Mike roudned out, it's me! And yes, it is, and I do my best to warn potential viewers of the language they'll encounter in all my releases. Since I am not working particularly hard on making these mass releases, I will continue to allow the f-bombs to drop... assuming they've been said in the video!

Amos Magliocco posted a couple new blog links in his blog. I checked those out and was impressed with both. With that, I elected to copy Amos and add both Ed Berry and Brian Curran to my blog links. Check them out, both are excellent reading! I've also noticed many bloggers have lists of blogs on their blog pages much like myself and Amos. While I'm not sure who started this trend with the chasers (I copied it from someone, probably Amos), it's served as a great linking post as many of my blog visitors have arrived from bloggers such as Amos and others whom I don't have listed (mainly because the lack of updates in the passed few months). I hope that I am serving those out as well. My blog continues to be the most hit section of my website, so I'm assuming I haven't bored too many people away, even during these dead months.

Two regular readers I want to acknowledge are both my boss's at my two jobs. Karen from Pizza Hut and Bedri over at Metro. Both read my blog with some regularity and I want to thank them not only for driving my hits up, but for allowing me ability to chase freely and post it without fear of issues stemming from missing work. As has been brought up by several chasers in Stormtrack threads, chasing and work don't often mix well. I have bragged about how lucky I am with both my jobs as I have been granted the flexibility to chase around everything else. And because of that, I am able to maintain a well updated blog and website as I don't feel I have to hide my activities from work. For that, I say thanks! And keep reading! :o)

So that's all with this update... finals week at school is next week, so studying is at the top of my list seeing as I have finished most of my projects. Warmer weather has taken over here in Denver and it looks as if that'll hold for at least the next week. Basically, back to boring conditions!
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Wednesday, December 07, 2005

 

Shows what I know... well, we didn't sink below the record this morning; we did it this evening. At 8:50pm, we dropped to -13 degrees which breaks the 1927 record of -12. Current temp at DIA is -9, so the temp has come up a few degrees since then. Temps are expected to climb to around zero as the night goes on, so I imagine the record will stand at -13 and tomorrow's record will go untouched.

Alex Fisher in Stormtrack made a post quoting a weather bulliten from the Pueblo office. Now I read this product this morning, but skimmed passed it. When he pointed it out, I about laughed myself out of the chair..


URGENT - WINTER WEATHER MESSAGE
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE PUEBLO CO
1041 AM MST WED DEC 7 2005

...WIND CHILLS OF MINUS 35 TO MINUS 45 DEGREES POSSIBLE TONIGHT OVER THE CENTRAL MOUNTAINS...

.A STRONG JET STREAM WILL MOVE PORTIONS OF COLORADO THIS EVENING. THIS WILL RESULT IN WINDS GUSTS OF 20 TO 30 MPH OVER THE LA GARITAS...SAWATCH...AND MOSQUITO MOUNTAIN RANGES. WINDS OF 10 MPH OR HIGHER CAN BE EXPECTED IN THE UPPER ARKANSAS VALLEY. COMBINED WITH THE VERY COLD AIRMASS THAT IS IN PLACE...THIS WILL RESULT IN DANGEROUSLY LOW WIND CHILL VALUES THROUGH TONIGHT...ESPECIALLY OVER EXPOSED AREAS.


Now that's a helluva jet stream.. for those in those areas who wake up in Missouri tomrrow, hope the trip isn't too rough. I wonder what'll be left in its place...

Made a purchase tonight with some of the cash I got from the sale of some of my photos today. I ordered up an accessory kit on eBay for my Canon A85; included in that is a tube adpater which holds a 3x telephoto lens, .5 wide-angle, and various other silly accessories. My main wants were the listed above items, everything else is just filler. I will get a few filters with it as well, so all-in-all, its not too bad. I've been eyeing such a purchase for a while, but the combination of the $275 I raked in this afternoon and the $15 off coupon code I used, made it hard to avoid this time.

Anywoo, back to bury myself in my electric blankie tonight. Temps are suppose to rebound into the 30s tomorrow which will feel like summer compared to today. Booger-freezin' is the appropiate term for such a day when the instant the cold air rushes up your nose, everything freezes. Stay warm everyone, this arctic blast is getting a lot of people!
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The showing of the DVD in class was a total success! I'd be a pretty curious man if I got anything other than an 'A' on that project. On a side note, for a basic DVD class, there sure were quite a few more advanced projects being shown, so I wonder if the class isn't up for some changes after this semester.

With the class done, I am going to make my final changes and burn out the first copies. My changes are basically to take care of things I had to do specifically for class but really didn't care to add to the final video. I'm merging the music and extras menu into one and will add the credits page in its place. Hopefully I won't exceed the DVD disk size and everything will be fine.

I have to make about 10 copies right off the bat; 1 for Shane, 4 for friends, and 5 resturant in Nebraska which wans a few copies along with some photos. Good start, I would say. I'm really stoked with this project and hope those that see it enjoy watching it half as much I enjoyed putting it together (minus the technical issues). I should be shipping copies out by the weekend.

Brrr! The arctic airmass has invaded; it's -10 at DIA right now (as of the 8am obs), which is currently the low for the day. Jeffco is -4 and Centennial is -7. While the temp has dropped since I woke up at 6:30 this morning, I don't think it'll plummet to the record low of -12 which has been standing since 1927. It has the possibility to tie, but I don't think -13 is in the cards with the sun coming out. Our high today will struggle to reach 5 degrees. Tomorrow's record low is -14, which is well out of range to be hit overnight tonight, so if we're to have any shots at breaking record lows, we have to do it in the next hour. We'll see; if you don't hear back from me, it means we fell short. I'll pop on again if we tie or break it.

Snowfall, I had about 3 inches at my place, which brings my unnoffical total for the season of 9 inches. I think the snow tapered off earlier than expected as we received only about a half an inch overnight on top of what we got yesterday afternoon and evening. No snow is forecasted in the next few days as we're expected to warm into the 30s tomorrow and then into the 40s and maybe close to the 50s by the weekend.
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Tuesday, December 06, 2005

 

The DVD burned successfully yesterday, however it wouldn't play correctly on my DVD player. It played on all three of my computers with no problems, though, so I'm not 100% sure what the problem is. Regardless, it'll be enough to turn in for class. As for the issue at hand, I'm going to burn another copy minus about 4 minutes of video to see if the jam-packed space issue may have lead to the problem. I'm also going to burn a second copy of the class version on my external DVD burner to see if that makes a difference as well. Once I figure out the problem (or conclude its my DVD player), then I'll get the release made. It looks really good and I am really happy with the results. I'm anxious to show it off in class tonight, and even more so to start getting copies out. I am very proud of this work as everything except composing the music (DJ Dani Garza did all that) I did myself, including the video capturing, rendering, graphics, and music placement.

The main feature includes 8 chases starting back in 2002 with one of my first successful chases here in Denver. The second chase was my drought ending tornado chase on May 15, 2003 in which I bagged my first tornadoes in nearly 3 years. From there, I take viewers on the ride from 2004 starting with the March Madness season kick-off in which I counted out three brief tornadoes in a very fun early-season chase. From there, we walk into May and open the month up with my biggest hailstorm of my early years in Northern Colorado. Two days later, I take you on the historical Attica, Kansas day which will keep you going for over 20 minutes. The sixth chase in the series is the second-biggest day of 2004 which holds my personal highest single-day tornado count; May 29 in Southern Kansas. This segment ended up clearing out 25 minutes between the early tornadoes, the Argonia Wedge, and the Conway Springs Devil's Dance series. Jump ahead to 2005 and you'll pair up there with 12 minutes of footage from the April 10 day in Kansas followed by the incredible timelapse of the May 10 Nebraska Supercell storm. In all, there's over 100 minutes of footage from these chases. I'm posting some updated info on the DVD on the Lubacca Compilation page, including why I chose the chases I did.

Also included on the DVD are two music videos featuring music from DJ Dani Garza. One video is about four minutes long and includes some of the more notable hailstorms I've chased. Another 6 minute video includes some really cool flooding clips from storms in and around the Denver Metro area over the passed few years. A 7 minute reel of bloopers and a slideshow featuring my 2005 lightning shots wrap up the DVD.

If I have to remove something, I'll likely rid of the hailstorm music video. I'll see how it pans out.

In the meantime, Colorado is bracing for its coldest temps of the season. While we may hit the 20s today, temps are expected to fall with passage of the front this afternoon; possibly into the single digits. Temps tonight and tomorrow night are expected to be below zero with high temp readings in the single digits. Wednesday will be the coldest day of the week with temps struggling to reach 5 degrees. Some snow is forecasted for the area; upwards of six inches of a dusty, light snow by tomorrow morning.
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Monday, December 05, 2005

 

High winds greeted pissed off Bronco fans today in Denver. Winds began to kick up about 4 hours ago in the western suburbs and have significantly increased since then. When I left the house at 7am this morning, winds at Jeffco had been clocked to 66mph. Since then, a gust to 83 was reported. This is causing some issues with visibility in the mountains as it is blowing around the snow which fell over the weekend. Things here in the city weren't so bad as only about an inch of snow was left to blow around, but in areas where snow was on the roofs of buildings become interesting when those gusts sent the roof-mounted snow flying. Winds are expected to increase for a few hours this morning as a high wind warning will remain in effect til 6pm this evening; this was extended overnight from an expiration time of this morning. Other gusts around the area include 98mph and the Wind Technology Center near Rocky Flats, 95mph near Kenosha Pass, 88mph at the NCAR Mesa Lab in Boulder, and 75mph near Genessee. My bets are to see at least one 100mph reading out of the area before this is all said and done.

In other news, my DVD is finishing as we speak. After two failed attempts, I discovered the issue of a missing file in the images for my lightning slideshow. I didn't pull all the images from the CD to the hard drive, and because I had taken the CD out to replace with the blank DVD, it had no where to pull the images. I'm hoping that will take care of the problem. It was transcoding when I left this morning, so I'll know when I get home whether it worked. My biggest concern is that the DVD was estimated to have only 2.5 megs of space left on the disk, so space may be an issue. If that's the case, I'll be cutting something from there and burning it tonight. My main objective is to finish the DVD for class tomorrow; then I'll pull together any last second things for the Dec. 15 release. Taking a look at the preview, I am very happy with the results. I hope everything burns successfully tonight, as then I can call it finished and start copying.
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Saturday, December 03, 2005

 

In a rather easy and quick method, I was able to finish the last of my video editing this afternoon. Last night, I ran out the 26 minutes of my May 29, 2004 footage and this morning, picked up immediately to finish the rest of the segments as well as the music videos. All that's left to do is render the "feature project" together which I'll do when I'm at work tonight, then do the DVD-specific stuff tomorrow (finish menus, space budget, etc). I should have the first copy burned before Sunday night, so here's hoping that it works well!

In other news, it snowed 4 inches here overnight last night in a surprising dumping which was only suppose to be an inch or so. When I went to bed at 1am, we had a couple inches of thick, heavy, wet snow. This morning, that was doubled; skies quickly cleared and the winds came in to blow some of the snow from the trees to give the strange appearance of moderate falling snow under blue skies. Far cry from yesterday's 61 degree day, but those who know the weather in Colorado realize that temps getting that high usually means you'll have snow within 12 hours. At 2pm yesterday, the temp at Centennial reached 61 degrees; I went to bed at 1am, 11 hours later), and 2 inches of snow was already on the ground. Thye don't lie when they say wait, it will change soon!
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I am awaiting the rendering of the bloopers section for my compilation DVD as I type this. I have 5 more chase segments and 2 music videos left to do and I will be finished. I completed all the menus this evening, but ran into problems with the DVD-Rom menu. While its not anything more than a filler for class, I may leave it as is, removing the buttons and just making it a list of sorts of some people's websites. I'll try and knocked out the rest of the video clips tomorrow and Sunday before returning to school on Monday. The thought of taking half a day Tuesday has crossed my mind, but I also have to remember that I don't have to give him a completed DVD for class, just something to show I know my stuff. I can easily sub out the rest over the next week if need be. My goal is to be burning the first test copy Sunday night as I am sleeping so I can check it out in the morning and make last second adjustments before taking it to school. I really enjoy this stuff, and I hope you guys do, too! It's been a pain in the butt to do this mostly thanks to the class oriented parts of this, but all the digital goodies I got to put together was worth the time. Shane Adams will probably be the first chaser friend to receive this as he and I worked out a trade between numerous videos between the two of us. I am eagerly looking forward to viewing his stuff.

Anywoo, about 2 minutes left on this, so I am gonna let it run its course, check it out, then try and piece togethe rone more segment before bed. Good night.
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