May 7, 2023

Statistics

Initial Target

Start

End

Storm Intercepts

Tornadoes

Hail

Wind

Features

Miles

Des Moines, IA

Springfield, IL 9:24 AM 5/7/2023

Mount Pleasant, IA 7:06 PM 5/7/2023

Mount Pleasant, IA

0 mph

Haboob, Mammatus, Gust Front

554

Summary

Haboob/derecho chase across central Iowa noting blowing dust and gust fronts followed by damage, mammatus, and sunset in Mount Pleasant.

Crew and Equipment

Chase partners: Jennifer Brindley Ubl. Equipment: Sony AX100, Canon 60D with EFS 10-22, Samsung S9.

Video

Map

Details

Brindley and I were off on a multi-day Plains run. Opening day looked like a robust setup across central Iowa and we set Des Moines as our initial target, stopping on the west side in De Soto. Scattered storms erupted by afternoon and started to form clusters rather than the nice discrete supercells we hoped to chase. We had to race back east for the intercept.

The clusters were quickly congealing and forming large outflowy gust fronts and with strong cold pools.

The outflow started to kick up massive amounts of dust. We stopped to watch it as the gust front passed overhead, bits of corn husks pelting the van.

We stair stepped east and south, and east and south again to try to keep up with the expanding gust front. We passed Sean Casey, Justin Walker, and Jana Houser chasing together in Sean's new Subaru intercept vehicle, but didn’t have a chance to stop and say hi. We didn’t know it at the time, but they were shooting footage that would be composited into the upcoming Twisters film.

Stormscape
8 miles E of Maharishi Vedic City, IA
6:27 PM

The gust front surged far ahead of us and there was no chance of us catching up with it. The dust expanded into a massive haboob under what was now a developing derecho. The wall of dust looked epic in the distance, and probably would have been pretty spectacular to view at closer range on the front lit side.

We called the chase and headed into Mount Pleasant for Chinese takeout and a room. The wall of dust looked like a looming monster. The derecho had raked the town and emergency vehicles were scattered about doing tree cleanup and much of the town was without power. Our Chinese restaurant was located in the old section of downtown, however, and still had power so dinner was saved.

Storm Damage
Mount Pleasant, IA
7:56 PM

We arrived at our hotel to find it without power. The sign had blown down into the lot and had fortunately missed hitting anything.

Mammatus
Mount Pleasant, IA
8:00 PM

We were also greeted with a spectacular mammatus display as the setting sun lit up the backside of the storm complex.

Mammatus
Mount Pleasant, IA
8:01 PM

The mammatus show and sunset made the chase for us actually. We stopped to shoot time lapse of it while chatting with the hotel staff and locals.

Mammatus Pano
Mount Pleasant, IA
8:01 PM

Sunset Colors
Mount Pleasant, IA
8:16 PM

Power's Out
Mount Pleasant, IA
8:45 PM

We ate dinner in the stuffy, darkened lobby of the hotel before heading to our room, the stairwell lit by emergency lighting.

Emergency Lighting
1 miles E of Mount Pleasant, IA
8:46 PM

We ate dinner in the stuffy, darkened lobby of the hotel before heading to our room, the stairwell lit by emergency lighting.

Conclusion

This wasn’t the chase we were expecting, but the haboob, mammatus and sunset made for a spectacular show regardless, and the damage and power outage in town made for a memorable misadventure to kick off our Plains run.

Lessons Learned

Keep ahead of the haboob for the most dramatic shots, but if you can't, stay for the mammatus on the backside.

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