Chris Brown is the Lanky Git

Day 1 (27th June 2009)

This is it. Today is the day I make the long trek to Denver, Colorado to join a tour group and go storm chasing! When I say storm chasing, think Discovery Channels program ‘Storm Chasers’ and you are on the right track. Severe thunderstorms, high winds, large hail and tornados are all on the menu for the week.

The aim of the trip is to join other like minded people to actively track down and chase severe weather in the American Midwest. Severe weather constitutes supercell thunderstorms that are capable of producing tornados. The group I am joining is run by Storm Chasing Adventure Tours and claims to be one of the most well equipped chasing companies in Tornado Alley. Never having done this before, I have taken their word for it.

For the next week I will be living out of a SUV and staying in a different motel each night, so packing relatively lightly is essential. Hard cases are banned and duffel bags are in. I set off for the airport feeling like I didn’t really have enough clothes to see me through the next week, but I had enough clean undies and socks to last me the week, plus a few days extra.

Seeing as I wasn’t travelling with the kids, this seemed like a great opportunity to book Upper Class with Virgin to Chicago. I have to say that I must be getting used to travelling with kids and the distraction they offer on long transatlantic flights. I was actually feeling a bit bored after a few hours of drinking champagne and watching movies, so I got my head down for a couple of hours.

Upon arrival in Chicago, I had to pass though immigration, identify my bag and then run to terminal B for my next flight to Denver with American Airlines.  However, as I passed through passport control I was detained, their reason being I had a fairly common name…  It was actually a rather painless affair involving a room with wooden benches and walls of two way glass. I had nothing to hide so I grabbed my book and read until they finally decided to let me continue on my journey. I was never really told why I was stopped, but they were pleasant enough so no harm done. Now having been sat there for an hour, I really had to run to catch my next flight.

The only worthy thing to note about my Chicago – Denver leg was that I was flying on a Super 80 aircraft – an old thing that has the engines at the back of the fuselage and I was sat right between them, next to a gum chewer, who spent the 3 hours making loud chewing and chamming noises, fabulous. The flight landed on time, happy days. Now I had 1 hour to get to the airport and meet up with the rest of the group. “Taxi!”.

Safely checked into the Quality Inn Suites just 12 miles from the airport it was time to meet my fellow ‘stormies’ for the next week and watch and orientation video, which was a kind of one hour lesson in meteorology, how tornados form and what to look out for. As it turned out the group I was in, was the smallest of the season. It consisted of Todd – our guide, driver and founder of the tour company, a high school principal and his daughter from Texas, another high school teacher and her friend, both from the state of Maine.

As an icebreaker we all went out to dinner and then for a couple of beers after, I am sure that I could have been a bit more social if I hadn’t have now been awake for near enough 24 hours. So after a polite good night to everyone, I went into bed thinking I was going to fall instantly asleep. The prospect of the forthcoming week however,  was enough to stop me dropping off to sleep for at least another hour.

Storm Chasing