The Chase
The cold front had plunged into the Gulf the day before, but there was some easterly wind now, pumping some moisture and modest instability into southern Texas. This provided chances for supercells coming out of Mexico into the far southern part of Texas.
We drove south from Lampasas and looked for some things to do on the way south. We ended up at Longhorn Cavern State Park near Burnett, but cave tours needed to be reserved in advance, and the next available tour was too late in the day for us to do the tour and still chase. We ended up along a road nearby to do some wildflower photography.
While we were photographing the flowers, some storms encroached upon us, so we decided to find a high spot and watch for some lightning. We found a good spot, and the storm moved in. This kept guests happy, but we were wanting to find some more storms farther south, so we continued through Marble Falls, where we at lunch in the Bluebonnet Cafe, and then continued. Exiting Marble Falls to the south, we came upon a significant traffic jam caused by a fatal automobile accident.
We continued south and kept our eyes on a storm that was developing over the "Old Faithful" terrain in Mexico. This storm stayed anchored to its initiating terrain for a couple hours, but near sunset, it began to move off this terrain, and headed for the United States.
We got to Cotulla, Texas and checked into our hotel for the evening. We invited the guests who were interested in an after sunset lightning chase to drive with us to Laredo, where we hoped to intercept the storm and photograph lightning. As we drove south, the storm, which earlier had looked supercellular as it got close to the U.S. border, began to shrink. We pulled around Laredo and looked for a dark spot to photograph, but the roads were really rough, so it took a while to get in position. As soon as we did, the storm was done. There was no more lightning. We turned around and headed back to Cotulla.
By the time we got back to our hotel, a supercell had developed just west of town. It grew in size and moved toward our hotel, threatening us with hail, so we moved our vans underneath the hotel awning. By the time the storm actually arrived, it had grown into a non-supercellular blob, and the hail threat was much smaller. We moved the vans back to their normal parking spots and enjoyed the heavy rain and lightning show.
