Ben Holcomb

Marginal supercells in Western OK and Western North Texas

Ben.Holcomb — Mon, 13 May 2013 00:44:02 +0000

Chase Statistics:

Date: May 8, 2013
Miles Driven: 522 Miles
States Visited: OK, TX
SPC Outlooks
Chase Partner(s): Stephen Jones, Brandi Dittrich
Chasers Encountered: None

Photo Gallery

Chase Narrative:

Chase Map

Hail south of Wichita Falls, TX

Ben.Holcomb — Wed, 24 Apr 2013 04:57:39 +0000

Chase Statistics:

Date: April 9, 2013
Miles Driven: 458 Miles
States Visited: OK, TX
SPC Outlooks
Chase Partner(s): Cory Watkins
Chasers Encountered: David Drummond, Jay McCoy, Bucky Graham, Evan Hatch

Chase Narrative:

Chase Map

April Oklahoma Hailers

Ben.Holcomb — Wed, 24 Apr 2013 04:27:32 +0000

Chase Statistics:

Date: April 22, 2013
Miles Driven: 344 Miles
States Visited: OK
SPC Outlooks
Chase Partner(s): Solo
Chasers Encountered: Jeromy Carter

Photo Gallery

Chase Narrative:

Chase Map

Marginally severe supercell in Noble County, OK

Ben.Holcomb — Wed, 24 Apr 2013 04:24:22 +0000

Chase Statistics:

Date: April 14, 2013
Miles Driven: 308 Miles
States Visited: OK
SPC Outlooks
Chase Partner(s): Donovan Gruner, Matt Phelps
Chasers Encountered: David Reimer, Paige Burress

Chase Narrative:

Chase Map

Sunset, TX Hail Storm

Ben.Holcomb — Fri, 19 Apr 2013 15:54:17 +0000

Chase Statistics:

Date: April 15, 2013
Miles Driven: 379 Miles
States Visited: OK, TX
SPC Outlooks
Chase Partner(s): Donovan Gruner, Jon Stone, Cory Watkins
Chasers Encountered: David Drummond

Chase Narrative:

Chase Map

Moderate Risk Tornadoes in Southwest OK

Ben.Holcomb — Fri, 19 Apr 2013 04:01:35 +0000

Chase Statistics:

Date: April 17, 2013
Miles Driven: 509 Miles
States Visited: OK, TX
SPC Outlooks
Chase Partner(s): David Drummond
Chasers Encountered: Marcus Diaz, Miguel Chavarria, Erin Copeland, Erik Fox, Adam Lucio, Bill Oosterbaan, Alec Scholten, Donovan Gruner, David Reimer, Paige Burress, Russ Contreras, John Schaefer

Photo Gallery

Chase Narrative:

David Drummond and I departed Norman at approximately 1pm and headed down I-44 towards Lawton. Storms started firing shortly before we arrived in the Lawton area and we decided to head west on US62 to Snyder for some gas.

This gave us a couple minutes to choose whether we wanted to go to the north storm or the south storm. We decided for the south storm and headed to southwest of Frederick where the storm obviously struggled and underwent a few cycles before really ramping up and producing a nice wall cloud.

Chase Map

Severe Hail near Brownwood, TX

Ben.Holcomb — Tue, 02 Apr 2013 18:40:58 +0000

Chase Statistics:

Date: March 30, 2013
Miles Driven: 474 Miles
States Visited: TX
SPC Outlooks
Chase Partner(s): Mike Boik, Matt Phelps
Chasers Encountered: None

Photo Gallery

Chase Narrative:

This was a nice Saturday afternoon chase which I was already in Dallas for the Sweet 16/Elite 8 games of Michigan vs Kansas on Friday and then eventually Michigan vs Florida on Sunday. The best target was looking out near Abilene, or north of there so we departed DFW and headed up Jacksboro highway.

I quickly realized we needed to stay south and maybe even head south of I-20 so we bailed south to I-20 and west. Storms started firing along and south of I-20 and we had a nice little storm near Cisco, TX we watched for awhile before bailing south towards the more dominant storm near Brownwood.

Not much chance of wrapping up and producing a tornado, but it did produce some nice hail.

Overall a good first chase for 2013. Unfortunately we were plagued with a flat tire on the way back, but that was quickly fixed.

Chase Map

For Sale: Storm Snob DVD

Ben.Holcomb — Thu, 31 Jan 2013 06:05:25 +0000

It's been awhile since I've updated the blog, but I wanted to toss something on here letting everyone know my new DVD "Storm Snob" is done and for sale in the store. Pick up your copy today for $15 + shipping! It features a lot of unique days from 2012 including April 13, April 30, May 25 and October 12th.

I believe this is my best DVD release yet. If you don't believe me, read what fellow chaser Adam Lucio had to write here.

"Storm Snob" is approximately 68 minutes and is in 16:9 format and looks very good on an HDTV!

As always, I am open to trades for other chaser DVDs! Just drop me an e-mail and we can setup a trade. I love watching others' storm footage!

Bust in Southwest Kansas

Ben.Holcomb — Sun, 11 Nov 2012 19:13:29 +0000

Chase Statistics:

Date: November 10, 2012
Miles Driven: 559 Miles
States Visited: OK, KS
SPC Outlooks
Chase Partner(s): Mike Boik
Chasers Encountered: Dillon Killoren, Justin Hoyt, Zach Elliott, Andrew Lyon, Rocky Watson

Photo Gallery

Chase Narrative:

I began looking at this day well over 10 days out with the promise of a very nice trough ejecting into the southern plains. The storm system continued to show strong on model forecasts, but moisture and instability questions persisted and I had almost certainly written the day off.

Friday night I looked at the NAM and still thought my chances of chasing were very low, but woke up Saturday morning and decided maybe it was worth a try. I should have trusted my instinct, as it was generally a waste of gas.

Mike Boik and I left Oklahoma City around 10 am and headed up towards Alva first then into Kansas. Storms had fired, but they didn't last long. I believe mesoanalysis was over-doing the 1000 SBCAPE as nothing could seem to sustain and the updrafts looked very soft and fuzzy.

We ended up heading to Woody's in Pratt for dinner as a storm fired to the southwest and split. It did nothing more than rain like crazy in Pratt. I wouldn't suggest Woody's as a place to go. I ordered a steak and it came out after everyone elses food at the table. In fact, it came out so late that everyone else at the table had finished eating. I ordered my steak medium and it came out well done as almost a leather substance. The final straw was when I went to pay for the $12.99 steak and the guy rings it up, says $25.78 and turns around to run my card. Wait a minute dude, it's a $12.99 steak and a Diet Dr Pepper. Needless to say I wrote the most about my terrible dining experience in Pratt which seems to stand out more than the storms.

On the way home we stopped a couple times, with a couple good lightning storm opportunities. I captured 5 nice images linked to in the photo gallery above.

Chase Map

Severe Storms in Oklahoma

Ben.Holcomb — Mon, 15 Oct 2012 16:52:17 +0000

Chase Statistics:

Date: October 13, 2012
Miles Driven:
States Visited: OK
SPC Outlooks
Chase Partner(s): Paul Kamis, Colby Goatley, Zach Elliott
Chasers Encountered:

Chase Narrative:

Chase Map

Hail and Tornadoes in Hale County Texas

Ben.Holcomb — Mon, 15 Oct 2012 15:16:46 +0000

Chase Statistics:

Date: October 12, 2012
Miles Driven: 742 Miles
States Visited: TX
SPC Outlooks
Chase Partner(s): Lindsey Ozment, Jeff Duda, Alec Scholten
Chasers Encountered: David Reimer, Jenny Brown, James Menzies, Adam Lucio, Jonathan Williamson, Stephen Jones, Jon Stone

Photo Gallery

Chase Narrative:

Chase Map

World Traveler

Ben.Holcomb — Fri, 07 Sep 2012 05:08:30 +0000

So I've really neglected my blog so far this year. I've not had a lot to write about as we had such a crappy year for storms and it's seemingly been 100 degrees for 3 months straight now here in Oklahoma City. I did manage to get away a few times this summer on business trips, one being to Indonesia and one to Dubai.

The Indonesian trip was first, leaving right after the 4th of July here in the US. Our objective was to install a radar archiving and playback system for the Indonesian governments radar system. This was probably the smoothest international installation I have been apart of.

I was also afforded a chance to spend an entire day in Singapore on the way back this time, which was pretty cool. The subway system in Singapore is amazing and the city is definitely busy and easy to get around in. You can check out my small amount of Singapore Pictures.

The second trip came just 2 weeks later as I was on my way to Dubai. I was able to schedule a few days beforehand to stop in Detroit before heading out towards Dubai, and I got a quick trip in to Cedar Point with my friend Bill Oosterbaan. We took the Winnebago boat cruise and I got some pretty incredible shots with my Canon 60D. Check them out here.

After Cedar Point it was back to Detroit Metro airport where I had a 945 pm flight to Amsterdam where I connected on to Dubai. We spent 9 nights in Dubai and almost most of that was waiting for the passes for us to get into the airport to work. I got to do everything touristy I could think of (besides a desert cruise, it was way too hot for that) including riding Formula Rossa, the worlds fastest roller coaster. I had originally missed out on my December 2010 trip to Dubai on riding Formula Rossa as it broke down just before I got on it, and I had to bail to get back to the airport in time.

I also got a chance to go up in the Burj Khalifa which is the worlds tallest building and a chance to go into the Dubai Mall Aquarium which was pretty fun and a lot more elaborate than I expected. My pictures from Dubai are here.

On the way home I had a 7 1/2 hour layover in Amsterdam and I took the opportunity to leave Schiphol Airport and head out into the city. We landed around 5:30 am and I cleared customs and was on the train by 6:30 am and downtown by around 7 am. The city is really dead that time of the morning, but I walked around and checked out the city including the Red Light district (which smelled like trash and puke) which was dead that time of day. I took a river boat cruise which was pretty cool for 14 euros. You can check out my Amsterdam Pictures.

Otherwise, I returned to the US and have been enjoying being back in the country. I took my first mileage run on Delta to Phoenix when I got back. It was good to catch up with some old coworkers from Liquid Web as well as check out the Arizona State campus in Tempe.

I have also been working on a new store and my new DVD entitled "Storm Snob". The new store will launch just prior to my new DVD release. I will be selling DVDs and photo prints of my storm photos and other photos.

I also have a new Facebook "like" page which can be found at http://www.facebook.com/benholcombstormchasing

Wakita Multivortex Tornado

Ben.Holcomb — Wed, 29 Aug 2012 04:09:17 +0000

$0.00

Store >> Photos >> Wakita Multivortex Tornado

A violent multivortex tornado near Wakita, OK on May 10, 2010.
*Please note: This picture is from a HD Camera video still and is only available in smaller prints

Choose your paper type and print size below. Metallic paper is highly suggested for the best quality. All prints are sent to a third party for printing and shipped directly to customers in the United States by USPS or UPS excluding Alaska and Hawaii. Alaska, Hawaii and International customers will be shipped using UPS Saver or UPS World Saver. If you have any questions, please contact me

Short Description:

A violent multivortex tornado near Wakita, OK on May 10, 2010.

SKU: wakitamultivortex

Night Mammatus

Ben.Holcomb — Wed, 29 Aug 2012 03:55:10 +0000

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Beautiful display of mammatus after dark in Western Oklahoma.

Short Description:

Beautiful display of mammatus after dark in Western Oklahoma.

SKU: nightmammatus

Nebraska Storm

Ben.Holcomb — Wed, 29 Aug 2012 03:46:04 +0000

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A desolate storm in Northwest Nebraska dominates the sky.

Short Description:

A desolate storm in Northwest Nebraska dominates the sky.

SKU: nebraskastorm

Close Lightning

Ben.Holcomb — Wed, 29 Aug 2012 03:40:05 +0000

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Very close lightning strike hits a house across the street from where I was shooting photos of an incoming shelf cloud.

Short Description:

Very close lightning strike hits a house across the street from where I was shooting photos of an incoming shelf cloud.

SKU: closelightning

Alden Tornado

Ben.Holcomb — Wed, 29 Aug 2012 03:24:21 +0000

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November tornado near the town of Alden, Oklahoma.

Short Description:

November tornado near the town of Alden, Oklahoma.

SKU: alden

Oklahoma Windmill

Ben.Holcomb — Wed, 25 Jul 2012 04:22:00 +0000

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Lightning behind a Windmill in Western Oklahoma on the evening of June 3, 2012. Perfect for wide prints in a 1x2 ratio.

Short Description:

Lightning behind a Windmill in Western Oklahoma on the evening of June 3, 2012.

SKU: okwindmill

Stormy West Texas Evening

Ben.Holcomb — Tue, 24 Jul 2012 04:51:17 +0000

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Store >> Photos >> New Mexico Sunset

Taken after dark near Plains, TX as storms were losing intensity for the night. A beautiful supercell against a flat West Texas backdrop!

Short Description:

Taken after dark near Plains, TX as storms were losing intensity for the night. A beautiful supercell against a flat West Texas backdrop!

SKU: stormywesttexaseve

Tipton

Ben.Holcomb — Tue, 24 Jul 2012 04:46:10 +0000

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Rare November EF-4 tornado near Tipton, OK.

Short Description:

Rare November EF-4 tornado near Tipton, OK.

SKU: tipton