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Blackened Horizon

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Tornado sirens rang through the humid air buzzing with mosquitoes. Locals could not help but to stop and stare. For hours this powerful supercell had been tracking across southeast Wyoming and already dropped 7 tornadoes. But now for the first time the storm was entering a populated area. As it crossed into the Nebraska Panhandle it picked up speed. I got far enough ahead so I could find this viewpoint of the national monument and shoot a time lapse. Scotts Bluff was a significant milestone on the Oregon Trail, and countless covered wagons passed between these walls of sandstone in the mid-1800's. I can't imagine what it would have been like to face a threat like this without a sturdy shelter or means of escape. The 800 foot high bluffs began to look tiny as the swirling mass of angry clouds blackened the western horizon. This was as close as I dared to get, because the core of the storm packed massive hailstones as large as 4 inches. When the hills started to disappear, it was time to leave. An additional 2 tornadoes soon dropped on the highway a few minutes behind me. While there were a few structures damaged, the twisters largely spared the town of Gering. But many car windows were claimed by the hail.

Copyright
Kevin Palmer Photography
Image Size
5788x3851 / 10.7MB
Keywords
Contained in galleries
Nebraska, Best of 2023, Storms, Recent Work
Tornado sirens rang through the humid air buzzing with mosquitoes. Locals could not help but to stop and stare. For hours this powerful supercell had been tracking across southeast Wyoming and already dropped 7 tornadoes. But now for the first time the storm was entering a populated area. As it crossed into the Nebraska Panhandle it picked up speed. I got far enough ahead so I could find this viewpoint of the national monument and shoot a time lapse. Scotts Bluff was a significant milestone on the Oregon Trail, and countless covered wagons passed between these walls of sandstone in the mid-1800's. I can't imagine what it would have been like to face a threat like this without a sturdy shelter or means of escape. The 800 foot high bluffs began to look tiny as the swirling mass of angry clouds blackened the western horizon. This was as close as I dared to get, because the core of the storm packed massive hailstones as large as 4 inches. When the hills started to disappear, it was time to leave. An additional 2 tornadoes soon dropped on the highway a few minutes behind me. While there were a few structures damaged, the twisters largely spared the town of Gering. But many car windows were claimed by the hail.