Garrett examined the GPS map on the screen, then switched to the Doppler map. We were approaching a T-intersection.
“It’s clustering over Comanche. Turn left on road 81,” Garrett said to Herbie.
The sound of the CB crackled again. “Breaker one-nine, Maxi-Jay to Herbie the Chaser. Do you copy?”
Herbie grabbed the mic. “I copy, Maxi-Jay. Whatcha' got?”
“I’m passing through no-man’s-land outside of Lawton. Just overheard some ears in Comanche saying they saw a big ugly cloud above them. Thought you’d find it interesting.”
“Indeed. Thanks a bunch, Maxi-Jay. Over and out.”
Garrett zoomed in on the Doppler-radar. “There it is."
I looked over the seat; on the screen was a hook formation within a cluster of red and green blocks.
“What’s that?”
“That’s what they call a hook echo,” said Garett.
Herbie made the turn and headed north as fast as he could. The rain had stopped by the time we passed through a small town called Addington, population 114, and consisting of six intersections. The streets were empty and very easy to pass through. I saw a police officer escorting the last residents into a storm shelter at an elementary school as the convoy passed by.
Then I saw it: a large, fat, mushroom-like, cumulonimbus cloud lowered itself close to the ground from a distance. I could see the thing making a slow counter-clockwise rotation. Now was the time to get the camera ready.
“Look there, Daniel,” Herbie said. “That’s what we call a ‘supercell’. It’s where many tornadoes come out of.”
“How far are we from it?”
“About four or five miles, as far as I can tell. We have to get closer if you want a good video.”
Garrett flicked a switch for the satellite radio and spoke, “Johnny, Billy-Bob, listen up. The supercell is just east of Addington. Turn right on Monument Road and follow it for as long as you can. Take extreme caution. Over.”
Now I started to get goose bumps when I heard that. Taking ‘extreme caution’ is said when you’re an FBI agent after an armed and dangerous killer – at least in the movies.
Monument Road was the last street in Addington. It was a single-lane road going out across a vast, empty field of grass and scrubby bushes. The convoy was able to proceed at 40 miles per hour through water and mud puddles. This must have been what Mr. Owens meant about the endless Great Plains. There was a cluster of trees in a field, their leaves blown away from the wind, revealing skeletal branches, waving for help. Stick-like telephone poles provided contrast between land and sky - but the sky was covered by a towering vertical vortex of a mother ship, ready to usher in the Second Coming, so to speak.
Then I saw it, about two miles away.
Down it came, slowly – like a nightmare in the making, the tornado funnel.
As it took on more shape, it plunged deeper, like the finger of God striking doom on the earth’s inhabitants. What little sunlight we had gave the column of death a translucent look, with hues of bluish-grey. Everything I’ve ever read or saw about tornadoes just went out the window. This was worse than a Godzilla movie. These things can cross rivers, climb mountains, descend into valleys, pulverize homes and devastate entire cities.
“Yee, haw! What do you think, Daniel? Get your video camera ready,” said Herbie.
I froze. I wanted to tell Herbie to F**k off and get us the hell out of here. Herbie must have noticed my fear.
“Don’t be afraid, Daniel. According to the Doppler-radar it’s heading away from us. It looks like an F1 type tornado, maybe F2. What do you think, Garrett?”
“Hard to say.”
The radio went off again. “Pa, I think we can get to the next road. Looks like it’s gonna’ make touchdown near some Indian burial ground. Whatcha’ think?”
“Take it slow, Billy-Bob. If you can make the next road, fine. If not, stay where you are and we’ll make our videos and measurements from there.” Herbie switched channels to speak to Johnny in his pick-up, “How’s your girlfriend holding up?”
“She’s trying to be brave. She’ll do fine,” he answered through the static.
“Just for your information, Daniel. F1 tornadoes represent 80% of all tornadoes. Few deaths are reported with these types. They last between one to ten minutes. They have a wind speed of 70 to 115 miles per hour and make a path on the ground of up to three miles.”
“Thanks for the tip.” I wanted to piss in Herbie’s backseat for revenge.
The convoy made it to the T- intersection; a muddy tractor road, known on the GPS as N2880, going north. We were now less than a mile away from the descending tornado. We were driving at a snail’s pace and inching our way as close as we could to the wind monster – heading ‘away’ from us, but it didn’t look like it from my point of view.
The voice of Billy-Bob spoke through the radio static. “I think this is as close as we can get, Pa.”
“I agree, everyone pull to the side.”
All three vehicles parked close to a ditch. The road was muddy from all the rain. My heart was racing. I could see the funnel coming close to the ground, crowning its wicked glory with flying dust. As it got closer it became more of a V-shaped object and seemed blacker.
Herbie and Garett opened their doors. The computers on the dashboard were making their measurements.
I could hear a type of whooshing roar nearby, but not as loud as I had imagined. But I was petrified.
Garrett opened the back seat door where I sat; he looked frustrated.
“Get out.”
It was like Garett asking me to jump off a cliff without a bungee cord. “I don’t think I can do it.”
“Give me the camera.”
But at the same time, I didn’t want him to do my job. “No.”
“Then get out and film it, damn it!”
Something made me decide to obey. Was it German heredity? I climbed out of the SUV and flinched as the wind pushed against my face and hair. Everyone stepped out of their vehicles and stood on the muddy roadside – all except Johnny’s girlfriend, who appeared to be whimpering inside the pick-up.
I mounted the camera on my shoulders, turned on the device and focused on the funnel. The air around me felt musty. Perspiration stuck to my face and got into my eyes. I struggled not to hyperventilate.
"Karen, I’m glad you can’t see what I’m doing," I whispered.
Through the lens, I watched the big, black “V” make its slow but diabolic-looking touchdown on the Oklahoma prairie, with a wide field of debris surrounding the bottom tip, making the upside-down triangle look more like a dusty hourglass figure. Soil and grass flew around the vortex. I could hear the sound of something like a rumbling freight train echoing through the field. Indeed, it looked like the monster was headed away from our team, which made me sigh with relief.
I heard Herbie speak into the car microphone, presumably to the police. “I got a wind speed confirmation of over eighty miles per hour. Touchdown at 9:51 AM, about seven miles south-east of Comanche, heading north-east at a slow rate. Hard to say how fast because the tornado is blocking the morning sun from where we’re standing, making it look fat and black. It’s kicking up lots of earth. There are no structures in the area. Looks like we’re the first ones to sight it. Do you copy?”
I got a close up shot of a tree being torn out of the ground and watched it fly high into the vortex.
“Hoo, wee! Did you see that?” yelled Garrett.
“Got it on film,” I answered.
Herbie came up and patted my shoulder. “Good job. They look scary at first, but you get used to them after a while.”
“How long will it last?”
“Not long, it’s a weak one.”
Herbie was once again right. After three minutes the tornado began to weaken. I could see sunlight shining through patches in the funnel. Herbie spoke again on the police radio. “The tornado is in the decay stages after three or four minutes since formation. L
ooks like it traveled across the ground for less than a mile. Tore into a wooded area and threw up trees. I can see the bottom tip leave the ground and ascend back into the wall cloud.”
Something distracted me while I was watching the tornado through the camera. A large black object seemed to have flown near the group to my left. I took my eye away from the lens to see what it was. The twisted, broken remains of a truck-sized oak tree crashed yards away from the SUV near the side of the road.
Garett cried out, “Holy shit!”
I focused the camera on the tree. Through the lens I saw Herbie run up to examine the roots, while Johnny peered at the remains of the branches.
“My Gawd, there’s a nest with eggs in it!” yelled Johnny.
I turned the camera away from the nest because I wanted to capture the last dying breath of my first tornado encounter. The funnel weakened as it receded upward, and then it fizzled into nothingness before my eyes, leaving the wall cloud.
I switched off the camera and returned to the car. I overheard Herbie speaking to Marty and Johnny near the tree, “It looks like the eggs belong to the Flycatcher, the Oklahoma state bird. We can take em’ to the local zoo for incubation …”
As I placed the camera in the back seat, my attention turned again to the screen on the dash board. Was that a second ‘hook echo’ I saw? From which direction?
I cried out, “Herbie?” I got out and there it was. I froze.
Another tornado funnel was forming behind us – this one was close!
“Herbie, look behind you!”
Everyone turned to see the giant whirlwind form out of nowhere, about a hundred meters or so from out vehicles. Like a finger of death pointing straight toward us, the ground began to lift and mud began to fly in our faces.
Johnny’s girlfriend screamed in bloody panic, forcing Johnny and Marty to head for the truck and turn around.
Herbie came to his senses and screamed at them. “No, that’s dangerous!”
Instead of driving away from the funnel, the truck made the fatal mistake of heading into the funnel.
It was too late – the vehicle was lifted into the sky and seemed to have been swallowed by the cyclone.
Herbie cried out to the others. “Don’t get in the cars! Follow me, in the ditch!”
We jumped into the ditch which ran along the muddy road: Me, Herbie, Garett and Billy-Bob. I took one last look at Herbie as he gave the order, “Lie flat, face-down in the ditch! Protect the back of your head with your arms!”
Just before I obeyed, I saw that the funnel was over our heads, like a dark super vacuum-cleaner!
Chapter Twelve
I don’t know how long I lay prone in the mud. The great vacuum cleaner in the sky was noisy. I didn’t know what would be worse, getting sucked away or having one of the vehicles tossed into the ditch and land on us. I thought it might have been safer to hide in the cars, but Herbie knew better how to survive these things out in the middle of nowhere.
I lifted my head out of the ditch as soon as the wind subsided. So did Herbie, followed by Billy-Bob and Garett. The tornado was gone, we had survived. But the others who got sucked away in the truck?
The first thing we noticed was that the SUV and the jeep were gone!
“Everybody all right?” Herbie asked.
We nodded and said something to indicate that we were alive and hadn’t lost our minds, at least not yet.
“What now, pa?” Billy-Bob said.
Herbie pulled out his cell phone but it didn’t work. “My phone’s wet,” he said. “Can someone make a call for help?”
We all tried our phones, but none of them were working. It seemed as if power was lost, or a cell mast may have been ripped away, who knew?
We began to climb out of the ditch to get our bearings again.
“How far is that town, Herbie, the last one we passed through?” I asked.
Herbie gave it a thought and said, “You mean Addington? I think it’s quicker if we hike north on this road towards Comanche. There’s a farm house or two on the way. We’ll stop there for help.”
We walked for almost two hours before we came to a house, just as Herbie had predicted. The owners invited us in after Herbie explained what had happened. The power was out as well, but we were treated with hot coffee and a ride to the Comanche police department. Once again, Herbie explained what had happened to the police and asked for a search party to find the three missing persons from the convoy. I felt for Herbie, this couldn’t have been easy for him. He had lost his SUV and all his equipment, and perhaps there were even casualties on his watch. Would he ever want to storm chase again?
My smart phone picked up reception again. I called Karen to tell her I was all right, but stranded with the team in Oklahoma. I also called Mr. Bronsworth to request a flight back to Hamilton somewhere. He said he would look into it and give me a call back. Technically I was homeless and had no idea where to go. I asked Herbie if I could join him on the search for our missing three colleagues, but the officer overheard me and refused to let me come along. The search team would allow Herbie to accompany them, in case he was needed to make a positive identification should the three be found dead. What a terrible prospect. I also thought about calling my mother, but why make her worry? Besides, the battery in my smart phone was running low and I wanted to conserve power. I had little money on me, but I still had my ID and bank card to use at an ATM for staying the evening somewhere, if need be.
Bronsworth called back. He had arranged for me to take a taxi from the police station to the local airfield near Meridian. A flight back to Hamilton would be waiting for me there. I would be allowed to use the work credit card, which I still had. The boss insisted that I write up an article about my adventures as soon as I returned. What a sweetheart. I gave my last business card to one of the officers, to pass on to Herbie, in case he wanted to get back with me for any reason.
I landed at the Hamilton Airfield in the late afternoon that same day. I was able to make one more call to Karen before my phone battery ran out. She was there when I got off, with her parents. I sort of wished her folks weren’t there, but it was still nice that they came along. She ran up and gave me a warm hug. I was so glad to see her and hold her. Her red hair was long and flowed in the wind.
She was still holding me when she said, “We heard on the news that a storm-chasing team got struck by a tornado. At first we thought it was you who was lost.”
“It was part of Mr. Mott’s convoy,” I answered and looked into her teary eyes. “Three of them panicked and fled into the tornado’s path. I don’t know what happened to them. I wasn’t allowed to help in the search, so I came home as soon as I could.”
“Just as we arrived here, we heard on the radio … that they found the truck in a field. There were no survivors.”
Marty, Johnny and his girlfriend; all of them college students at Wichita Falls, studying natural science. The least experienced in Herbie’s team – with me included. I held her tight.
Later that evening I started to type on my laptop about the tornado chase for the magazine. I’d watched the news earlier on TV, but there were no good shots of the tornado. Unfortunately I had no pics either, although I was so close to it. It was then that I got an unexpected email from Herbie Mott.
Hello Daniel,
The officer at Comanche gave me your card with your email address. I’m sure you know by now that we lost three of my team members. Please don’t feel as if this was your fault, because it wasn’t. All of us had to sign an insurance contract indicating that all team members are aware they put themselves at risk of life and limb when they go tornado chasing, and therefore the next of kin can’t hold me accountable for such accidents. It’s similar to what stunt drivers have to sign before they can begin their dangerous work. However, it doesn’t make life any easier for me. I have to fill out police reports, identify the bodies, attend their funerals, etc. This is never easy, I must say. Things like this have happened to me before
in my thirty years’ experience as a storm chaser. Of course I hope and pray that it will never happen again, but nobody knows.
By the way, we found the other two vehicles, about five miles away from where the tornado hit – completely wrecked. I pay so much insurance already that I hope to recover most of the loss, but I’ll definitely not go on vacation next year as I’ll most likely have to tighten the belt to pay for extra premiums next year.
We were also able to recover the video of the tornado that you captured. I’m sure you would like to have a copy of it for your magazine, so I’m attaching a copy of it for you.
Again, please don’t go into despair thinking this was your fault. I think you did a good job recording the tornado and I hope you write a good article for your boss. If you need anything, please let me know.
All the best
Herbie Mott
I opened the video file attachment and saw the monster once again, like a re-run of a horror movie. I finished my report and sent it with the video to Bronsworth. As I was getting ready for bed, he wrote back, saying that this was sensational.
I was not impressed. I called my mother and asked if she knew a good lawyer. I’d had enough of this jerk and wanted to fight fire with fire. But I needed to build up my case.
Chapter Thirteen
The next day I returned to the book shop. I turned on the PC and ran through the sales during my absence to see if everything looked normal. When I was satisfied, I commended Thomas for his hard work during the two days I was gone. He seemed happy and went back to work.
Karen came into my office a few minutes later. She was again dressed in her nerdy clothes and glasses; her red hair pulled into a bun.
“Hi,” I said.
“Hi, you doing better?”
“Sure, and you?”
“Yeah. Look … about what you said to me, about your real job and everything ...”
Heart of Texas Page 10