TCS.net - Michael's Blog

Lightning - August 19, 2011

Sat, 20 Aug 2011 16:58:10 -0500

Lightning - August 19, 2011
by Michael Tillotson
Saturday, August 20, 2011, 4:58pm

I was out on a walk yesterday evening and saw a storm to the south that looked like a good photo opportunity for some lightning shots. I decided to avoid the city lights and went south of the Interstate to the Platte. By this time the storm had been going on for a while, but I had at least 20 minutes of good lightning before other clouds moved in and blocked the view.

The lightnight was no longer visible, so I had the shutter locked open waiting to see if there would be one more bolt. 39 second exposure.

It was a beautiful lightning storm. Glad I didn't miss this one. :)

Western Nebraska Shelf Cloud - June 16, 2011

Fri, 17 Jun 2011 15:14:44 -0500

Western Nebraska Shelf Cloud - June 16, 2011
by Benjamin Tillotson
Friday, June 17, 2011, 3:14pm

Yesterday was another epic high plains upslope event in eastern Wyoming. We started north of Burns, WY on Hwy 85 near La Grange.

Storms were firing north of Cheyenne. We waited near La Grange for the severe storm further to the west.

The western storm quickly became linear and a shelf cloud began taking shape. Eastern WY and CO are probably my favorite chase areas as far as terrain - very open/no trees.

The the shelf really became awesome at this point.

The drier air in these parts helps to see the detail in the clouds.

This is a seven image stitch to make this panoramic. Location is still southwest of La Grange.

I took the road east from 85 through La Grange as outflow from the storm really kicked in.

As you will see on video the amount of dust was quite impressive.

It seemed as though the top inch of this road surface was getting torn off by the outflow. Video shows that really well at this point.

Further east on the Nebraska side just moments before getting swallowed by a thick dust cloud. There were several moments where I couldn't see the road ahead. I don't even want to know what my air filter looks like now.

Dust Bowl II

Just south of Scotts Bluff.

Courthouse and Jail Rocks.

We repositioned to near Arthur, NE where I took some timelapse.

Awesome sandhills scenery.

We called it a day near Tryon and headed south to North Platte to get something to eat.

Central Nebraska Severe Storm with Strong Winds -

Tue, 31 May 2011 13:07:06 -0500

Central Nebraska Severe Storm with Strong Winds -
by Benjamin Tillotson
Tuesday, May 31, 2011, 1:07pm

I went to Indianapolis to see my brother over the weekend and I didn't get back to Kearney until around 6:00pm Monday so a got a late start to the chase day but it was still quite rewarding considering I like blowing dirt.

I had been watching the potential for today and thought storms would mostly be linear. I was still interested in chasing that day and headed out at 6:30 to intercept the line of storms near Broken Bow.

The storm was already developing a shelfy appearance. I was just east of Broken Bow right off of Hwy 2. I basically stayed on Hwy 2 the whole chase.

A local stopped and asked if a tornado was coming and commented on his childhood tornado memories. I tried to explain the whole linear vs supercellular storm difference and told him this was a linear system and probably would not produce any tornados. I think a bunch of spotters may not know the difference since there were so many false tornado reports...:P The storm didn't seem real intense at that moment but things were about to change.

The storm was starting to go crazy with the shelf structure and the inflow/outflow. Dust bombs were going off everywhere and the thing was just getting started.

Some video stills of the crazy wind/gustnados.

This is when all the tornado reports started coming in. :P I guess flying dirt can look scary.

Outflow winds really started kicking in everywhere at this point.

I was surprised to see a small funnel at the leading edge of the gust front. You can see it in the upper right hand corner of the above photo.

Transformer line blowing up. Cairo was out of power when we drove back through it.

The lightning display that night was awesome. One of those constant/never ending lightning shows...

I might put up a longer version but for now I'll you can see some short clips.

Southern Kansas Storms - 5/24/11

Thu, 26 May 2011 13:01:00 -0500

Southern Kansas Storms - 5/24/11
by Benjamin Tillotson
Thursday, May 26, 2011, 1:01pm

The southern Kansas target was a bit of a fail tornado wise. Storms had difficulty staying discrete and the tornado warned cell west of Enid, OK just wouldn't reorganize. Lots of HP stuff was hindering inflow into the storm and the cell pretty much dissipated as moved into Kansas. Below is the cell south of Medford.

The haze was an issue too as it was difficult to see much of a cloud base until it's nearly on top of you. Both times I've chased in Oklahoma I've had that problem. Not good if your looking for something photogenic. I guess I'm used to the northern plains storms where you can see storm bases from 20+ miles away.

The cell looked like it was trying to wrap up. You can see a bit of an RFD cut there. It just wouldn't go beyond that to actually produce.

We sort of gave up on anything supercellular and went for the linear stuff back west near the dryline. I was noticing the two supercells on radar way north near the warm front and sort of wished I had stayed put in Salina.

More linear/Shelf cloud stuff north of Wichita on I-35.

I was glad to finally have something cool to see through the viewfinder.

Central Kansas Storm Chase - 5/19/11

Fri, 20 May 2011 11:23:10 -0500

Central Kansas Storm Chase - 5/19/11
by Benjamin Tillotson
Friday, May 20, 2011, 11:23am

Waiting in St. John, KS for initiation. Lots of good looking cumulus ahead of the dry line.

A couple of storms developed near Great Bend, KS. I didn't chase those because I wasn't sure if they might move north and east toward the less instability. The cells further down the dry line had difficulty getting their act together though so those northern cells looked to be the best of the day.

We got on this severe warned cell near Lyons, KS. It was somewhat picturesque for a short time.

Kansas wheat fields make an amazing foreground!

I was surprised at the number of chasers on this storm. I wonder how many made it to the northern cell. There were a few reports of tornadoes on that storm but I have not heard/seen anything of it.

Driving on I-70 east through the core of that southern most cell you can see on radar on the laptop.

Cool clouds at sunset.

On the way home we saw a lot of flooding. Some fields near Delphos, KS were severely flooded. Smith Center had several rivers running through town as well.

Northwest Kansas Storms - 5/11/11

Sat, 14 May 2011 09:20:38 -0500

Northwest Kansas Storms - 5/11/11
by Benjamin Tillotson
Saturday, May 14, 2011, 9:20am

Early morning convection/rain showers sort of ruined all the storm potential for yesterday. Josiah and I sat around in Kinsley, KS anyway hoping for some moisture return but even with several hours of sunshine dewpoints struggled to stay in the 50s. The photo above is a flag from a war memorial on the west side of town as the high clouds were clearing off after the rain.

I was originally thinking of a far southern KS/ northern OK target so we had left early from Kearney. Since the southern target was pretty much gone we stayed around in Kinsley for a while and saw this memorial as well as some historical sites/buildings from when my mom was a teacher there.

The school that my mom taught in many years ago.

later in the afternoon it became obvious that if we wanted to see anything stormy NW Kansas was the place to be. So we headed back to Hays/I-70 and then west to Garfield, KS. We took a lot of muddy Minimum maintenance roads which was fun and you'll see all that on the video.

Hwy 36 west of Norton.

We stopped for one short timelapse shot after this and then headed home since it was getting dark.

Tornados in Northwest Iowa - 04/09/11

Tue, 12 Apr 2011 16:11:00 -0500

Tornados in Northwest Iowa - 04/09/11
by Benjamin Tillotson
Tuesday, April 12, 2011, 4:11pm

We did our first chase of the season on Saturday! I targeted Onawa, IA and I was right for once! A storm initiated west of there and quickly developed on RFD cut as it moved over Onawa.

The storm as it was crossing over into IA. It produced a possible tornado north of Onawa. It sort of looked more like a gustnado and I would have thought that it was except for the obvious funnel above it. The storm sort of cycled through wall clouds a few times before producing the Mapleton tornado. We weren't in the best position for video during a lot of it because we were trying to figure out our road options. :P

This is a video capture of the Mapleton tornado either during or after it went through town.

Since It's still April the sun set kind of early so the rest of the chase was in the dark.

A close bolt.

A vid cap of the first of several tornados this storm produced.

We drove further NE to get closer and kept an eye on this cone tornado to the west.

We drove further north to get into position in case it would continue and cross the Hwy. We weren't really paying attention to anything else and didn't notice the wall cloud over Early, IA. We stopped just south of town and got some great video of the rope tornado as it moved through town.

The Tornado to the west was still there and we took video of it until the rain/hail arrived and we decided to call it a day. Not bad for being the first chase of the year!

Snow Geese - 3/9/11

Fri, 11 Mar 2011 11:43:05 -0600

Snow Geese - 3/9/11
by Benjamin Tillotson
Friday, March 11, 2011, 11:43am

I visited the masses of snow geese this week. There were probably close to 25,000 in a single sandpit lake. It was hard for me to get a good perspective of the group with the 400mm lens because every picture is just a small portion of how many were really there.

See if you can count all the birds in this photo... And let me know.. :P

I drove south of the river and saw a few Cranes. I think the recent snow storm and cold temps have kept a lot of them south longer.

Some sort of migratory ducks I think.

Some Mallard ducks. I think I know what they look like at least.

And more ducks.

Sort of artistic maybe?

Seagull.

The mass of snow geese from a distance. They all started heading east for some reason. Maybe to further clog the lakes around Grand Island.

"N" stands for Nebraska! If it doesn't look like an N to you your looking at it the wrong way.

Below are a few pics from a trip I took a couple weeks ago.

Bird Migration - 2/22/11

Wed, 23 Feb 2011 11:47:19 -0600

Bird Migration - 2/22/11
by Benjamin Tillotson
Wednesday, February 23, 2011, 11:47am

Bird migration is beginning this time of year. A few cranes have come already but the usual masses are not here yet. I also saw a bunch of snow geese and a lot of other birds that I don't know much about.

After driving along the river road I went to the Fort Kearney bridge for sunset.

I think those are Mallard ducks.

I found this tree chewed down by beavers.

Sunset on the Platte River.

On the road back to Hwy 10 there are always deer ready to jump out ion front of you this time of day. Even though it was dark and I was using the 400mm handheld I was able to get a decent shot. 1600 ISO on the T2i is awesome!

Full Moonrise - 2/17/11

Fri, 18 Feb 2011 12:13:09 -0600

Full Moonrise - 2/17/11
by Benjamin Tillotson
Friday, February 18, 2011, 12:13pm

Temperatures have gone up drastically this week! We went to the river hoping that there would still be some good ice. But the warm temps had melted everything except for some ice on the south side of the river. I think it looks like we missed our opportunity to do some ice surfing this year.

The full moon rising was really cool. These photos are all taken at 400mm.

Bird migration is starting!

2/8/11 - Light Pillers

Tue, 08 Feb 2011 11:12:01 -0600

2/8/11 - Light Pillers
by Benjamin Tillotson
Tuesday, February 8, 2011, 11:12am

I got up a 2:00am this morning to shovel a couple places that needed it early. Once the snow began to slow down I noticed light pillars forming from the ice crystals in the air. It was about 0 degrees out. Here is one shot I got just before going to work. I wanted to get closer to some brighter lights but I couldn't find any of our tripods and just had to set the camera on my car. I'm just posting one photo because all the others look exactly the same.:P Hopefully they show up again sometime soon.

Lunar Eclipse - 12/21/10

Mon, 24 Jan 2011 12:59:43 -0600

Lunar Eclipse - 12/21/10
by Benjamin Tillotson
Monday, January 24, 2011, 12:59pm

Here are some photos of the Lunar eclipse that happened last year.

This is one of the first shots of the moon as it moved into shadow. You can see some of the shadow starting on the lower left side.

We tried to do some sort of a timelapse of the eclipse but that will take some time to put together. We just need to take the time to do it. :P

Veterans Day Parade 2010

Fri, 12 Nov 2010 12:00:27 -0600

Veterans Day Parade 2010
by Michael Tillotson
Friday, November 12, 2010, 12:00pm

Here's some of the photos of the Veterans Day Parade in downtown Kearney, Nebraska yesterday. It started raining just before the parade, but thankfully it quit by the time it started.

Knights of Columbus

A couple veterans

I like the candy in mid-air. :)

The Old House

Tue, 02 Nov 2010 14:39:22 -0500

The Old House
by Benjamin Tillotson
Tuesday, November 2, 2010, 2:39pm

I remember driving by this old house with Michael last year and thinking it looked really neat. We tried going back and finding the spot but for some reason we couldn't remember what road it was on...until yesterday when I drove west of town on some random roads.

The Old House, The Old Tree, and The Old Car.

The old car is very cool. Not sure what brand it is.

It has an old Nebraska tag. I bet its registration is expired.

Probably a straight 6 or 8 cylinder engine.

Needs some new headlights. You could probably just wire a light bulb onto that though.

Plenty of seating for probably 6 people.

Lots of trunk space.

The tree was cool looking too. It added a lot to the cool old look even though it probably isn't that old.

The house was just really old. And the wide angle makes me look tall. :P

It looked like the west half the house had mostly collapsed.

It took me a while before I had the guts to go inside. I was scarred the floor might collapse.

Looks like the front door.

Blue and green plaster.

Lots of old leather belts and stuff.

The bedroom with a doorway to the attic. I didn't try going up there.

I think this was the kitchen because you can see what looks like a chimney in the corner of the room.

More ways into the attic.

More belts.

And this last photo is a self portrait of me racing around on the crazy fun roads in the area.

Badlands Trip - Sep. 25th

Thu, 07 Oct 2010 12:09:04 -0500

Badlands Trip - Sep. 25th
by Michael Tillotson
Thursday, October 7, 2010, 12:09pm

These are all photos from the morning of the 25th.

A Panoramic looking west from a high point south of our camp.

Badlands Trip - Sep. 24th

Wed, 06 Oct 2010 09:55:51 -0500

Badlands Trip - Sep. 24th
by Benjamin Tillotson
Wednesday, October 6, 2010, 9:55am

This was our first morning at the badlands. It was still a bit wet from the night before but this kind of mud dries fast once the sun hits it.

There was a thick dew everywhere and the lens kept on fogging up.

It was really cool to be able to camp in the badlands. You kind of feel like your on another planet sometimes.

Can you see the people? :P

Sunrise

We all had muddy pants btw. haha

Some wildlife in the area. Those are mountain sheep to the right.

The nights were bright with the full moon. It made for some cool night landscape shots.

Our campsite at night. :P

Badlands National Park - Sep. 22 - 25

Tue, 05 Oct 2010 11:17:36 -0500

Badlands National Park - Sep. 22 - 25
by Michael Tillotson
Tuesday, October 5, 2010, 11:17am

Last time we went up to Valentine, NE and the South Dakota Badlands was in March of 2009. This time we camped at Smith Falls State Park for the first night. It rained all night. We and our sleeping bags got wet, spent a couple hours at the laundromat drying our stuff, and headed on up to South Dakota. As a result, we didn't spend as much time taking photos at the Niobrara as I had hoped. Maybe next year...

We did drive through the Fort Niobrara National Wildlife Refuge on the way back into town and got some video and photos of elk and bison.

We arrived at the Badlands National Park in the afternoon. It had rained not long before, so the badlands were muddy. We'd never done much badlands climbing in the mud, but we thought we'd give it a try. It was a little slick in a few places, but overall was pretty good.

Group photo! Benjamin, me, Josiah, Micah & Luke

Another group photo.

We had planned on camping at the campground, but Benjamin found out that we could camp out in the middle of the badlands as long as we were at least a half mile away and out of sight of any trails or roads. So while I captured some amazing sunset scenery with the camera, the other guys hauled our camping supplies out into the wilderness.

This is the site of our first camping spot. The next day we realized we were a little too close to one of the trails, so we moved further in.

After sunset and some grilled hamburgers, Benjamin went out for some star photos. The moon was full, so the landscape was well lit.

Kearney Band Day Parade

Sat, 18 Sep 2010 13:05:32 -0500

Kearney Band Day Parade
by Michael Tillotson
Saturday, September 18, 2010, 1:05pm

Bands marched past our shop in downtown Kearney today. Here are some photos.

Recent Sunrise and Sunset Photos

Tue, 14 Sep 2010 16:14:59 -0500

Recent Sunrise and Sunset Photos
by Benjamin Tillotson
Tuesday, September 14, 2010, 4:14pm

Here are a few Pics from sunrise on Labor Day and a stormy sunset on the 13th.

Not much to say about these except that I like being out during sunrise and not stuck at work.

I have been playing around with the video on this camera and trying to be creative with some timelapse stuff.

Skipping ahead a few days to the 13th when we had an awsome sunset. Michael took these photos.

A timelapse of the storm. I like how it fades into darkness by the end.

Little Bear to Blanca Traverse and Elingwood Point

Thu, 26 Aug 2010 15:14:15 -0500

Little Bear to Blanca Traverse and Elingwood Point
by Benjamin Tillotson
Thursday, August 26, 2010, 3:14pm

Update: A few video frame captures have been added to the post.

The trip started out with 50+lb packs and a 5 mile hike up to Lake Como. It was a killer hike but got me acclimated for the next day.

The road up looked like it would be an amazing drive if you had a vehicle that could do it. It's supposed to be the hardest 4x4 raod in Colorado. I guess few vehicles can make it all the way since I didn't see any at the lake.

Our camping spot at lake como. It's a nice place just to camp at. We had a good view of Little Bear Peak and portions of the ridge to Blanca which we did the next day.

Michael M. and I took some shots of the area while we waited for David and Michael. Michael was recovering from a cold and was out of energy. As a result he was not able to complete the climb to LB the next day. This was a bad thing because Michael was going to use some gear he brought to get some cool video of us on the climb. I ended up attempting to get good video for him...

Right now I feel like just going back to the lake to camp for a few days. It's a great place with awsome views. I'm guessing it would get real busy on the weekends though.

We were on the trail by 6:30 the next morning headed for LB. The plan was to do all three peaks that day. The first challange being the lose gully leading up to the west ridge of LB. I took the Left side of the gully and found it helpful to stick close to solid rock on that side. I'm not sure what the other side was like. You would have ask Michael M. about that since he took that route.

Here are a bunch of vid caps. This will give you a taste of what the video is like. It's going to take us a bit to process it all.

Climbing the first gully.

Top of the first gully.

Once I got to the top of the gully I waited for the everyone else before taking the ridge toward the hourglass. It became noticeable at this point that Michael was having difficulty keeping up with the rest of us. He ended up turning back before the hourglass which ment that we wouldn't be getting as cool of video as we had planned. I took the camera and tried to get some good quality handheld video. Michael is deffinitly better at that stuff than I am.

Beginning the hourglass.

The hourglass was simple. We took the left side of the gully which was steeper but was dry and had good holds. There was one rope hanging down the gully but I wouldn't trust it. It sat in the middle of the water flowing down so I would imagine it is quickly becoming weathered. Above the hourglass we scrambled up class 3 without as much lose rock as I was expecting. Though we did send a few rocks down the mountain which quickly got funneled into the hourglass. Even those small rocks looked deadly as they bounced from side to side down the gully.

Staying away from the water.

We peaked Little Bear at about 10:30 and didn't stay real long since we had a good climb ahead of us. The traverse begins with a class 4 downclimb which actually seemed quite easy to me. The ridge quickly narrows and gives you a good idea of what the next 1/2 mile will be like. There is one tower right at the bottom of the initial downclimb. We took a narrow ledge around the left side but it looked like it would be possible just to go over the top of it. The climbing around the left side of that tower is simple but exposed - which basically describes the rest of the route. I think I got quite a bit of good video of this first portion of the ridge. The rock is solid with only a few lose stones to knock off. We did drop one off the south side and watched as it fell for an eternity and exploded at the bottom. That sure made us feel good..lol. There were a few spots where you had to trust rocks that looked like there about to fall but were actually solid. I think I might have mentioned something about that on video.

A narrow ledge.

Ellingwood Point

Captain Bivwacko Tower.

Our campsite is about 4 inches to the right of Davids leg.

This shot was taken just after Captain Bivwacko Tower I think. The ledge around the left of the tower was no big deal. The lack of stills here I made up with video wich will be uploaded ASAP. Maybe a can grab a few frames and post them.

The Catwalk. A little more intense than it looks...

Michael crossing the catwalk. The cliff you see on this side is the same on the other side.

Here are some photos that Michael M. sent.

This is about midpoint on the ridge.

I'm getting video of David crossing the catwalk.

Blanca summit shot. The guy was who took this shot was awsome because he shared his pepper jack cheese with us. That stuff was totally wow!

Ellingwood summit shot!

This was taken very near the peak of Blanca. The hardest part on the blanca side of the traverse is probably route finding. The catwalk was challenging though and required some tuff concentration. Probably the hardest part of the traverse mentally.

You can see lake como down there.

Michael M. climbing the last slope to Blanca.

I like Gary Roach's description of this ridge as being the most astonishing connecting ridge on Colorado.

A crop of the previous shot.

From Ellingwood Point.

Mt. Lindsay.

Blanca Peak.

The ridge looked impressive from this point.

The hike down was hard. It didn't look that far back to camp but the trail kept going through lose boulder fields and such. It became another killer hike trying to keep up a good pace back to camp. Once we got back to camp It was hard to move and I felt bad until I cooked and ate a few chedder smokies.

Micheal just missed getting some neat light on LB as the sun set.

Below is a timelapse of the moon and stars over Lake Como taken that night. It's a combination of 280 photos taken over a 2.5 hour period. You can see a moondog appear toward the end of the video.

Video of the traverse coming soon...

Lake Como by moonlight

Here is a Trailer/Music Video of the Traverse. The full length version will be on as soon as we get it done.

Crestone, Colorado Star Photos

Tue, 24 Aug 2010 11:36:31 -0500

Crestone, Colorado Star Photos
by Benjamin Tillotson
Tuesday, August 24, 2010, 11:36am

I'll start by saying that we had an epic trip to Colorado last week! Which we documented with our new Canon Rebel T2i. This camera takes HD video so we ended up with more video of our climbs than stills. This post will be mostly from the night of the 19th when Michael M. and I shot some stars...

Just before the moon set there was some good light on the mountains to the east. The clouds were neat but I was glad when they cleared off after moonset. It gave us a good view of the milky way and such for the rest of the night.

Fog in the San Luis Valley just before the moon set.

The red glow is from Michaels head lamp. lol It looks kind of cool though.

The T2i performs much better in low light than our older Rebel Xti. I think it is an excellent upgrade.

Even at 35mm I was able to use a fast enough shutter speed with high ISO to freeze motion.

At 24mm of what I believe is Saturn reflected off our cabin roof.

"Shooting Stars"

35mm long exposure.

85mm at about 4 min. Some sort of UFO flew through my shot. Kit Carson Peak is to the left of this shot.

85mm shot of Orion. I noticed that nebula just above that mountain and got a few shots of it with the 400mm and 1.4x extender.

85mm of the milky way. Lots of stars.

A super telephoto shot of that nebula.

I think this is Saturn with 4 moons pictured here.

A crop of the planet taken with a faster shutter speed. I was surprised to see that much detail.

More to come...

Storm Clouds at Sunset East of Kearney

Mon, 28 Jun 2010 14:04:04 -0500

Storm Clouds at Sunset East of Kearney
by Michael Tillotson
Monday, June 28, 2010, 2:04pm

Benjamin and Luke Kruciak went up to Columbus last Tuesday, only to find blue skies. Not much happened up there. Everything was the opposite direction down in Kansas. The storms hit Kearney by evening, so my sister Kristin and I met Benjamin and Luke east of Kearney to watch the storm.

This is one of the few photos worth taking up northwest

The photos below were all taken northeast of Kearney on Poole Road.

Just for fun. This is Luke's car.

My Buick, the traditional chase car up to this point, finally had the transmission fail. It's had troubles off and on for the last three years or so, but first gear seems to have finally gone out. I'm listing it on eBay this week if anyone wants to buy. ;)

Our friends in Holdrege had told us we could have their Ford Escort if we paid to get it fixed. Thankfully the car was fixed by the time mine died, so we had it for a chase vehicle. It has a manual transmission, so Benjamin thought it would be fun to let Kristin learn how to drive it while I was taking photos. First, Benjamin let Luke take it for a drive.

I think Luke is driving in this photo

I liked the background motion blur in this photo. :)

Benjamin's demonstrating to Kristin how to operate the clutch

At least we got a few good photos out of it. :)

Storms in Northeast Kansas

Mon, 21 Jun 2010 14:59:55 -0500

Storms in Northeast Kansas
by Michael Tillotson
Monday, June 21, 2010, 2:59pm

It looked like a decent chase day, and it would a "local" chase, according to Benjamin. We didn't plan to go much more than an hour or two from Kearney. Luke and Josiah didn't come this time, but our sister Kristin and Peter came along for the ride.

We headed south of Holdrege and watched storm clouds start popping up. Benjamin had his eye on a storm building to the east, so we turned onto highway 136 at Alma.

I believe it was south of Franklin that we hit our first storm.

We abandoned this storm for a better one that had developed further east. It had an obvious hook on it near Jewell, KS.

In an effort to get closer to the storm, we took some less favorable roads east. Thankfully it hadn't rained here yet.

There were groups of people stopped along the road watching the storm. Some people were parked in the middle of the road, forcing us to drive in the grass to get around them.

We caught up to the storm and stopped for a restroom break and took some photos of the nice wall cloud. Peter was being train for tripod duty, so he was in charge of setting up and taking down the tripod whenever we stopped. He got pretty fast at it by the time we were done.

We drove through Concordia as the storm closed in. TornadoVideo.net's Dominator was just ahead of us.

The Dominator

Driving through Concordia

The storm was getting exciting here. We were watching the rotation over our heads for any sign of tornado formation.

The core of the storm was nearing us, so we took off east before it hit. We didn't want our dad's vehicle to get hammered by the hail. (My vehicle is out of commission due to transmission failure).

Kristin and Benjamin survey the sky

There was a spin-up on the ground just a few yards in front of us. Benjamin was watching the cone form up above, but I was watching the ground circulation. I grabbed the camera and got out to get a photo, but it was gone. Didn't last much more than 10 seconds. The Dominator pulled up shortly after.

We came to a place were several power poles in a row were snapped off, and some of them were stuck back into the ground where they were broken off.

At this point we decided it was time to head home. We drove along the southern edge of the intense rain as we headed back to Concordia. The sunset was beautiful as it shown through the rain.

Concordia looked like a war zone. Branches and were down everywhere. We stopped at a gas station to get something to eat, but we had to wait a few minutes while the girl at the counter got the cash register running again. On the way out of town we had to re-route to get around downed powerlines. Just outside of town we saw a grain bin that had been blown over.

Water was across the highway in some places. We were pulling into Randall when suddenly we saw rushing water across the road. I couldn't stop before we had gone several yards into the new river. It wasn't very deep at that point, but as I inched forward it kept getting deeper. Benjamin and Peter got out and waded ahead to see how deep it would get. It came up to their knees in the middle, so we realized we shouldn't attempt it. It looked like a river just flowing from between the houses and across the road. I've never seen anything like it. A man in some kind of machine pulled up beside us and told us that even if we could make it through this spot, we wouldn't be able to make it past the next flooded area. He told us the best thing to do would be to go all the way back to the road north of Jamestown, twelve miles away. A man in a white pickup pulled up alongside the first man and he wondered if we could just go to a road three miles back. "I wouldn't send anyone on those roads in a car like this", the first man said.

We thanked him and headed back down the highway. We knew our car could do a gravel road just fine, so we checked the first road north that we came to. It was just a minimum maintenance road, so we kept going. At two miles from Randall we found a gravel road. I should have taken better note of the fact that the guy in the pickup was talking about a road three miles east, not two. Maybe that one would have been gravel all the way through.

But this road was great. We just had to go two miles north before we got back to a paved highway, and no need to go all the way back to Jamestown.

We were passing some farm buildings and a line of trees and the gravel abruptly turned to the color of dark chocolate. It took me a whole second to realize that it wasn't gravel. Hitting the brakes confirmed it. The brakes didn't do much besides make us slide at an angle into the ditch. The ditch wasn't more than a slight depression at the edge of the road, and my wheels stopped part way in the weeds at the edge of the wheat field. I put the car in reverse to see if the weeds under the tires might give me a little traction. Not a chance.

The next option was to get out and push. When I stepped out my shoes sank in the mud. Kristin sat in the driver's seat while Benjamin and I pushed. When Kristin pressed the gas, we were bathed with muddy water from head to toe, but the pushing was in vain.

We were stuck.

My reputation with my passengers was very poor at this point. I do not have the heart to repeat the things that were said to me at that time. I deserved it.

We had no choice but to walk the muddy road back to the farmhouse just a few yards up the road. Benjamin, Peter and I walked back up the road while Kristin waited in the car. To our dismay, there wasn't any house. Just a barn and a light illuminating the barnyard.

We were stuck in the mud out in the middle of northern Kansas in the middle of the night, far from help.

I like adventure. But I hate having adventure at other people's expense. The worst part about it was that it wasn't my car. I wasn't sure that all my companions were enjoying it much either.

We have some friends in Red Cloud, Nebraska. Kristin had a brilliant idea to call and ask them to drive the hour to come and rescue us. They seemed almost excited at the prospect of coming out to save us from the mud.

"It was a dark and stormy night..."

After the rain and hail had stopped, I got out and walked back up the road to take some lightning shots. Here are a few of them.

You can see the lightning reflected in the floods of water in the valley

I was very dissappointed that this lightning bold wasn't fully in the frame. :(

We were very happy when our friends showed up around midnight. They had made preparations in case we had to spend the night at their house and return later to extract our car. However, we decided to see if we could push it out with the extra hands.

It took us maybe five minutes to push the car back to the gravel road. It took a little effort to keep the car from sliding into the ditch as we went.

We are forever grateful.

We got home around 4:00am.

Next time I drive a gravel road on a stormy night I'm keeping my eyes peeled...

June 17, 2010 Freeborn County, Minnesota Tornados

Fri, 18 Jun 2010 10:35:10 -0500

June 17, 2010 Freeborn County, Minnesota Tornados
by Benjamin Tillotson
Friday, June 18, 2010, 10:35am

Almost didn't chase this day as I had a lot of other things going on. But after looking at data that morning I really thought this day was looking to good to pass up. I'm very glad I went as this ended up being an incredible day...

This is the first tornado that we saw. It didn't last long and the wall cloud quickly dissipated. At the same time the cell to the south began to organize...

...and quickly produced a small tornado.

This storm basically went tornado crazy for the next 45 minutes.

It was a bit dark for handheld shots but the lighting was really good.

Things are starting to get fun.

Tornado just missed Kiester, MN to the north. We are on the north side of town. I heard later that trees were falling on the road in town so they closed the road going through Kiester. It's a good thing we didn't get stuck south of town.

Crazy action right over the road. BTW these are mostly taken at 10mm so this thing was a lot larger than it looks.

Another wall cloud forms to the east.

Blurry shot but it tells the story. :P

Time to get close now since we have a good road.

It really beefed up right over the road.

This is still at 10mm so you have to understand how huge this thing was.

Wow!

That collar cloud had some crazy motion. I pretty much just drove up to it at this point. Saw debris flying in the air high above our heads.

Incredible! (I was using that word a lot at this point)

The area smelled real strong like dirt after the tornado passed.

Inflow winds were sustained at at least 60mph. I had a really hard time opening the door to get out. Then when I got out of the car it was too windy to get still shots. So these are all taken out the winshield.

We ran into a bunch of debris after this went through and the roads out of Albert Lea, MN were blocked off so we headed home after this.

Brickyard Park in Hastings, NE

Mon, 14 Jun 2010 09:18:20 -0500

Brickyard Park in Hastings, NE
by Michael Tillotson
Monday, June 14, 2010, 9:18am

I went to Hastings on Saturday for a wedding, and Micah and Josiah (brothers of the groom) took me to Brickyard Park. It's a beautiful park with hills and trees and large grassy spaces. We decided to take some photos of ourselves there. I'm not very experienced as a people photographer, so it was fun to make an attempt at being creative...

I wasn't standing in quite the right spot. It was hard because I had to push the shutter and run and get in place within 10 seconds. I desaturated greens and yellows in this photo.

Micah and Josiah look good in this photo. My pose is somewhat interesting. I just barely got to my place in time before the shutter went off. Micah and Josiah called it the "this is my tree" pose. :P

That was fun, guys! :) We'll have to do that again.

Scotts Bluff, Nebraska Tornadic Supercell

Tue, 08 Jun 2010 16:04:17 -0500

Scotts Bluff, Nebraska Tornadic Supercell
by Benjamin Tillotson
Tuesday, June 8, 2010, 4:04pm

We chased the warm front in eastern Wyoming/western Nebraska area on Monday.

Cells began early in the day moving off of the higher terrain in Wyoming. We targeted the Kimball, NE area and watched a couple small high based cells for a while before going north. It quickly became apperant though that the cap was too strong that far south and the only good stuff was further north toward Torrington, WY.

The storm at Torrington had some great structure!

We followed this storm untill it moved over some vast roadless areas in western Neb. After leaving that storm we waited for another storm to the west which was severe warned. This cell eventually developed some decent rotation and produced a short lived tornado east of Scotts Bluff. We did not see this torndao as we were getting buried by the RFD at the time further west. Once we emerged from the core we had fun watching clouds racing south over hwy 26 and wrapping into the wall cloud. It was too dark for pictures at that point though.

Also saw a lot of blowing dust out ahead of these cells.

Camping at Eldon Reiter's Farm

Mon, 07 Jun 2010 13:02:58 -0500

Camping at Eldon Reiter's Farm
by Michael Tillotson
Monday, June 7, 2010, 1:02pm

Every year we camp out at Mr. Reiter's farm. Usually we go earlier in the year when it's cooler and fewer bugs.

Mr. Reiter even mowed the grass for us

Andrew & Peter found sticks to practice their fencing skills

The dam at the south end of the cow pond

Peter & Patrick hunt frogs while the bull and his cows observe from the opposite shore

Luke & the bull eye each other

The cows decide to retreat

Luke & Benjamin return from chasing cows

Exploring the land

It was very hot out, so we rested in the shade for a while

Mr. Reiter's barn

Turkey burgers!

Heidi spent hours before hand getting the food ready for us. It was delicious. Thanks Heidi! :)

Josh looks like he's about to faint from hunger

We were hearing turkeys nearby, so Luke and I decided to track them down. Luke saw the turkeys at a distance, but I never saw them.

Luke surveying the landscape

When we got back to camp the others were taking group photos.

Even Rance made it for the group photo!

After the photos, we played a game of "Human Capture-the-Flag". The rules were a little confusing and not universally known, so we never really knew who won. I captured Patrick (the enemy "flag") and carried him to one side of the pond while Josh had capture Andrew and carried him back to his side of the pond. The debate was never settled as to who got there first.

We gathered together again to read a chapter from the Bible. We read Isaiah 40, a powerful description of the transcendence of God. It gave us something to think about as we went to bed and looked up at the stars.

My brother and I don't really like tents. We prefer to lay our sleeping bags on a tarp out in the open and watch the sky and feel the breeze on our faces. Our tarp is usually large enough to have enough extra to pull on top of us in case of rain. This time we had so many people that we didn't have any extra tarp, so we were hoping it wouldn't rain. Thankfully all the storms stayed north of us.

We lay there talking for a while about the stars, satellites and meteors we were seeing above us. We could also hear the frogs down at the pond. The frogs sounded different than any frogs I had heared before. They made a mournful wailing sound, as best I can describe it. It was gutteral, but not a croaking sound. They would have moments of silence and then start up again in chorus.

About 2:15 I woke up and decided to get up and get a drink of water. When I stood up I saw an amazing lightning bolt to the north, so I decided I should get out the camera. Patrick apparently hadn't slept at all, so he and Peter went with me. Here are a few of the shots:

This lightning bolt was so bright it washed out the photo beyond recovery. I wished I could have gotten one of these bolts with a lower ISO setting, but I missed my two chances.

It was a beautiful storm. I stayed up for an hour and a half taking photos.

Micah's waking up

Cottages!!! The best breakfast. :) Sausage and cottage cheese helps provide enough calories to get through the day.

Taking our morning walk

Ok...?

After our walk we cleaned up and headed out to the Platte for a swim. The river was deep.

Benjamin & Peter getting ready to wade through the mud

We didn't bring our swimming suits, so some of us had to swim in our jeans. It was great fun!

Looking forward to next time...

May 24, 2010 - Central Nebraska Squall Line

Tue, 25 May 2010 11:13:56 -0500

May 24, 2010 - Central Nebraska Squall Line
by Benjamin Tillotson
Tuesday, May 25, 2010, 11:13am

Targeted North Platte yesterday. Cells were starting to form north of North Platte when we arrived. They didn't look very organized though and I decided to head south and catch the cells coming out of Kansas. Bad choice... The cells North of North Platte were soon tornado warned and our storms in Kansas were quickly dying. Storm motion was fast today so there was no chance of catching the stuff up north. We waited around North Platte for a while to see if anything could fire up in the area. Nothing did. It seemed like we were in a big hole and all the action was somwhere else around us. A cell fired at Broken Bow which was a good 40-50 miles east of where we were. That cell raced north becoming tornado warned as well. It was just too hard to intercept and keep up with any individual cell. So we went west to Arthur closer to the dryline and basically followed the squall line it produced back to Kearney.

The rain bands were one of the coolest things to watch here. We really needed a video camera to capture this. There was deffinitly some strong straight line winds in parts of the storm.

It quickly formed a whales mouth type of deal.

Micheal unknowingly lost his cell phone at this point in the tall grass across the road...

Group photo. I just had to insert this photo into Benjamin's blog post. :) -Michael

...and this is where we realized he had lost it. Amazingly we found it probab;y within half an hour. I wasn't sure if we would be able to catch up to the line but we did by the time we got to Stapleton.

The contrast is always cool with these things.

Over next to that power pole is where we found Micheals phone. It survived the torrntial downpour and boots up just fine.

Back ahead of the line in Stapleton.

Very cool.

The sunset colors were incredible. I even managed to get some lightning with it.

I included this last photo just to prove how bad I am getting at photography. I used auto focus to focus on the horizon/ininity. Forgot to check to make sure it was on infinit. It was actually on 1.4ft or something like that. They would have been really good shots otherwise. I even remember looking at them on the camera LCD and thinking that these are probably some of the best storm/night shots I have ever got.

May 21, 2010 - Eastern Wyoming Supercell

Sat, 22 May 2010 11:17:51 -0500

May 21, 2010 - Eastern Wyoming Supercell
by Benjamin Tillotson
Saturday, May 22, 2010, 11:17am

Luke, Seth and I chased the supercell in eastern Wyoming yesterday. Probably got there to late for the best structure. Also missed the short lived tornado that was reported. The highlight of the day was probably sitting through the shower of golfballs it produced.

You can see that RFD cut back there. We drove into that core after this and had fun with the hail.

I'm thinking that I am becoming a worse photographer the more I do it. The lens was knocked off AF and was focused beyond infinit which means that nothing was in focus in these photos. :P Same problem as the last chase. You can see the hailstone though. They were mostly about golfball sized maybe a few bigger ones in there.

After this we had a fun time driving through some back roads back across the border into Nebraska.

Back in Nebraska on Hwy 29.

Drove north on 29 toward Harrison to see some cool structure before sunset.

We had a lot of fun on this chase...

May 10, 2010 Medford, Oklahoma Tornado

Tue, 11 May 2010 14:10:32 -0500

May 10, 2010 Medford, Oklahoma Tornado
by Benjamin Tillotson
Tuesday, May 11, 2010, 2:10pm

Luke and I chased the Setup in Northern OK/Southern KS. We got to the Medford, OK storm just as it put down an incredible multi-vortex tornado. I didn't have the camera ready at that point so I missed some of the best action.

Very strong inflow at this point. This at 10mm and 1/50 sec. and was still blurry. Not sure if the tripod would have worked any better.

Anything zoomed in from 10mm was blurry. This is at 22mm. Also found out later that the focus was off a bit which added to the softness. They're ok I guess...

Some pretty intense action under that base.

RFD was closing in fast.

Tornado forms off to the north of Hwy 11.

I really wish these 22mm shots turned out sharper...

Storm went further off to the north and got rain wrapped. Not sure if it produced much more after this. It didn't look that great on radar so we dropped south to catch a storm crossing I35 south of Ponca City.

Drove through an intense core too see this.

We saw a very brief tube on this storm just before this shot. I'm not sure if it touched down or not.

Followed this weakening storm to Independence, KS.

This was deffinitly the best chase we've had this year. It was well worth the 1000 miles traveled. Hopefully there will be good setups like this closer to home though.

April 23, 2010 Storm Chase

Mon, 26 Apr 2010 13:56:43 -0500

April 23, 2010 Storm Chase
by Benjamin Tillotson
Monday, April 26, 2010, 1:56pm

Luke and I sat in under a very nice cumulus field all afternoon waiting for what wasn't going to happen till late in the day and way east of our target due to a stronger cap than forecasted.

NWS broadcasted a tornado watch for much of NE by about 1:00pm that afternoon. I have to admit the cumulus was beginning to look impressive in our area. That's as far as it got though. I think the only real supercells that organized in the whole state were east of that watch box. I was first drawn toward Omaha because that was the first convection I saw all day and just wanted something. Once close enough to that storm though I saw how unorganized everthing was there so we went south to some better looking storms west of Nebraska City. Sort of wasted time and gas going to the Omaha stuff. Oh well...

The cells between Nebraska City and Lincoln.

There was one point where it looked like the north cell could almost produce but it never got around to it. Some chasers reported a funnel and possible tornado on the south cell but we didn't see that. We probably just weren't looking.

This is a three image stitch showing both the north and south cells.

Mostly tried to keep up with the north cell as best as we could.

It was getting dark fast. Tried to stay close to the storm on gravel roads. Almost hit a deer in the process.

After driving through west Omaha (bad idea) and getting annoyed by not finding a good place to stop we drove west through the first line of storms then dropped south toward Wahoo and got some good shots of lightning on the backside of these storms.

Cool lightning always makes up for a not so great chase I guess.

Might be another chase day this Thursday.

Western Nebraska Shelf Cloud - 04-13-10

Wed, 14 Apr 2010 11:31:27 -0500

Western Nebraska Shelf Cloud - 04-13-10
by Benjamin Tillotson
Wednesday, April 14, 2010, 11:31am

This chase was sort of a last minute decision. More than anything I just wanted some good landscape storm shots. Things turned out very good when a photogenic squall line/shelf cloud formed along the cold front. I left around noon targeting Ogallala. Got there around 3:30pm and watched stuff developing in NE CO. A couple cells formed ahead of the cold front. These cells looked to be the only chance for a tornado so I tried to chase one just west of Ogallala but storm motion was at least 50kts and with bad road options this was basically impossible. Plus the alltel card was not working on my computer so I had to go back into town to get updates. :(

This was the storm west of Ogallala. It went tornado warned as it passed further to the north. The only problem was I didn't learn about the warning until getting internet access back in town. This storm was moving fast enough I doubt I would have been able to keep up with it anyway.

After getting updates I decided to go north to Arthur. This is when I get my first view of the squall line. Contrast under this thing was incredible.

Everything about this scene was really cool.

A shot out the windshield as I was trying to get to arthur before the precip hit. That didn't quite happen so I drove at least half an hour in blinding rain and hail before getting out of it east of Arthur.

Back out of the precip east of Arthur.

The sandhills added a lot to the scene.

I like road shots like this.

Now the only thing I had to do was to keep on going east ahead of the line. I knew to start heading east when I started feeling the cold outflow. The line between hot and cold was crazy. One second your hot the next your freezing. The wind was strong as well. At one spot I think it was sustained at least 50mph with higher gusts. I had a tough time holding the tripod down to get some good shots.

It was getting dark enough for some lightning shots. Lightning was still distant though.

The day ended with a cool lightning display.

400 ISO sort of blew out these shots...

This was a really fun chase for me. I really like the sandhills and with a photogenic storm like that it really made up for that last chase.

April 5th, 2010 - Northwest Missouri Lightning

Tue, 06 Apr 2010 12:43:36 -0500

April 5th, 2010 - Northwest Missouri Lightning
by Benjamin Tillotson
Tuesday, April 6, 2010, 12:43pm

This day didn't turn quite as I had hoped. I was hoping storms would be able to break the cap earlier in the evening... So it ended up being a mostly night chase without much in the way of good supercell structure. Good lightning display though.

Some towering cumulus late in the evening. First sign that something was actually going to happen. We had been waiting in Mound City, MO for a while.

The hills in MO were cool but not my favorite chase terrain.

MO does have cool roads...

We soon dropped these clouds for better stuff west.

The lightning show begins!

Not sure why this shot is so soft. I can't tell if it is just motion blur from the wind or if auto focus was off a bit. I've been noticing that auto focus on our 10-22mm seems to focus slightly beyond infinity.

Lightning began to get very cool about this point.

Around this time we got some internet connection and saw a couple of storms in norhteast KS that looked good on radar. We headed that direction but the storms quickly disorganized.

Sandhill Cranes Blind - March 26 - 27

Mon, 29 Mar 2010 13:34:45 -0500

Sandhill Cranes Blind - March 26 - 27
by Benjamin Tillotson
Monday, March 29, 2010, 1:34pm

This is a photo of the blind we used... I took this with my new Canon EF 35mm f/2.0 prime lens! It's sharp and I like it. This lens we will use mostly for video when we get the T2i.

The cranes didn't want to get close for a long time but there were a lot flying around. Sort of wish the lighting was better...

It was getting dark fast so the shutter speed had to come down which is obvious in these shots.

Cool motion blur effects.

It was hard to follow them with the tripod perfectly to get a good shot with a slow shutter speed.

It's crazy how part of the wingtips turned out so sharp when the rest is not.

Dragonflies...

This was the layout in front of the blind.

Coming downriver...I found out that cranes have souls that night. Pretty obvious in the next shot. :P

Last shot of the night.

First shot of the morning.

Asleep.

Awake.

Much warmer white balance after sunrise.

More cool motion blur effects.

A few shots with the 1.4x.

Sandhill Cranes & Snow Storm

Mon, 22 Mar 2010 09:25:16 -0500

Sandhill Cranes & Snow Storm
by Benjamin Tillotson
Monday, March 22, 2010, 9:25am

We had a bit of snow/blowing snow on Friday. It was very interesting to watch the cranes in these conditions.

It snowed heavily for a while before the wind started picking up. It was hard to see very far at times. Sometimes I could only hear the cranes in the field and not able see them.

Some of these photos were manual focused because the lens had a really hard time focusing on anything near the cranes. I don't remember if this was manual focused or not. If so I must be getting pretty good at it lol.

Visibility was getting somewhere below a quarter of a mile at this point. The ground was warm though so it didn't accumulate fast.

Sort of hunkered down. The wind is starting to pick up now.

A little ground blizzard starts to form in this field.

They were getting blown around quite a bit at this moment.

Probably wishing they were back in Mexico.

Didn't seem to be too happy with the weather.

The whole field went up at this point. Wind was really getting strong. Definitely time to find more shelter.

Almost got a real close one here. This is uncropped. It looked like it was attacking something in the field next to the road. Wish it would have stayed there longer.

March 17 - Sandhill Cranes

Wed, 17 Mar 2010 16:53:52 -0500

March 17 - Sandhill Cranes
by Benjamin Tillotson
Wednesday, March 17, 2010, 4:53pm

Lots of cranes everywhere at the moment.

Most of my photos this morning were landscape type shots with lots of these cool trees in the background.

I really want to get some close shots this year. We might have to rent a blind to do that though. Those farmers next to the river have it good. It looked like every house had cranes pretty much sitting on their back porch.

I like this one. I wish it was sharper though. A lot of my photos I took this morning were a bit soft. I think it was from all those heat waves from the car. I had the heat on so whenever I opened the windows everything was all wiggly. Not good for photography. Oh well...

Playing with corn husks.

Sandhill Cranes

Sat, 06 Mar 2010 13:09:42 -0600

Sandhill Cranes
by Benjamin Tillotson
Saturday, March 6, 2010, 1:09pm

The Cranes are here!

The fog was very cool this morning. Made for some good even lighting for most of the morning. Looks like the crane on the left was digging in the mud.

The warm moist air was creating quite a bit of steam near the ground where it was cold.

Cottonwoods are always cool.

Red Tailed Hawk.

You'll probably see some of these photos on POD in the next few days.

Wells Fargo Bank Hostage Situation

Wed, 10 Feb 2010 14:18:46 -0600

Wells Fargo Bank Hostage Situation
by Benjamin Tillotson
Wednesday, February 10, 2010, 2:18pm

At 11:15 this morning a man carrying a shotgun entered the Wells Fargo Bank in downtown Kearney (only three blocks from our office). The man held four people hostage for a couple hours. The Kearney Hub website has some detailed onfo on the whole situation: "UPDATED 12 p.m. 02-10-2010: KEARNEY - Snipers are perched on the roofs in downtown Kearney as police rush to resolve a hostage situation at Wells Fargo Bank. As the Hub went to press, an armed man was using a shotgun to hold hostages inside the bank at 21 W. 21st St. The hostage situation began about 10:57 a.m., and around 11:15, some employees and customers at the bank were evacuated through an east door into the alley. About 30 to 40 people were evacuated, and police officers accompanied them to ensure the suspect was not among them. According to police radio exchanges, the hostage-taker was a male, about age 25, with a beard. He was wearing a tan trench coat. According to police radio communications, the man held the shotgun to a woman's head and demanded news cameras from NTV. He said he had been fired at the TV station and wanted publicity. Later, police communicated that the man had four hostages on the bank's second floor. As the Hub went to press, the Kearney Police Department was preparing to send in a negotiator. Police blocked streets around the bank and took up positions around the area. Snipers were on top of the nearby Bruce Furniture building."

The guy surrendured only five minutes before I got there. Kearney Hub says: UPDATED 1:30 p.m. 02-10-10: KEARNEY - The hostage crisis that began at 11:15 a.m. today ended almost two hours later when the hostage taker emerged without his shotgun from Wells Fargo Bank. Police immediately took the man into custody and then entered the bank to check for people who might have been hiding inside.

January 6, 2010 - Hoar Frost

Thu, 07 Jan 2010 18:16:13 -0600

January 6, 2010 - Hoar Frost
by Benjamin Tillotson
Thursday, January 7, 2010, 6:16pm

More frost pictures! I don't know if you like snow and frost as much as I do but as far as new blog posts go this what you get this time of year. :)

I went to Cottonmill Park before the snow and wind started blowing most of the frost off the trees.

The frost was very thick in places. I'm guessing there was at least an inch of frost on the most exposed grass and trees.

A miniature forest of sand plumb trees.

Once the snow and wind started I went down to the platte river.

The Platte River is a very cool place in a snow storm.

85mm f/2.2 3200 sec.

Taking a break... At some point I realized how cold it was and started heading back to the car.

The camera bag had some snow on it when I got back.

Dec 8, 2009 Snow Storm & Frost

Mon, 14 Dec 2009 13:54:54 -0600

Dec 8, 2009 Snow Storm & Frost
by Benjamin Tillotson
Monday, December 14, 2009, 1:54pm

Tuesday, Dec. 8 was the big day for this event. Kearney ended up with a total of about 10 inches by the end of the day. But due to work and having to leave early the next morning I was not able to take as many photos as I would have liked. The trip across Iowa the next day was interesting as all of Iowa was under a blizzard warning all day making travel difficult. These are mostly from the morning of the 14th. The day before there had been quite a bit of freezing fog which made for some thick frost on the trees. I don't have a whole lot of time to write as I have a lot of work to do before Christmas so I'll just post lots of pictures and maybe I can write more later. Hope you enjoy. :)

The Platte River was almost completely frozen over.

These dips around the posts were interesting. It was all solid ice. I'm thinking that the water must have soaked into the snow as it drifted around the posts and froze that way.

Here are a few more from that evening.

Treehouse Decorating and Moon Halo

Tue, 01 Dec 2009 11:28:41 -0600

Treehouse Decorating and Moon Halo
by Michael & Benjamin Tillotson
Tuesday, December 1, 2009, 11:28am

Some people have traditions for the day after Thanksgiving, like going shopping at 1:00am in the morning and decorating their houses and yards with Christmas lights. We have traditions too: decorating the treehouse while playing Christmas music and having monkey bread and eggnog.

Shopping costs money, even with the good deals. I usually skip that tradition since money seems to be in short supply these days. Sure, treehouse decoration costs money too, but not that much, especially when several strings of last year's icicle lights still work...after reattaching severed wires and replacing a few bulbs. The only shopping we did was to get a few more Christmas lights to be sure our treehouse would be well lit. Last year our treehouse was on the front page of the Kearney Hub, so we decided to do an especially good job with decorating this year. We expect a few more people to be driving by to see our handiwork.

Our treehouse is 27 feet off the ground. The peak of the roof is 39 feet in elevation. To get up to it you climb a 12 foot ladder to the first landing and take two flights of stairs up to the front porch. From there you can take the take the steps up to the balcony or enter the main level of the treehouse. The main level is maybe 80 square feet, large enough for a small table and several people (the more the merrier). There is a narrow ladder (somewhat flimsy) that takes you up to the loft which is approximately 4x6 feet. The height of the inside of the treehouse is 14 feet: 7 feet for the first level and somewhat less in the loft, but for the most part you can stand up straight without hitting your head on the ceiling.

This is a view of the front porch. On the left their are steps attached to the tree branch for ascending to the balcony, although you can't see them well in this photo.

While some of us were outside pounding in nails to hold up the strings of lights, Benjamin put up the greenery and lights on the inside. This is the main level.

Here you can see the ladder that leads up to the loft

As I mentioned before, we have a tradition of playing Christmas music from the treehouse while we decorate. We set up some large speakers and played music while we worked.

We wrapped string lights around the railings and put icicle lights pretty much everywhere else. This is the first time we ran this many lights all the way down the stairs. We even put lights on the ladder.

Here's what it looked like after a few hours of work:

I'm thinking it might look good to put another string of lights down the other side of the ladder as well. It looks fine from the street, but from this view it looks incomplete.

Group photo time! We did an 8 second exposure, so those that didn't hold still turned out to be a blur. (Micah!)

The treehouse decorating team! The guys decorated the treehouse, but the girls worked on other decorations and fixed monkey bread and eggnog for us (delicious!).

Left to right: John Tillotson, Kohei Kawai, Noah, Josiah, Michael Tillotson, Benjamin Tillotson & Micah

Here some more shots of the treehouse that Benjamin took:

Later that night a moon halo appeared in the sky, providing an amazing backdrop for the treehouse photos.

Well, we had as good a time as ever decorating this year. Thanks to all you guys who helped out! :)

Stanley Cemetery

Wed, 04 Nov 2009 11:56:32 -0600

Stanley Cemetery
by Benjamin Tillotson
Wednesday, November 4, 2009, 11:56am

I'm still trying to find the best spot for some good super telephoto sunset shots. I didn't find anything quite like I was looking for but did end up in a decent spot east of Elm Creek.

Unharvested field of milo. Its been a little wet for the framers around here.

Some sort of wild flowers I think.

Cessna Road. This road is one of the main roads south of Amherst.

Some combines were stiring up the dust which made a cool effect at sunset.

Later that night we went northwest of town toward Amherst to get some moonlit landscapes. We ended up at this cool cemetery south of Amherst.

You can see a few ghosts in this picture. Yikes! :O

And here's part of Michael. :P

Stanley Cemetery

The Nebraska Badlands Part II

Wed, 21 Oct 2009 10:35:10 -0500

The Nebraska Badlands Part II
by Michael Tillotson
Wednesday, October 21, 2009, 10:35am

The low for the night at Fort Robinson, only a few miles south of us, was 28 degrees. It's definitely the coldest campout I've ever had, but with a sweatshirt, hooded jacket, sleeping bag and blanket, I kept plenty warm. In spite of my efforts to make sure everyone would be comfortable during the night, poor Micah still got a little cold.

When we woke up in the morning, we had ice on our pillows. The dampness that was on our sleeping bags the evening before was now frozen. When we crawled out of our beds and tried to put on our shoes, we found that they were stiff from the frost.

Sunrise was coming quickly, so I grabbed the camera and tripod and ran pel-mel all over the place trying to get as many different angles and views as I could in the beautiful dawn light.

I repeatedly had to wipe off the ice that kept condensing and freezing on my lens.

The cloud patterns were beautiful in the morning light

Seth and DJ were perched on top of a couple of the nearby badland hills. Suddenly I heard DJ announce the sunrise with a yell. :) I looked to the east and saw the sun beginning to poke above the horizon.

A view looking east toward our campsite. Benjamin's there getting breakfast ready.

DJ is walking back to camp

Benjamin had breakfast almost ready when I returned to camp. Same traditional breakfast, this time with some cinnamon rolls.

The sunlight hadn't thawed our beds yet, so I got a photo of the frost on Seth's pillow.

Seth's pillow

Delicious

Josiah enjoys his sausage and cottage cheese

Cooking the second course of sausage

We had difficulty cooking the bacon enough to make it crispy

Don't laugh. We were only trying to figure out ways to cook cinnamon rolls without burning them. :P I don't think we succeeded.

After breakfast we still had time for a short hike to what we called the "baby badlands". :)

These badland formations are much smaller than the large ones we climbed the day before. DJ is demonstrating one of the better ways to navigate these narrow passages.

Seth is trying to find a way to descend gracefully

Josiah walks along one of the easier passageways

Water break

It's time to head back to our campsite to pack up if we're going to get home at the appointed time.

We rarely return the way we come. What's the best way down from here??

The riverbed is still icy

I believe it took us over an hour to pack everything back in the vehicle. We finally rolled out of Toadstool Park and were heading back to Kearney on Highway 2.

We stopped at a gas station for a rest break and a very late lunch.

The sidewalk was a convenient spot to spread out our sandwich ingredients

Josiah ponders the meaning of life while DJ takes catches up on sleep

By the time we got back to Kearney, the ice was all melted and our sleeping bags and blankets were wet. We spread them all out on our front yard to let them dry.

A nicely decorated front yard. Josh is making sure the pretty weeds by our mailbox don't dry up.

I am gratefull to all the guys for a great time on this trip! Perhaps again next year, as has already been proposed. :) I'm sure even greater adventures await us...

The Nebraska Badlands

Tue, 20 Oct 2009 11:24:56 -0500

The Nebraska Badlands
by Michael Tillotson
Tuesday, October 20, 2009, 11:24am

Sleeping in the open air on a cold night at Fort Robinson can be fun, provided you have enough blankets and a cap on your head. I slept comfortably, but when everyone got up in the morning I found out that some of the team hadn't been as comfortable.

There were also reports of strange sounds in the night. Some creature had been near our campsite and made an peculiar high-to-low pitch screeching sound. Benjamin didn't think it was a bird. It ran away when they tried to approach it. As of now we have no idea what it was.

I think it had gotten down to the mid 30s during the night. We got a fire going as soon as we got up.

Some of the boys are still in bed. :)

Before sunrise, all of us (except Josh, who needed more sleep) loaded into the van and went east a little way to greet the sunrise. There was a moment when the horizon was pink just before the sun came up, and that was all. The sky was too overcast to get any really good photos.

Back at camp we fixed breakfast and replenished the water supply for our next destination.

Our traditional camping breakfast: cottage cheese & sausage, scrambled eggs, & bacon. Perhaps not a balanced meal, but we survived. :)

You can see the Fort Robinson graveyard in this shot

Micah is staying warm

Josiah & Josh refill our water containers

Seth cooks his bacon on a stick. It's much faster than the frying pan.

After packing the van, we stopped at the shower house for showers and then crammed ourselves in for the drive to Toadstool Park.

Stocking up on water and salt and pepper shakers at the Crawford grocery store

Cows just southeast of Toadstool Park

Everyone else waits in the van while I take cow pictures

We arrived at the park and packed a lunch and water bottles before we set out on our trek through the badlands.

Toadstool Park!

It was a little cool when we started, but it wasn't long before we shed our jackets.

Group photo! I got as high as I could before the camera timer went off

Navigating the badlands can be quite interesting. Nothing is very sturdy, and once you start sliding you may not be able to stop.

Yes, there are people in this picture.

Descending the ridge

Micah stands above a chasm

Micah jumps the chasm

There were small streams of water in the valleys. It had rained not too long before because there was some mud in the shady areas.

Josh found a piece of quartz

A cave!

Climbing the last steep spot to the grassy plateau was very challenging. You might make it most of the way up and then lose your footing and slide all the way to the bottom again.

Lunch break

Everyone's ready for a rest

Group photo! This time I made it all the way to where everyone else was before the shutter went off

Dark clouds started rolling in from the north and the wind was strong and cold

Micah and Seth wait for the others to catch up

DJ found an animal skull

At this point we decided to start heading back. We didn't take a direct route though.

DJ walks across the grassy plain

Some unique formations

See those cactuses? I put my hand on one and had my hand loaded with cactus spines. I pulled out as many as I could, but some of them were so small they broke off when I tried to pull them out.

I'm still trying to pull out cactus spines. :P

Cactus heights

Josh attempting to squeeze into the gap

Descending to the winding river

Walking in the river bed

DJ jumping the badlands

Group photo! :)

After the long hike we were tired. Time for an afternoon nap.

After naps we went out to explore the area to the north before supper. We ended up staying out until after sunset and having a late meal.

As usual, getting myself in the photo was a challenge

This wall looked like a badlands fortress

The shadows are getting longer...

The badlands river

There were sun rays coming from behind the badlands after the sun had set

We were quite hungry when we got back to camp for dinner. Benjamin cooked hamburgers and we had potato salad to go with them. We used our gas grill to cook the hamburgers, but we wanted to use the charcoal grill to roast marshmallows for s'mores. I poured the rest of the lighter fluid on the charcoal, and then it wouldn't start. There must have been condensation in the lighter fluid container which kept it from igniting. After trying to start it with paper plates and sage brush, we finally gave up and a few of us roasted our marshmallows over the gas grill.

I tried to make sure that everyone had enough blankets and clothing to keep warm for the night. Our sleeping bags were wet with dew before we even went to bed. That night it was going to get very cold...

Fort Robinson

Mon, 19 Oct 2009 22:33:37 -0500

Fort Robinson
by Michael Tillotson
Monday, October 19, 2009, 10:33pm

A year ago we took a trip to Fort Robinson, and we decided to take another excursion out to that part of the country.

The day before our departure, Benjamin was working hard to get everything ready to go. We planned to camp out under the stars, so we packed LOTS of sleeping bags and blankets. Some very special friends let us borrow their van for the trip, so all seven of us could squeeze into one vehicle.

The alarm went off at 5:00am. Some members of our team wanted to leave at 3 or 4 in the morning, but I figured we should all be well rested for the trip. :) Anyway, we headed out to pick up the rest of our team and were on the road by a little after 6:00.

We stopped once or twice for photos, which wasn't nearly enough to capture the beauty of the sandhills in the morning light.

The whole team. From left to right: Seth Brauning, Benjamin Tillotson, Micah, DJ, Josiah, Josh, & Michael Tillotson (myself)

DJ was sitting in the passenger seat, so he got to take photos as we flew past the scenery. He took the next three photos.

The sandhills. Good photo DJ! :)

We arrived at Fort Robinson State Park around noon, and paid for the park sticker and a camping spot in our traditional spot near the graveyard.

Breaking out the lunch

After lunch we drove out to the buttes. There were horses and longhorns in the fields, but no bison that we could see.

Micah & Josiah enjoy the view

We tried to get a group photo with all of us in the tree, but I couldn't climb fast enough to beat the 10 second timer. :P

Climbing dirt cliffs is a challenge. Thankfully we all made it back down in one piece.

Group photo! :)

Longhorns

The horses were very curious about the camera Benjamin was holding

We started to head back to camp to get supper ready, but we thought we should get our picture taken with the horses.

Group photo! :)

We also have a tradition of forgetting to bring a can opener on our camping trips.

The Cream of Chicken is now opened and ready to be dumped into the noodle pot...once the water boils

Getting the fire started is a team effort

Josiah watching over the noodles

The sun was getting low in the sky, and the noodles weren't in any hurry to get cooked. So I needed to get back to the buttes to get some sunset photos before it was too late. Josiah went with me to keep me company.

It was somewhat cloudy, but the sunlight managed to poke through shortly before the sun disappeared behind the hills.

We finished off the day with a visit to Staab's Drive-in for some ice cream. Perhaps it isn't very smart to eat ice cream before a cold night sleeping under the stars, but we enjoyed ourselves nontheless.

Thus concludes day one of our journey. A cold night awaits us with more adventures to come in the morning...