Lack of sleep: Tension rises

June 7, 2007 by T Love.

Internet and time to update has been lacking yesterday and today. Lack of sleep is beginning to affect many on the trip.  More on this top and developing story later in this post. Now back to you in the studio for an update from yesterdays storm in SW South Dakota.

We arrived in Valentine, NE for lunch around 200p. 245p we left Valentine heading north as this seems to be the right area. 350p, tornado watch for a storm west of us…we are going for it. 410 tornado warning on it. According to Al Pietrycha from the NWS was on that storm and seen a twister for about 30 minutes. Unfortunately, we were still 30 minutes out from it when the twister dissapated.

530p, we stopped for video and pictures. Great rotation less than a mile from us. It looked really really good. Shelf (RFD) was incredible. Small funnels (I believe) were visible at times. The 10 minutes of tripod video with a wide angle lens should be freaking awesome.  I may have not seen a twister, but this was definatley satisfying…for me at least.

We kinda left the storm around 745p.  Road network was really poor.  What I mean was that there are limited options to travel on. A few storm fired south of us which happen to be on our way to our motel in Grand Island, NE. We arrived around 1140p.  Lots of driving to get here and lots of time in the Vans for the 2nd day in the row.  This brings me around to the top story.

The last two nights, we have been getting in late to our motel and obviously getting to sleep late as well. Last night was another 130a night. Did you notice no mention of dinner last night? Yeah, our dinner was around midnight. Some of us ate, some of us stay at the motel, and some of us….well who knows.

Most of us have not drank alcohol for the last two nights. I prefer sleep over drinking lately. (I know, I know). However, 6 1/2 hours of sleep (if you were lucky) is taking its toll on most.  Decisions are being questioned, crankyness is becoming, sleeping or dosing off in the van is becoming more prevelant. I’d imagine its only going to get worse in the coming days as lots more driving is on the outlook.

We are leaving at 915a. I assume we are heading south.

RFD from last night. The meso is to the far right. About 5 minutes after this picture was taken, the RFD passed over kicking up sand and blasting us. Visibility was less than 50 feet.

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