June 5th brought some wild weather to northwest Texas, but while most of us were watching from a safe distance, my friend Mike Sawyers was out in it, and he snagged not one, but two tornado selfies.
Sawyers is a storm chaser, and not the kind who casually follows a thunderstorm around with their phone. He’s the real deal, radar, maps, the works. And this time? He did something that he had never done before.
Massive Storm System In Texas
This monster system hit northwest Texas hard Thursday night. Around 7:39 p.m., the National Weather Service in Lubbock issued a tornado warning, calling it a “life-threatening situation” and urging folks to take shelter immediately. That warning lasted until 8:45 p.m., but the storm didn’t clock out.
With winds up to 80 mph and hail as big as softballs, multiple counties stayed under severe thunderstorm warnings into the night. Thankfully, Lubbock missed a direct strike, but areas nearby weren’t so lucky.
Tornado Selfies
Sawyers managed to snap not one but two selfies with massive wedge tornadoes barreling through the plains just outside of Lubbock. That’s right. Two tornado selfies. In decades of chasing these twisters, that’s something he hadn’t done until now…