Weather memory: November 3rd, 2012. An excerpt from my story about my Houston - Nashville flight and the 2012 Severe Local Storms conference in Tennessee.

—

I did not know what I was getting myself into as we headed off towards Nashville. We were barely up in the air when thunderstorms brutally reminded me, along with the rest of the plane, that even the seemingly mild showers are powerful dynamic forces of nature that toss our marvels of technology around without care or concern.

Whoa. 

The plane violently shook, dropping several feet. A child started to cry from somewhere up in the front of the plane. I lurched forward, strapped in by the belt they always tell you to wear; certainly, of great benefit to myself now, I think. “MOD-SVR Turb,” I think to myself, referencing the turbulence category of “Moderate-Severe.” My group’s forecast products encouraged smaller planes to avoid this type of air entirely. “There’s danger in the air,” I whispered to myself, thinking of the Def Leppard lyrics.

The ride got more volatile as we flew closer to the thunderstorm. Light flashed brightly across the western sky. I was getting one strong dose of late season convection, and the cabin was getting a strong dose of the reality of life. I decided that day that I just do not need to chase in airplanes, although this trip will not be the only aviation thunderstorm experience. This experience here, bluntly, kind of sucks, even as I recognized how amazing lightning is when it is purely horizontal with you. 

I did not chase much this year. My 1999 Saturn was beginning to die, and 2012 was not the best year for storms in the eastern Nebraska area anyway. I had other priorities on April 14th. A series of tornadoes from a line of thunderstorms in south central Kansas on May 19th were my claims to catch for the year. Here, late in the season, from ten thousand feet and climbing, I had one more chance at a weather experience as I headed to the Severe Local Storms Conference.

Eventually our flight passed to the northeast of the thunderstorm complex, with the lightning left harmlessly flashing to the west. When we passed beyond the clouds, I saw another celestial phenomenon to my north. Bright and green, a shooting star raced across the northern sky, the tail hanging in the air for an extra moment, a moment that felt like a year.

I know the science behind shooting stars. The earth passes through the debris of comets as our planet hurtles through the realms of the universe at 66,000 miles/second that we do not feel. That cluster of rock, ice, and gas dazzles and astonishes us in the nighttime sky. In a moment of indescribable beauty, I am thinking of my friend in the hospital, and I stary to cry.