From several days away it was obvious Monday would be a significant day for severe weather in Minnesota. The SPC morning forecast place a Moderate Risk over southern MN and northern IA. Through the morning, I paid close attention to the mesoscale convective system (MCS) approaching from North Dakota, which was already causing severe thunderstorms over NW MN. I figured the outflow boundary of this system would trigger supercells further south, where the atmosphere was most unstable.

I departed Minneapolis at 1:30pm, as a few cells were initiating over Montevideo, heading east. Targeting Willmar, I took HWY 7 west to 71 north. Despite my inability to download any radar images, I managed to intercept the now tornadic storms south of Willmar. Unfortunately, I had to drive through downtown Willmar to reach HWY 12, which I had planned to take a bit further west. Not long after getting out of the downtown, the wall cloud was upon me, so I deployed just west of Willmar. About 5 seconds into the video, a tornado spun about 1/2 mile north of me. After reporting the touchdown, I filmed a few more seconds then jetted east as fast as possible. Though the tornado quickly dissipated, the inflow winds were amazing, and I was sure I'd see more development--I just didn't want to be in it. 

Driving east out of Willmar on HWY 12, the winds and rain picked up as did either inflow or outflow dust. I even saw another brief spin up northeast of Willmar. As the storm shifted to a more southeasterly path, I was desperately trying to find a south option. When it started hailing, I took the next dirt road and fortunately avoided any potential damage to my vehicle. 

I eventually found my way to Hutchinson, where I met up with the KSTP news crew (channel 5) who had been trying to catch up with me all day. Along the way, I filmed more wall clouds south of the main core, where I thought the next action area would be. Strong RFD winds kicked up a lot of dust, but there were no more tornadoes. I stopped south of Glencoe to be interviewed by KSTP, and we watched the storms from behind as they progressed into the Twin Cities. Saw a few more gustnadoes, then headed to the KSTP TV studio in St. Paul where they dubbed a copy of my tornado footage for the 10 o'clock news (amazing mammatus clouds on the drive back). 

Today was about as ideal as they come--only about 90 minutes of driving to the target and then following the storms home. I would have liked to be further west, near Benson, but I was fortunate to have seen the brief Willmar tornado. Also had a great opportunity to plug Skywarn, thanks to KSTP.