Author: Doug

Today was a test chase to see how my truck was running.  So far so good but I still need to bring it in to get the transmission checked out.  I needed to get out of the office and do a test run chase on my gear today to work out any issues and get back into spring and summer chase mode vs. winter blizzard chase mode. 

I headed up north towards the Brainerd area and Lake Mille Lacs area as the storms were firing but racing off towards Duluth.  It was a cool light show but I gave up on following them as they headed towards Pine County.  You can’t chase in Pine County due to all the Pine Tree’s and is just as bad as chasing in Western Wisconsin.

So I headed back for the second round of storms that was heading towards Lake Mille Lacs and just sat and waited for the light show.  The storms were pretty sweet to watch but they were also very outflow dominate when they moved into the area.  Outflow for those of you non weather geeks is when the storm is starting to fall apart and all the air that went up comes crashing back down.  And that is when you get a wind storm / dust storm like I was in up on the north west side of lake Mille Lacs as strong winds raced across the lake and came racing onto shore and blew a ton of sand and debris around.  It looked pretty cool but I could not get out and setup any cameras because they would have just been blown over. 

After the wind calmed down I got out and along the side of highway 169 on the north side of town and shot some stills of the lightning.  The stills are not the greatest if your looking for wicked lightning hitting the ground since the lightning was all cloud to cloud.  But what is cool is that I got the heads up from Tim Marshall via Facebook that there was still ice on Lake Mille Lacs and with a thunder storm over frozen lake shore, that was going to make for some interesting shots. 

It was not a impressive chase or deadly chase, it was a chase were I was able to pull off something that is almost impossible because it’s pretty rare to get lightning with snow or a huge lake like Mille Lacs that still had a lot of ice on it in, in the photographs.    I know I could have done a lot better video and stills and got closer to the storm when it did have a lot of cloud to ground lightning when it was west of Brainerd but I was able to now say I photographed lightning with snow / ice covering the lake in the same shot.   

Oh and before I forget, the air temp was about 70-75F outside, until I was along county road 18 at the beach on the north side of the lake.  The outside air temp (OAT) was 46F as the wind raced over the near freezing water and frozen ice.  That’s about a 30F temp drop in less then a couple of miles.  But there were no bugs out .

Ok, I know I have been slacking with the photo updates for a while but one of the reasons was that I did not have the latest copy of Adobe Photoshop.  I had a copy that was over 6 years old and was not the greatest at editing the latest digital photography.  Hey, I shoot video for a living so still photography has always taken the back burner for a long time. 

This weekend I found a copy of Adobe Photoshop CS3 with the training video, for sale on Craigslist that was brand new in the box for only… $189.00  Yes, $189.00.  That saved me a lot of coin since Adobe CS4 is about $700 and I can upgrade for only $199.  So I saved over $200 if I do upgrade to Adobe CS4.  But, I will hold off on that for a while since it’s going to take me some time to learn this new software but I have been playing around with the new software and all I can say is WOW. 

CS3 is a very powerful tool that I should have upgraded to a long time ago but never could justify the expense since I don’t sell a lot of still photography.  Tonight I tested it out while reviewing the rest of the flooding stills from March, and again, WOW.  The options that I’m now able to do with the RAW image files is insane.  Oh and don’t get me started with the new photomerge options and features. 

Here is an image that is really several images merged together. 

The grass area on each side is the side of the road on my left and on my right and that’s a whole field in front of me from as far as the eye can see that is flooded.

I have uploaded most of the images now to the gallery

This week I have a ton of website stuff to do for BNVN but once that is done, I’m going to be using my down time between chasing this spring to get this site up to date.

Today I was out chasing grass fires but this time, they were prescribed burns.  A few days ago, Bill Doms gave me the heads up about the burning that might take place and I went and scouted out the location and talked with the NWR staff.  I’m glad I did because today I was able to get closer to the fires and hang out with their crews when they were along the roads setting the fires.

They pretty much gave me the play by play about what was going to happen and where the best shots would be when the fires merged together. 

I do have a slight sun burn like burn from the fire as the areas I was at, the heat was pretty insane but I was always up wind so I did not get smoked out.  It was pretty intense to be standing right next to the field as the fire started up and the wind started rushing into the fire from my back and it really started to create it’s own wind field.   I think it would be a great meso field test for Vortex2 to put a bunch of probe cars around something like that just to watch the wind fields shift.

When I left I stopped to talk to them about the next burn and as of right now, it’s all on hold until next week if we get some preceip.  The crews were putting out some hot spots as I left and I did get some funny photos of two chain saws that got stuck in a tree that they were trying to cut down to keep it from falling on the roadway.

The first image is from where I got burned just from the heat coming off the fire.  I was right on the fire line as they were setting the fires and when the field when up, I was worrying about shooting video and stills and not the heat.  That was until the heat started to singe the hair on my right arm…

One Man is dead and his passenger and a 22-year-old woman who is eight month pregnant is in serious condition after a major crash that involved at least a half dozen vehicles shut down 2nd Street (Highway 23) on the boarder of Saint Cloud and Waite Park, MN this afternoon.

The Minnesota State Patrol along with Stearns County Sheriffs Department and the Saint Cloud and Waite Park Police and Fire Departments were on scene for several hours investigating the accident after Timothy Richard Gilles, 22, of Waite Park, crashed into a mini van while fleeing police by driving west bound in the east bound lanes of 2nd Street.

Giles was driving the Red Jeep that is in the video and hit the Green Mini Van that caused several additional accidents as motorists tried to avoid Giles fleeing the police.

According to a report from St. Cloud police, after he crashed into the Mini Van and killed the driver, Gilles ran on foot to the south accident and was arrested after officers used a Taser on him to get him under control.

Gilles was taken to Stearns County Jail, where he is being held on a Wright County warrant as well as possible charges of fleeing an officer in a motor vehicles and criminal vehicular homicide. Gilles was wanted in Wright County on drug-related charges, for fleeing and for assault of a police officer.

Officials are withholding the identity of the victims pending notification of relatives.

UPDATE

The guy ended up getting pretty much a life sentence, 36 year’s which will mean we won’t have to see the P.O.S. walking the streets until he is almost 60 year old.

Ok, just got home from Fargo North Dakota after spending pretty much the better part of this week up there to cover the flooding.  The river has crested per the forecast but the area is still on high alert for any problems or leaks that may start. 

Here is the latest river forecast that shows the highest river levels have past and I’m pretty burned out and needed a day off to get some clean clothes and get ready for the blizzard that might be hitting the area in the next couple of days. 

Here was the forecast for the river tonight.

Now the long range forecasts shows that the ice is going to start getting thicker on the water that is in the fields south of the Fargo / Moorhead area.  I was filming in Moorhead today (will post that footage tomorrow after I get some rest) and I was also location scouting sout of Fargo near Oxbow.  The water did come up a couple of feet from when I was filming the air-boats on Thursday but it has gone back down into the fields.  But when it flooded Highway 81, it left about six to eight inches of frozen ice on the road that needs to melt off or get plowed off. 

Here are some quick photos before I go. 

Here is a hazard sign with a sheet of ice on it that is above the water that gives you an idea about how much the water has fallen in this area.

This next photo is of residents in Moorhead, MN fighting in the trenches to battle the water.

Moorhead Resident watches the Red River invade her back yard.

Everyone up here is wondering is this it?

Yesterday the Red River got up to almost 42 feet and set a record at 40.82 feet and has fallen just over an inch during the overnight hours.  So much is happening and so little time to update. 

Here is the first video I shot yesterday.

I did not get a chance to post this video that I sent in as part two of the levee starting to fail at the Country Club in Moorhead. 

I was filming the house of Creek Kuser, yes, his real name, and he was really great to talk to and even brought me into his home to show me what the back yard looked like with the massive flooding just feet from the house. 

Ok, time to wrap up and get back out filming in the 10F temps…  At least the cold is slowing the river and it might not end up being a frozen katrina…

Today I was out chasing with Eric Whitehill around the Fargo, ND and Moorhead, MN area.

We started out in the Briarwood area just to the south of Fargo.

As we were heading back towards the downtown area to cover the flooding, several State Troopers flew past us at a high rate of speed and shut down Interstate 94.  Even the US Boarder Patrol was on the scene to help out.

We ended up in Moorhead, MN and documented the insane flooding round the mall.

The size and scope of the flooding up in the Fargo, ND and Moorhead, MN area is just incredible.

This is some of the footage I shot after talking with the local EOC office in Clay County. I shot a package for TWC and was going to wrap up the shoot when I went to go explore the area around the Moorhead Country Club when I saw some people running down a street. They said that their neighborhood watch was seeing some water starting to come through the levee.

By the time I got to the location which is IN the golf course, there was at least five levee failure points with one of them looking like Minnehaha Creek in the summer time when the water is low.

After shooting a few minutes of footage, I had to hike about 100 yards back through the deep snow to get back to my truck and then went and talked to the nearest cop and National Guard check point that was being setup (after I got in the location) and showed them the footage. I was asked to go back to the EOC office where I showed the Guard Commander and FEMA and some other gov folks the footage. They had a look of Oh Crap on their faces.

Today I’m around the town of Oxbow, ND and documenting the flooding up here that is just insane.  The people are scared and the wildlife is freaking out.  I uploaded some more images and the crazy one has got to be the Deer trying to swim across the Red River to get away from the air-boats that were out in the flood water to rescue people that were trapped by the rising waters.

Here is the video from today and some of the images.  The air-boat footage is pretty insane!!!  None of the local or national media photographers got anything like this since most of them were watching sand bagers or doing interviews.

Check out the Deer, I thought for sure they were going to get washed away but they made it across the river.

Here are the images that I shot today.

I’m in Fargo for now but I’m not stuck here, I can get out on 94 but Interstate 29 is closed off to traffic due to the Wild Rice River flowing over it.  Interstate 94 is closed off west of here as well and the area is being cut off.  Almost all the roads in Richland County are flooded or washed out west of the red river to Interstate 29. 

The water is rising and you can’t get up here unless your coming up Interstate 94 and I don’t know what the Buffalo river is looking like since I could not make it over there today. 

Here is the video from today that I shot for the networks.