I've Seen A Lot of Tornadoes on May 22nd

I've been chasing storms for 25-ish years now, and over those years there are some dates that start to stand out as anniversaries of favorite tornadoes or favorite storms. May 22nd is one of those dates that has accumulated a ton of memories on my end, especially during those glory days in the late 2000s and early 2010s.

Over the last couple of years I have archived a lot of these old chases from their original MiniDV videotapes - I'll share a few of my favorite May 22nd chases below.

May 22nd, 2008 was one of my best tornado chases of all-time. The day took a couple of hours to get going, but once it did, it seemed every storm across western Kansas was dropping tornadoes. Crazy enough, the same thing would happen the next day in basically the same location. May 22-23, 2008 was top tier tornado chasing.

May 22nd, 2007, the year before, basically in the same location again! We gathered around Hill City, Kansas that evening watching jaw-dropping storm structure and a couple of tornadoes with a beautiful lightning show into the late evening.

May 22nd, 2010, oh the joy, oh the pain. One of my best forecasts ever, one of my best timelapses ever, great, up close video of an EF-2 tornado, and then a logistical nightmare during one of the best tornadoes of the decade.

May 22nd, 2019, More recently, myself, Colin Davis, and Alex Hall observed a long-track family of tornadoes that began in northeast Oklahoma, tracking into Kansas, and eventually southwest Missouri after dark. This was one of my first long-form storm chasing VLOGs!