"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
oups.com...
We were there Thursday-Sunday.

snip

Once things dried out, we broke camp, loaded the airplane, and headed
south
where we saw some REALLY interesting weather. Just north of Aurora, I
deviated west to avoid some building convective activity. We went around
a
rain shaft or two, and then I spotted a funnel cloud dropping from the
base
of the convective stuff. It dropped 300-500' from the cloud base and
couldn't have been more than 3 miles away.

Wow! Not many people can say they've seen a tornado THAT close.
Pretty scary stuff.

Not scary at all. Other than one dark cloud (with a funnel sticking out the
bottom), there was no turbulence in the area and only a couple of small rain
shafts. It looked like lots of other building weather I've flown under or
preferably around. The real surprise was that a relatively small cloud
could spawn a twister. If the RV didn't have a wood prop, I probably
wouldn't have deviated and would have flown right under the cloud where the
funnel appeared.


I wonder what that would look like on a 496?

It appeared and disappeared quickly enough that I think you'd have been
lucky to have gotten a radar snapshot which showed it.

I think this took place at 1:20 PM Central time (plus or minus 15 minutes).
I wonder if anyone knows where to find yesterday's radar loop from Aurora,
Il? It would be interesting to look at those pictures.

KB

--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"