Total Bust in South Dakota

Drove all the way to South Dakota and back, missing two epic days of tornadoes including one on my birthday. Drove all the way home angry, defeated and ready to try different hobbies.

Departing Norman

After finishing my seemingly never ending list of things to do, I was able to depart Norman about 1030-11am on Sunday morning. This would put me out of position for Sunday the 27th which I figured would be in North Central Minnesota anyway.

As I was driving through Nebraska, a beautiful tornado was ongoing near Watertown SD. I’d make it to Sioux Falls shortly after sundown where I was greeted by thunderstorms eventually.

Waking up in Sioux Falls

Woke up in Sioux Falls and had some work tasks to take care of in the morning. I would complete these by lunchtime, and then headed over to the Fryn Pan restaurant for some food before hitting the road.

17z SPC Mesoanalysis

Trip to Pipestone National Monument

After breakfast, I took a quick trip to Pipestone National Monument and took a short walk around the trail to visit the waterfalls. Neat place, would suggest going if nearby.

21Z/4pm CDT SPC Mesoanalysis

Distractions

Between visiting the National Monument and work obligations, I became distracted. When I started moving west, the idea was to go to the Huron area or a little further west and/or north. Convective Initiation further southwest put me out of position big time. To compound the issue, I headed west out of Pipestone and continued through Madison and then tried to go through Salem. Road construction including a 15 minute wait for a pilot car and another long detour around Salem and back to I-90 cost me a lot of time.

Heading for the storm near Winner

The storm near Gregory just southeast of Winner started producing tornadoes. Man they were photogenic and well streamed over the internet. I was still east of Mitchell at this point, and would not make it to the storm in time to see a tornado.

Chatting with a Farmer overlooking the Missouri River

I got about as far south as possible with the road network on the east side of the river. Apparently, there was still a tornado ongoing in the storm, but I could not see it from my vantage point. A very friendly farmer pulled up and I was able to have a good conversation with him to take my mind off what I missed. He could not believe I would spend my own money driving all the way up there to miss everything. He might have been the smartest person I ran into all year.

Returning home and contemplation

I spent the next 9 hours driving home, finally arriving at 5:45 am. Work started sharply around 7:15 and I managed to make it through the day, somehow. The dollars and time wasted to come away with nothing along with such an unpleasant birthday have really made me contemplate life and the future of my storm chasing, at least on a long distance basis.

Links

• National Weather Service Sioux Falls write-up of the July 28, 2025 event
• Stormtrack Reports Thread for July 28, 2025