Busted Chase in West Texas

Chase Recap:

With west to southwest flow for a few days over West Texas, as well as dewpoints in the mid 60’s, I decided to leave for a few days of chasing.

Unfortunately, I’d rather forget the 28th. While heading to a storm southwest of Lubbock, I hit a pothole and damaged my vehicle.

Pothole near Spur Texas

While westbound on FM2794 west of Spur, Texas I hit a pothole going 68MPH. This caused me two flat tires, which I spent the next 30 minutes dealing with. Luckily I had an air pump and was able to keep air in the rear tire. I replaced the front tire with the spare and was able to limp to Lubbock for the evening.

I was able to replace the tires under road hazard at Discount tire in Lubbock, but the rims were also bent from this incident. Toyota wanted almost $600 a rim for factory rims, so I got a set of rims for the car around the same price. Texas does not provide any payments for damage to property, so it just kinda sucked to be me.

The Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code §101.021 does not allow TxDOT to expend state funds for damage to property (e.g. vehicles) that is sustained as a result of highway conditions.

https://www.txdot.gov/about/contact-us/pavement-condition-claim-resolution-process.html

I had to dodge lightning strikes at one of my air stops as a nice LP supercell was to the west. I enjoyed watching the storm out my window as I drove towards Lubbock.

After arriving to my hotel in Lubbock, I’d have a scare. The 5 inch hailstorm in Levelland was heading my way and I couldn’t move my vehicle easily or safely. Luckily it’d lose intensity and move south of my location. I was, however, presented with some mammatus over my hotel

Links

• National Weather Service write-up of the May 28th events