About Powell

        I am 54 and finally don't work for the phone company any more, after 27 years of hard labor.  I might HAVE TO retire in 2002, but for now I'm in the job bank taking the summer off.  Ask me for my resume.  I work part time in radio, and occasionally assist a friend of mine in radio engineering.  Weather has been one of my favorite avocations for, well, let's say decades.  I am an amateur radio operator [W4OPW] and a member of Columbia Amateur Radio Club, and WeatherMatrix.  YES, we DO have storm chasers in South and North Carolina!   I have an interest in severe weather and have taken my Skywarn training.  I got to use it the first time this year, running my very first Skywarn net from the Columbia SC NWSFO!

        We have not had a big storm season here, but came close to becoming a LSR upon arriving to do a Skywarn Net.
         

        I also have a motorcycle, a 1995 Black Harley Davidson 883 Sportster.  I've done around 10,000 miles putting around the backroads of Lexington County.  NO, this is NOT my chase vehicle.  I couldn't afford an Explorer, so I did the next best thing.  I bought 1/3 of an Explorer...a 1996 Ranger Extended Cab, named Gutless Wonder 3.  Picture available on Weathermatrix web site.  No, I don't have my own Meatwagon....YET!

        I'm also interested in DTP, and photography as well as all my radio interests.  I also like to grow trees and plants from seed.  (I gave my friends new trees to replace those that had theirs blown away in the August 1994 tornado in Lexington, SC. )

        Until 1996 I had not thought of actively doing any storm CHASING.  Chasing in South Carolina is usually futile and far more dangerous than out in the area where chasing normally occurs.  We have more HP storms, and the summertime obscures storms.  Our early season storms normally happen at night.  I do observe, and have collected a few storm chase videos. So I guess I'm doing "remote" chasing.  I'm going to try some cloud (and storm) photography to see what mistakes I make, and learn from them.  One of these days I'll find some green bean burritos, and I have seen (by video anyway) ....the elusive MEATWAGON!

        The highlight of my Wheeler/Shamrock, Texas, chase week was eating a burrito at Allsup's in historic Shamrock and visiting KBYP which has been off the air since 1986.  And the best part of the Texas panhandle was: I could breathe!  No, I did not bring mesquite back to South Carolina.

        Right now I'm active on 2 meters and 440.  I'm now on the air on 7290/7295 with the good old Collins 32V!