Australian Severe Storms, Weather Events and Storm Chasing

[Michael Bath]

Cells are underway along the Central Tablelands and MNC. Williamtown sounding reveals quite a nice profile with potential for hailstorms. Activity should develop along the Northern Tablelands and parts of the North Coast.

[David C]

Issued at 6:02 pm Wednesday, 10 December 2008.

Severe thunderstorms are likely to produce large hailstones, destructive winds, very heavy rainfall and flash flooding in the warning area over the next several hours. Locations which may be affected include Lismore, Grafton, Coffs Harbour, Armidale, Tenterfield, Casino, Kyogle, Yamba, Maclean, Woolgoolga, Sawtell and Dorrigo.

An especially severe thunderstorm was located 10 km south-southeast of Grafton at 6 pm and was moving to the north to northeast. It could produce giant hail (larger than 5 cm diameter) and destructive winds.

[Jimmy Deguara]

Hi David,

Yep was definitely watching that one - nice supercell exploded to the south of Grafton. Pity that the radar is too close to the cell as you cannot get an indication of the structure as it nears Grafton.

Regards,

Jimmy Deguara

[David C]

Indeed Jimmy, and the one south of Casino has a nice PPI echo structure - very nice actually.


Issued at 6:21 pm Wednesday, 10 December 2008.
"Hail as large as cricket balls or larger was reported from Swan Creek (east of Grafton) at 6:15pm. "

[Jimmy Deguara]

And now another cell has exploded SW of Lismore and this will likely become supercellular given its isolation and moisture availability and similar conditions.

Hope Michael at all is after it.

Regards,

Jimmy Deguara

[Steven]

They look to be high based, as evidenced on MB's webcam. It must be very dry up there for sure.

[Jimmy Deguara]

And try this!

For people in the
NORTHERN RIVERS,
MID NORTH COAST and
NORTHERN TABLELANDS Forecast Districts.


Issued at 6:53 pm Wednesday, 10 December 2008.


Severe thunderstorms are likely to produce large hailstones, destructive winds, very heavy rainfall and flash flooding in the warning area over the next several hours. Locations which may be affected include Lismore, Grafton, Coffs Harbour, Armidale, Tenterfield, Casino, Kyogle, Yamba, Maclean, Woolgoolga, Sawtell and Dorrigo.


An especially severe thunderstorm was located near Lawrence (about 25 km northeast of Grafton) at 6:45pm and was moving to the north to northeast. It has been producing giant hail (larger than 5 cm diameter) and potentially destructive winds.


Another especially severe thunderstorm was located about 10 km south of Casino and is also moving towards the north-northeast. This storm is also likely to produce giant hail and possibly destructive winds.

Hail about the size of tennis balls was reported at Swan Creek (east of Grafton) at 6:15pm.
3 to 4 cm hail and winds estimated at 100 km/hr were reported at Coutts Crossing (south of Grafton) just before 6 pm.

[Michael T]

I am pretty sure that Michael has been on the Casino storm right from the start. Pretty impressive, two very obvious supercells, I bet the structure is very good.

Michael

[Rochelle Ferris]

Thank you Jimmy!  Hi everyone.  I'm in Ballina, 2478!  It's very dark here and the temperature has just plummeted.  The radar looks pretty spectacular this evening, as does the lightning tracker.  I think I should baton down the hatches.  Woohoo!

[Richary]

I'm in Narrabri at the moment and came through the developing storms on the way up from Sydney. Caught the edge of the first one at Scone, then progressively more as I headed west, and went through the last one about 40km east of Gunnedah. By this stage the severe storm warning was been given on the local radio more for areas around Armidale/Tamworth.

The development was very quick on some of these from looking menacing to starting a little bit of rain to dumping. Core punched the final two on the drive and while no hail there was certainly very heavy rain, though all quite localised. They weren't generally that lightning active at this stage though the last one dropped a couple of nice CGs. You could see where they had punched through the cap and a huge spread of cloud off the top in a NE direction indicating quite a bit of shear.

As I moved NW things calmed down, though a big one was building west of Narrabri at about 6. It or another came through town at about 8 with reasonable rain and a few CGs.

Got a few nice photos of structure and the rain cores but can't post them until I get home (or maybe on the weekend if dad has the right cable).

[Jason(pato)]

Once again I was confined to chasing in the neighbourhood (looking after kiddies). Went to the same spot as last time to watch the storm coming over. Rain eventually forced me back to the confines of my home but did manage to get a quick pic of the decaying guster as it was approaching.

   

Tryed for some lightning shots as the cell that smashed Grafton made its way up the coast to my east. Could only manage to get some dodgy crawlers, with all the CGs obscured by cloud. This is the best of the lot.

   

Hoping for something better tomorrow (shots wise). Looking forward to MBs pics as I know he was out and about chasing today.

Cheers Jason

[Michael Bath]

Had a great late afternoon chase this afternoon. I was initially tempted by the Grafton supercell but James Harris was onto that and it was a long drive. The new one developing south of Casino caught my attention shortly after I headed out.

Click pics for larger view, time is EDT.

The first few updraft pulses really struggled but the anvil was quite impressive from the outset:

5.21pm

Getting organised now:

6.08pm

From this point on the storm had a constant jet-like background noise - full of lovely hail *evil grin*   These following pics all taken halfway between Lismore and Casino:

6.38pm

Hail shaft getting close

6.43pm

Small hail was falling out of the anvil ahead of the core.

6.50pm

It then got bigger - you can see it falling in this pic:

6.50pm

Was a lot of 2-3cm hail here with isolated 4s and some random 5 or 6cm stones. At first winds were fairly light, then it got rather serious. I was under a small bus shelter thing, and had to dash back into the car.

7.05pm

The rear flank downdraft had the higher concentration of 4-5cm stones but still mostly 2-3s:

7.16pm

Back end of storm as it impacts the Nimbin area:

7.35pm




These are the views I had of the Grafton storm:

5.20pm

5.53pm

It was still coming up the coast after the other storm cleared my location.

7.16pm

I met up with James Harris and we watched a lovely display of structure and lightning, though the storms were now weakening.

7.39pm

8.00pm

Michael

[Richary]

Realised I did have the cable for the camera with me, so here are the pics from between Quirindi and Gunnedah.

Not quite sure how to edit and put the descriptions between each pic! 0202 was east of the highway at Scone, 0204 taken from the lookout at Quirindi, 0205 showing some interesting rain bands about 20km west of there on another storm. 0206 was a long way off but shows how far the top was blowing off, and 0207 was the most lightning active and the last one I core punched, with this photo taken from the rear of the storm. The final two were way off to the east from the road between Gunnedah and Narrabri.

Might help show the early stages of these storms, taken from about 2-4 pm as I travelled.

[James]

Today will be etched in my memory for a very long time. I have always wanted to watch a Supercell develop over the Dorrigo/Nymbodia area and follow it north through the Northern Rivers. Finally today I got my wish.

I started mid afternoon in Grafton watching the DP's edge towards 21c and wondering when and if the cap was going to break. It was a lot stronger than I was expecting. With every extra minute it held the more I got excited at the huge amount of CAPE that would become available later on. Re-plotting a GFS sounding for Grafton with 34/21 gave CAPE values of over 3000kj and LI's of -8 ... pretty damn nice!

Around 3pm a small line (running E-W) developed from Clouds Creek to Glenreagh. The line continued to look unorganised for the next two hours although one base caught my interest with some slight rotation and a funnel cloud as it died.

   

My attention turned to the western most base in the line. It was looking a little darker and had a good strong look to it. I was hopeful this would be the one. Thankfully it was. The base was now separate to the downdraft indicating some good organisation. Time to move closer.

 

 

I headed down to Coutts Crossing and watched the base separate from the rain curtain even further and take on a more symmetrical shape. Shortly afterwards a wall cloud developed.

 

 

Considering the storm should start moving north and increase in speed I took a gamble and core punched south of Coutts Crossing. The base was now increasing in size and looking very dark and green.

 

 

I found my way to the RFD which was now starting to circulate around the southern edge of the base. Upon entering the white rain curtain I was greeted with a blast of wind and hail around the 3-4cm mark. 5 minutes inside there was enough, it was time to move north. The cell had become a fully grown supercell and was now spinning its way north towards South Grafton. North of Coutts Crossing I was safely out of the RFD, or so I though. 10 seconds later the wind and Hail roared across the road in front of me. Tree branches were now snapping off and hail up towards 4cm was falling sporadically onto the ground. At this point I tried to find a clearing away from trees and sit it out for a few minutes whilst the main wind core moved away.

 

I quickly gave a report to the BOM (who I have been advised didn't have a warning out until that stage .... not sure why)and then proceeded north to Grafton again. The wind was still howling however the initial gusts (~100km/h) had moved on. (I was amazed at the stupidity of some people parking their cars under trees trying to protect themselves from hail as branches fell nearby.)

Finally I got out at South Grafton and headed up the highway north.  Near Ulmarra I stopped and watched the supercell advance towards me. The Supercell had now taken on the mature stage and looked nasty.

      

      

At the time this photo was taken, Swan Creek (7kms to my SW) was being hammered with reported cricket ball hail.

I continued north east trying to get out of the sporadic hail now falling out of the anvil. Finally I broke through however the views were terrible except for the back end of the Casino supercell MB was on.

      

I ended up heading all the way to Coraki and watched the supercell advance north. Behind me the Casino Supercell was spitting out some intense CG's from the anvil above.

Finally met up with Michael and watched as the two supercells finally ran out of energy.

      

     

[John Allen]

To both of you, simply wow, some love imagery there. Really nice to see a good strong CIN get overcome by some really good conditions, always will produce nice storms. That tracking of the Casino storm over its life cycle is simply awesome. James that Grafton SC looks like a beast, congrats on getting the capture you desired...now if you can just go bribe the weather gods to supply one of those to Bendigo . That second last shot James is calendar worthy, simply a most beautiful image.