Australian Severe Storms, Weather Events and Storm Chasing

[James]

Not sure if anyone here lives out Bourke way, however tomorrow (Jan 10th) so far is looking very nice for some severe storms thanks to a good looking short wave trough moving through (And possibly another one on Sunday)

Really nice tongue of moisture pushing down from QLD with surface DP's of 18 - 20c, combine that with surface temps of around 36c with -12 at 500mb and you have an extremely unstable atmosphere, my favourite. Vertical wind shear is pretty good although I would like to see some more strength in the lowers. Lapse rates between 800 and 600 look really nice. Certainly Supercells possible with large hail and strong wind.

It's a shame the road network out there is terrible unless you have a 4WD that loves mud roads after rain.

Good luck if anyone does chase!

[Shaun Galman]

Hi James,
I think I'd be the closest forum user to Bourke here at Lightning Ridge. It's situated close enough to our West that we sometimes cop the same storms systems soon after Bourke/Brewarrina has. Worst comes to worst, we can at least see (and even photograph) the their weather from here most times.

I haven't looked at any obs. for the Upper Western area as yet but I will look into it shortly. Had a few isolated cells kicking around here yesterday but only managed to score a few brief showers late last night. Not even enough to settle the dust.

I hope you're right as far as possible supercell formation but I wouldn't hold my breath as they are EXTREMELY rare out this way. maybe only one or two every few years given the right conditions. I think I've only seen the one (but couldn't really confirm it?) which brought severe damaging winds/hail last year. Link: http://www.australiasevereweather.com/forum/australian-severe-storms-significant-weather-events-and-storm-chasing/northwest-nsw-sw-qld-storms-26-feb-1-mar-2007/20/

The roads are definitely no good out this way as you say, even in 4WD's! All the roads that do run East - West are all black soil based and will eat 4WD's after a heavy downpour lol. We are usually confined to the Castlereagh Highway or around the Ridges in town during weather. Sometimes I do get a chance to use the 30k's of bitumen road that runs to Cumborah, out to the SW of the Ridge.

If anything shows up you can be certain I'll be out in it! :D
Take care,
Shauno

[Michael Bath]

The setup around Moree is not too bad today (9th Jan). The sounding shows 3km of moisture then dry with plenty of shear, though with NE winds swinging to SW between the surface and 800hPa.

Quite a number of cells have fired across the region west of Moree to Charleville

[Shaun Galman]

Hi guys,

Michael: Just watching the storm that formed and is sitting to our North currently (4:24pm EDST) seems to be around 30k's away. It looks very weak however. Not sure the shear is holding up too well this far West? No anvil on the storm that I can see so far, haven't heard any thunder though seemed to be active on the LT over the last hour or so as it built?

Looks like a left mover (previously had a red-black core on radar) heading for Mungindi, but seems to be weakening now. Still interesting looking out west of us now with plenty of Cu towers still going up. Nothing wrong with the convection out here today that's for sure!

Collarenerbri would be the place to chase from today!

See what eventuates later-on? Very warm here currently @ 38.2ºc and a little humid but not as bad as I though it'd be today?

Kindest regards,
Shauno

[James]

I havent looked at anything since this morning however a quick check of the obs shows -1 DP in Bourke right now, don't like that at all. DP's up in the high teens to the north so these may push south through the night.

Shauno - I know what you mean about those black soil roads. In my first year of chasing I managed to get bogged between Bourke and Brewarrina whilst some big storms fired around the area in a 2WD car. I chose the black soil road as the raised red soil road next to it looked to be blocked off. Spot the city person!!! I had no idea about different soil types back then and learnt a valuable lesson for future chasing. A couple of Aboriginals came along in a classic Toyota Landcruiser and managed to pull me out, but only just.

Good luck tomorrow, hopefully you guys will see some good structure.

[Big P]

Just looking at the recent radar (10.42am) around Coonabarabran - nice storm cell with plenty of lightning showing out of it. would love to know if anyone can see the storm?

Also the BoM is forecasting possible severe storms for W NSW with a line to include Alpine VIC and the ranges here in VIC as well - from my home vantage point there is plenty of heavy Cu cloud to the north - so this topic may need to include VIC today.

Big Pete

[Antonio (stormboy)]

hey dose anybody think that the northern rivers will get hit by storms late tonight? i know they don't forecast any but the sattelite image for 5:30 shows that some large mass of cloud has developed in the west of moree area and is cell active.

[Big P]

Keep an eye out, Stormboy, anything could happen.

I have noticed as of this morning (11.45am) there were a few severe cells forming close to Omeo, VIC. Very lightning active. and also near Bairnesdale as well.
Big Pete

[Shaun Galman]

Upper Western NSW Storm Report. January 10th 2009
Hi guys,
Yesterday's storms that went through our area weren't as ferocious as I had expected, though Bourke had reports of a heavy rain deluge which did not surprise me, even though they seemed to be clocking a fair pace and looked squall-ish on radar, these were quite slow moving cells. We had a nice anvil covering us near to 4pm-ish (I wasn't watching the clock so my time might be out a little) this had rather large mamatus and stretched for some way to the NE. The main core arrived soon after from the West but I think it just missed town to the North as we only had partial showers from the time the anvil was overhead (this deterred me from heading out with the camera). Lightning was frequent but more overhead crawler through the anvil than CG's. The cell took on a greenish hue for a brief period but soon weakened as it passed town.

Hoping today throws down something a little bigger and better! :D
Take care if chasing!
Shauno

[Shaun Galman]

Hi all,
Nothing to report from the current wave of storms hitting our area of the Upper Western as yet. The cells seemed to have split around us completely, bypassing to the South and North. We have been buried under anvil but the cores have been well away from town.

On the other side of things: Russ has showed me something pretty cool that he took traveling home from Sydney somewhere halfway between Mendooran and Gilgandra around 5:30pm EDST. I laughed when I saw it as, as far as I can tell it seems to be the Mesocyclone/Updraft of an LP Supercell that was sitting out on the back of the Warrumbungles! Russ said it didn't last too long so it must have been in the weakening phase (it's a shame he didn't pass by it sooner?)
I'd be glad to take any comments on this image. I'm so wishing I was with him at the time!

Take care,
Shauno

[Richary]

Well looking at what was coming towards home tonight I wasn't expecting much. A few rumbles and flashes were happening but nothing much. Then about 8:15 there was a close strike somewhere while I was watching the cricket, and everything went dark for a fair area around including Silverwater Road and Victoria Road. Took them an hour to get the power back on, while I watched the cricket on the 5 inch portable running off the 12 volt car jumpstart kit! Also watched the lightning disappear to the north, but mostly up in the clouds.

So not expected, not worth trying to photo but interesting. Had a few mm probably but haven't gone out to check.

[Dave Nelson]

 Sunday 11th Jan   Storms

Hi Gang,
 Cindy and I chased up to Katoomba area today, photo'ed several mean looking cells, but all they did was drop rain

 We left the area around 1730EDT and after getting home saw a big cell that developed over Lithgow.  Produced
a worthy lightning show... flaming typical   1/2 hr after leaving an area it goes nutz   :

 a mass of cloud passed over home area (Paramatta - Ryde) tonite producing ~ 8 flashes, captured 2 excellent
ones on video.  no defined base to the clouds.

  We didnt lose power here in West Ryde,  Richard

cheers
Dave N

[Jimmy Deguara]

Shaun, that is a nice structure cell and although I cannot verify LP supercell without radar or timelapse etc, I can say that visually it has supercell characteristics. The lapse rates today were impressive as the upper trough progressed across central NSW.

Take note of the base of the cell (photographs 2 and 6 below) which has a suspect base as well but not the impressive characteristics as show in the photograph you posted.

Chase report January 11 2009

Dave - don't be in despair - the lightning mostly seemed to be in the core with the odd cg visible. However, having come through the storm from Bathurst (where we were in between storms), we (Imelda, Kimberly and I) turned towards the Mudgee direction and got some picturesque shots of the base structure as well as timelapse ( so I am not sure if the cell went ballistic over Lithgow with visible or embedded bolts).

Some shots below:

The first photographs are from near Bathurst of the cell near Oberon and then the cell heading to Bathurst. The last photographs including those in the following post are from the Mudgee road.

















Contrast today was nice.

Regards,

Jimmy Deguara

[Jimmy Deguara]

Further to the report, the pictures below are on the road to Mudgee near Cullen Bullen.







All photos for 11 January 2009

[Shaun Galman]

Upper Western NSW Storm Report & Photos. January 11th 2009.
Hi guys,
Yesterday's conditions held on just long enough into the afternoon/evening to let rip with a monster storm cell that built directly over town. Russ and I were watching the radar keenly (after my previous post) and marveling at the cell split that had taken place sending the storms N and S of town. Russ had a call from his parents last night saying that the storm that went to the S of us, hitting just N of Walgett (over the Collarenerbri turnoff) had blown a car completely off the road! The driver wasn't hurt luckily.
At 8pm I had noticed a bit of a base forming directly overhead and within 5mins of seeing it my father raced in and told us to grab our cameras as we had an amazing sunset lit monster updraft carrying a nice RFB! All I remember thinking was WOW! as I looked straight up at the boiling towers. No sooner had Russ mentioned we race out for a better view point than a close CG fired out of it on the edge of town. Time to grab the cameras and go!

8:15pm
This was the first time I used and needed my Sigma 10-20mm lens. All the photos are taken with it as this thing was totally enormous! The white dot on the ramp (lower right) is Russ setting up.


This was another highly active tower going up overhead. This would impact the main cell soon after but stayed highly active all night.


The first of many CG to fire out of this beast. The hail core is just breaking here and it soon became huge. I was talking to a guy that traveled in on the dirt Collarenerbri road this morning and said he encountered the hail around 8:30pm just before arriving in town, he couldn't be too accurate as far as the size but said around 1-2cm+ from what he saw on the roads.



Some of the CG were staccato-ing 6 to 8 times. It was hard to balance the settings at times to stop the bolts blowing out the photo.



This is some of the activity coming from the small cell that was impacting the main storm. This remained partially independent of the main storm all evening.


This is the point at which the storm was about to anvil. It had a weird internally illuminated, almost ultra violet/plasma blue iridescent look to the caps that I have never seen before? As you will see from the photos it remains throughout from this point. Russ and I were talking about it a fair bit at the time.