Australian Severe Storms, Weather Events and Storm Chasing

[Antonio (stormboy)]

i took this photo of the same developing cell from Ballina not to far away from where the ones above were taken it did for a split second rain on us and when i drifted out to sea i saw a small funnel but when i got my camera it dissipated. i was a little bit dissapointed in the weather on 19/12/08 the clouds would develop anvils but dramatically dissipate

heres some pictures of the cells

[Harley Pearman]

Albury Hailstorm 18/12/2008:

The thunderstorm that went through Albury 18/12/2008 at 1.30 pm did not cause damage but appears to have caused some chaos in suburbs of Glenroy, Eastern Hill, East Albury and at the airport.

A photogallery of the event can be found at:-

http://iframe.bordermail.com.au/yg_photogallery/photogallery.asp?ixGallery=3315

Reading the Border Mail on the event, the storm lasted about 15 minutes but in a narrow path stretching from Glenroy right through to the Airport plus East Albury and Eastern Hill, it produced prolific hail to about marble size and caused hail drifts to form.

It produced enough hail for people to make snowmen.

Suburbs outside this narrow band only received a heavy downpour. Checking the rain gauge at the airport, 10.6 mm of rain fell from this storm cell. It was part of a system that brough rain and thunderstorms to this area and welcome rainfalls topped 27 mm here.

Other strong thunderstorms occurred in his region during the afternoon but they passed over rural areas and appears that they were not reported too well.

Harley Pearman

[Kristy Norman]

Hi Harley, I've tried to click on your link to see the Albury Hailstorm and it wouldn't work? They certainly did get some VERY welcome rain, that's for sure!

[Macca]

Hi all,

I managed to squeeze in an hour of storm watching on THursday night and I picked the best hour of the day for SEQ.  Fortunately (but definitely NOT a coincidence) my balcony faces SW and I had a perfect view of the storm which moved NE for a while as it developed some classic supercell structure (lit up by the nice CGs).  Of note is the first picture in this series which is a clear air CG...what is interesting is where this comes from in relation to where the main updraft is....slightly odd.

http://macca.bsch.au.com/gallery2/v/Season+08/181208/

(Note there are 2 pages of images so you'll need to click on the "2" at the bottom to get to the 2nd page).

Macca

[Michael Bath]

Brisbane radar loops for the 18th December. The early evening supercell west of Brisbane can be tracked - interesting area for that clear air CG Macca.

The hailstorm I intercepted at Kyogle around 6pm also indicates supercellular structure before the squall line comes through an hour later - some wind maxes around Kyogle again.

---> Brisbane radar loop


---> Brisbane Doppler radar loop

[Brad Hannon]

Macca, doesnt your apartment rotate to face the storms as necessary?  ;D

It certainly doesnt get much better than shooting a storm which such structure and branched CG's from the comfort of home!  I'm jealous as usual down here.

[Andrej Matko]

Macca great shots!! I love the structure here --> http://macca.bsch.au.com/gallery2/v/Season+08/181208/181208am13.JPG.html Would be cool to see this storm structure in daylight. How far away was the storm from your position? Cause I noticed that some bolts are "weird", they have orange tint to it and they don't look sharp. This happens to me, if the storm is far away, like 20+ km. Btw. what was with the white balance, did you change or did you have it on auto?

[Jimmy Deguara]

Macca,

That was a nice catch given the impressive bolts and structure. And all from a balcony. Wow!! Excellent - been an excellent year in Brisbane!

Regards,

Jimmy Deguara

[Mike]

Why chase when you have these at your doorstep!  Excellent display of power there and you would have been grinning from ear to ear!

[Harley Pearman]

Kristy84

Thank you for pointing out a mistake in my thread. You are right. I inadvertently typed in one incorrect numeral.

The correct thread to the Border Mail photogallery showing the Albury Hailstorm for 18/12/2008 is here:-

http://iframe.bordermail.com.au/yg_photogallery/photogallery.asp?ixGallery=3315

Moderators, I have no problem in any correction being made to my previous post as Kristy has pointed out an error I made. Thank you.

I should also note that on the same day 18/12/2008 two brief thunderstorms passed over Blacktown where I live. The combined rainfall total was 1.5 mm. The first storm at around 9.15 pm produced one cloud to ground lightning strike that may have hit an electricity transformer out near Prospect to my south east given that I witnessed a rather large green flash and again my area suffered a brief electricity failure / fluctuation following the strike.

The second storm following it produced a few rumbles and a shower of rain.

Harley Pearman

[Macca]

Thanks Andrej - storm was between 45km and 15km away from my place (depending on when the photo was taken - the earlier the photo the futher away).  Most of those pics are about a 50% crop too.  The white balance comment is interesting.  As the last parts of daylight were fading and for the next 20 mins the lightning was very much orange in colour (hence why i set the WB as I did).  Then after a while it seemed to change to the more bluey/purple colour as you can see in the later photos (hence why I changed the WB setting).  I've seen plenty of different coloured lightning in my time but don't recall seeing it change colour over such a short timeframe.

Jimmy - thanks.  Its been an excellent year for quantity of storms up here but in terms of quality, I'd personally say it has been somewhat lacking.  Sure there have been plenty of awesome gust fronts and a few nice lightning shows but a lot of our storms have been totally outflow dominated (definitely not my cup of tea).  Each to their own though.   >:D  Unfortunately, a lot of people have etched in their mind that we have had an horrific storm season (in terms of severity) simply due to that one storm which hit the north western suburbs back in mid-November.   But really there haven't been that many really severe storms (no massive hail, no tornadoes, etc).

As for all the balcony comments - I love it.  I'm very lucky to be able to have that view to the SW and have been waiting for days like this for a while (where I can't chase but am lucky enough to be home at the right time to see it unfold). 

Macca

[Michael Bath]

All photos I took for Thursday 18 December 2008

and Friday 19 December 2008

Yeah, it's amzing how much hype can be generated from one major thunderstorm hitting the suburbs :)

[Mike]

Visitor to the Gold Coast took these great shots whilst working there during your coastal lightning shows (early 19th Dec).  Not a bad effort! .  One of those shots is a little overexposed but in all fairness it was pretty close! Photo credits to Paul Head and Ajsa, his wife for supplying them.