Storm Australian Severe Weather Forum
Severe Weather Discussion => Australian Severe Storms, Weather Events and Storm Chasing => Topic started by: Mathew Townsend on 19 January 2011, 04:48:46 AM
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What a morning!!! Very hot and humid start for today with beautiful seabreezes in early (not too strong though)! Some places already hit 30s already. I just looked at the stormcast and there may be some severe storms across the region for heavy rainfalls and large hail due to plenty moisture and dryness in the uppers. Due to this heat these storms may be electrical!
Happy chasing day one :)
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I saw SE QLD had been severe warned again when I got home about 5:30 Sydney time. The radar from Brisbane showed a few nice cells, one of which suddenly turned a nice black and presumably did a severe dump of rain/hail over somewhere called Crows Nest NW of Brisbane (and probably in the Wivenhoe catchment). Hopefully most places just got enough rain to help clean the streets a bit of all the flood sludge.
Channel 9 weather in Sydney did mention reports of 4cm hail in SEQ this afternoon, and Channel 10 late news is about to show storms from Ipswich this afternoon.
The channel 10 report mentions winds of up to 95kph hitting Brisbane's west, with downed trees and 23000 homes losing power.
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Severe weather still hang around though!
Ballina had 14mm from that heavy semi stationary shower this morning at dawn. I think the convection has already started since dawn (thats how the showers to pop up earlier than usual). Now looking at today conditions, lifted index of -6 and CAPE around 1900 is very widespread. Looks like some storms would be severe due to slow moving process.
At the moment its very extremely muggy and humid hot conditions, currently at 26.8/24.8 and feels like 29.3. Certainly felt like Townsville!
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Been a very noisy and slow moving cell Lismore and surrounds. Lots of CGs by the sounds of the thunder. We are up 15mm and there was small hail (to half a cm) before.
Probable supercell passed near Dorrigo, Bellingen area. Jimmy is on it so will get some reports later
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Hi Michael
I just took a great example picture of mid level clouds appearing extreme instability outside. Days like this visual have a best chance of storminess in the area.
I can see alot of backbuilding stuff behind Lismore cell however they appear doing different direction than the main cell heading for Mullumbimby. Coraki cell may have a chance to come nearer the coast like down at Coffs which is doing the coastal movement (similar to 18/12/1998).
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Can't wait to see if Jimmy got some nice images today. The storms on the Mid North Coast have been interesting with a left moving cell from an earlier split near Comboyne going north east across the wind flow and crossing the coast at Nabucca Heads, then the right mover split again producing a stronger right moving cell that just passed through Wingham heading south south east. Awesome!
Jeff.
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Probable supercell passed near Dorrigo, Bellingen area. Jimmy is on it so will get some reports later
The Bureau storm warning mentions reports of golf ball sized hail at Thora this afternoon (just to the west of Bellingen). Also 54mm of rain in 30 minutes near Kempsey.
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Here nice article about the storms locally.
King tide may flood Ballina
(http://media.apnonline.com.au/img/media/images/2011/01/19/LNS_20-01-2011_EGN_05_LNS2005A_t325.jpg)
A KING tide will hit the coast early tomorrow, with the Richmond River at Ballina set to peak at 2m just after 10am.
The high tide is expected to force sea water up through the drains and flood low-lying parts of the town, including Tamar Street and Burns Point Ferry Road.
Ballina Shire Council has warned drivers to take care if driving through water.
Other areas which could be affected include Canal Road, Riverside Drive, North Creek Road, Uralba Road, Old Bangalow Road at Tintenbar, and the Pacific Highway at Cumbalum.
Tides for the Richmond River mouth would be higher than average for the rest of this week, with a 1.8m tide early on Saturday.
Meanwhile, yesterday’s severe stormy weather had coastal residents more than a little worried.
Dave Heggie, secretary of Ballina Tourism and Hospitality, took this photograph (left) of what he believes was a water spout or tornado forming over Lennox Head.
In June of last year a water spout crossed on to land at Lennox Head and became a tornado, causing massive destruction through the village.
“All morning there was a dark mass of cloud hanging over Ballina and Lennox,” Mr Heggie said.
“My wife and I went swimming at Lake Ainsworth and we saw what looked like a water spout, or tornado, forming up Broken Head way.
“But it seemed to dissipate.
“We were driving home when I saw that it was forming again, so I took this photo. Twenty seconds later it had disappeared, thankfully.”
The Bureau of Meteorology issued a severe thunderstorm warning for the Northern Rivers yesterday afternoon.
Almost 50mm of rain fell in just 30 minutes at Corndale, north of Lismore, at about 2pm.
More storms are forecast for today.
http://www.northernstar.com.au/story/2011/01/20/king-tide-may-flood-ballina-streets-richmond-river/ (http://www.northernstar.com.au/story/2011/01/20/king-tide-may-flood-ballina-streets-richmond-river/)
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Ballina airport had 37mm last night however downtown recorded the most of 89mm where i am. The falls are insanely incredible and it teasing me too much! I havent upload pictures of beautiful structures yet from yesterday! More storms ahead now, i can hear thunder from cell in west moving nowhere due to lack of shear!
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Man I missed the start of the bello storm, that will teach me for having an afternoon nap. I woke to thunder and raced out the door I could see the base of the storm hidden behind the hills but it seemed to be weakening. I tried to get ahead of it to intercept near woolgoolga. I arrived just ahead of the storm and took some shots here of the gustfront and rain. it went out to sea and so I made the drive to grafton hoping for another nice storm but only encounterd weaker stuff, also meant I couldnt get to the Nambucca possible supercell. I'm glad I'll be able see the structure from Jimmy from the bellingen one :) my computer is down so I can't post pics of what I did get (I'm on my phone).
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Hi guys,
A few nice storms kicking off around the place!
Just keeping an eye on a few "smaller" ones around us here, both visually (sitting out to our NE) and on radar. We are almost isolated by major flood waters so I don't have much else to do, not that that's a bad thing :)
Kindest regards and take care if out chasing!
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Hi,
I will post the images of the cell but to put in perspective, you are talking the cloud base being just above Dorrigo and the low cloud hindering any structure view! But I do have some video that can be placed online.
Regards,
Jimmy Deguara
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Look forward to seeing the video Jimmy!!! Shane, Phil and I got onto the right mover near Taree. Thought we had busted till this storm formed and caught us majorly by surprise!!! A large amount of structure was covered by low cloud also, but when it became visible it was certainly not impressive. By the time finally got a decent view of it was weakening but suggested there may have been a wall cloud present prior with a highly organised rotating base on the correct side of the storm. Radar echos were also impressive. We briefly got caught in the core just outside Wingham and received 4-5cm with the odd 6cm stone, adding more dents to Phils car, and some strongish outflow at 70-80kmh. There was decent inflow into the storm which surprised us considering at first it looked like a gustfront
Storm early in it's lifecycle. 20 minutes later we got the 4-6cm hail
(http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5124/5369622161_fc5ac5a45f_m.jpg)
Large (http://www.flickr.com/photos/28009095@N05/5369622161/#)
Before we got smashed by more 3cm hail
(http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5163/5369622093_b62c575822_m.jpg)
Large (http://www.flickr.com/photos/28009095@N05/5369622093/#)
Onto the pacific highway near Nabiac where the storm rapidly weakened, but nonetheless had a big base with rotation
(http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5087/5370229208_7d6fa579b9_m.jpg)
Large (http://www.flickr.com/photos/28009095@N05/5370229208/#/)
Shane uploaded some video of the hail also Hail storm - 19th January 2010 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BmfU7VMF9OI#ws)
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Hey guys - looks awesome! Well done! More structure there than I was able to achieve haha!
Dorrigo storm and hail - video later.
(http://www.australiasevereweather.com/photography/photos/2011/0119jd24.jpg)
(http://www.australiasevereweather.com/photography/photos/2011/0119jd28.jpg)
(http://www.australiasevereweather.com/photography/photos/2011/0119jd31.jpg)
(http://www.australiasevereweather.com/photography/photos/2011/0119jd33.jpg)
(http://www.australiasevereweather.com/photography/photos/2011/0119jd36.jpg)
I observed quite a few stors in the Dorrigo Ebor region and then opted out later in the day to head for the inland. At Uralla, we got another hailstorm with copious amounts of hail for about 10 to 15 minutes. Earlier, this was the storm. Nice inflow into the storm consolidated the shelf cloud structure.
(http://www.australiasevereweather.com/photography/photos/2011/0119jd82.jpg)
Interesting feature!
(http://www.australiasevereweather.com/photography/photos/2011/0119jd89.jpg)
Regards,
Jimmy Deguara
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I'm glad you got some footage of that Storm near Wingham, Ben. It was a nice looking storm and quite slow moving and long lasting as well which makes for good prolonged chasing. Very interesting.
Jimmy I can't wait to see some video, the pictures hint at a strong storm over the Dorrigo plataeu.
Jeff.
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Thanks for posting those pics Jimmy :) seems like it might have been a frustrating position on that side of the storm and being on the plateau itself would have prevented you from chasing it off the mountain? Where were the hail pics taken?
This is how the storm looked further up the coast as it went out to sea..
(http://i27.photobucket.com/albums/c172/enak12/IMG_3602.jpg)
(http://i27.photobucket.com/albums/c172/enak12/IMG_3608.jpg)
(http://i27.photobucket.com/albums/c172/enak12/IMG_3606.jpg)
After this storm I noticed others developing on the ranges behind it and went to Grafton. Along the way the storm from earlier seemed to reorganise a bit off the coast and I got occasional glimses of it but there was really no where to pull over on this stretch of the highway and the road veers awaay from the coast to the NW. In Grafton I watched this other storm develop on the south side of town..
(http://i27.photobucket.com/albums/c172/enak12/IMG_3631.jpg)
(http://i27.photobucket.com/albums/c172/enak12/IMG_3632.jpg)
(http://i27.photobucket.com/albums/c172/enak12/IMG_3642.jpg)
(http://i27.photobucket.com/albums/c172/enak12/IMG_3643.jpg)
(http://i27.photobucket.com/albums/c172/enak12/IMG_3650.jpg)
I had to leave now to pick up my girlfriend from work back in Coffs...
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Hi guys,
Here is a video from the Dorrigo possible supercell.
Dorrigo Hailstorm 19th January 2011 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HA-GFHb3be4#ws)
Regards,
Jimmy Deguara
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Storm Chase 22nd January 2011
I decided to head down to near Cooma early. Storms did develop but they were ordinary and high based. It was anticipated that moisture would be in the area by say 2pm. After exploring one of the cells on the hills, I left it and head back south of Cooma. There were storms to the north along the eastern range and of course struggling cells to the south.
One cell exploded as the moisture fed into the base. Te transition into an organised cell was rapid with inflow features observed. There were two cells that seem to be on the same line. But it was the front cell that dominated. During this period, the northeast inflow was fresh and persistent. Eventually this cell began to weaken though perhaps due to loss of sufficient heating being there too many anvils.
I gradually headed north keeping watch of any cell but all cells were way too high based. On the way back and just prior to Goulburn, I observed drifts of hail measured to about 2cm.
The followig is a sequence of images of this cell
(http://www.australiasevereweather.com/photography/photos/2011/0122jd43.jpg)
(http://www.australiasevereweather.com/photography/photos/2011/0122jd45.jpg)
(http://www.australiasevereweather.com/photography/photos/2011/0122jd48.jpg)
(http://www.australiasevereweather.com/photography/photos/2011/0122jd49.jpg)
(http://www.australiasevereweather.com/photography/photos/2011/0122jd53.jpg)
(http://www.australiasevereweather.com/photography/photos/2011/0122jd60.jpg)
(http://www.australiasevereweather.com/photography/photos/2011/0122jd62.jpg)
(http://www.australiasevereweather.com/photography/photos/2011/0122jd65.jpg)
(http://www.australiasevereweather.com/photography/photos/2011/0122jd69.jpg)
Regards,
Jimmy Deguara
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here's some very brief video highlights of both friday's chase to eden/bega/moruya , and also saturdays chase with pingtang between braidwood and goulburn.
SE NSW STORMS JAN 21,22 2011 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U3uN1E3-t8U#)
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I am glad somebody chased that lightning fest the other day. And the structure on that storm I assume on the way to Goulburn looks nice and consolidated!
Great stuff!
Here is the video of the Nimmitabel severe structured storm.
Structured severe storm Nimmitabel (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E9fffQ9CnEs#ws)
Regards,
Jimmy Deguara
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Storm chase Moss Vale / Goulburn / Crookwell 22/1/2011
Saturday afternoon, I chased storms around Moss Vale on the Southern Highlands. Storms developed around Moss Vale not long after midday.
There were three storm cells that developed with one to the south, one to the south west and one to the west. The one to the west appeared weak and struggled to consolidate. The one to the south west looked more interesting but the one to the south as seen in my photos below was the most interesting. After taking the photos, I chased it to Bundanoon where I was able to sample the core and mainly heavy rainfall. I did notice that in rural areas just west of Bundanoon, allot of rain had fallen due to the amount of water on and off to the side of the road.
The storms eventually collapsed and looking south, I was aware of another storm. I then drove south to Goulburn where I intercepted a storm coming up from the south. I went up to Anzac Hill Lookout and watched the storm develop further and took some great photos. On separate threads, I am going to post photos of structure. I post a photo of what appears to be a funnel cloud although can someone please comment on the photos and try and determine what was going on and what I was looking at.
I then decided to intercept this storm by travelling north west on the Crookwell Road. North west of Goulburn,I intercepted the core of this storm and some torrential rain that made driving tough. I was reduced to 30 km/h at times due to rainfall. I had two bursts of hail although relatively small, I did pass a locality where there were hail drifts although I could not get out of the car to verify the size. The hail looked small and I would have to estimate from pea size to 2 cm or under. The rain was too heavy and there was too much water on the side of the road to stop anywhere that was safe. I did experience high winds at times and bark and leaves were being stripped off trees.
It appears there was a second storm just to the north of the first storm. I drove into it with more torrential rain and water cascading over the road at times. There was cloud to ground lightning and I experienced another burst of hail, again roughly similar in size to the first storm. I made it to Crookwell where I saw allot of water over the roads. I then drove north east to a tiny township called Laggan where my chase came to an end due to a flooded road. The storm cell rapidly went into decline. I was content and after taking photos of the flooded road, I decided to make my return trip back to Sydney via Goulburn.
The photos of the Moss Vale storm are attached below. The photos of the storm at Goulburn are attached on separate posts.
Harley Pearman
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Photos of Goulburn Storm 22/1/2011
Please find attached a sequence of photos that I took from Anzac Hill at Goulburn Looking south west. I am not sure what was going on. Any comments? In photo number 4, there appears to be a funnel on the left hand side below the base of the storm. I did note that this part of the storm had a rain free base for a while. I did see clouds forming and merging into the base. I did not see any lightning in this part of the storm while watching this. I took numerous photos for my curiosity and I post 8 photos for viewing.
Regards
Harley Pearman
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Goulburn storm (Final four photos 22/1/2011
The final photos of the same storm are attached. I can only place four per post due to the resolution of my photos.
Regards
Harley Pearman
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Hi Harley,
Absolutely awesome structure there! I am glad you got in front of the storm and let us know what it looked like. Nice striations there.
There is a feature in the 4th photograph - can you post a timelapsed video? Otherwise, did you see any rotation? How long did it last? This feature is behind the gust front and seems to be rsulting from cold outflow.
(Harley, you can reduce the resolution of the pictures for web viewing 900 x 600 and small file sizes).
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Excellent structure on the Goulburn storm. I used to like heading out to the lookout in Goulburn and watching the development from there. Interesting feature in photo four. It does look like a small funnel but the position of it seems a bit funny to me. Looks like there is some strong outflow directly below the possible funnel. Can really see the precipitation getting blown sideways in quite a few of those photos. Were damaging winds reported anywhere from this storm?
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Goulburn storm 22/1/2011
Thank you Jimmy.
I did not take any video of this although I was trying to get lightning from another part of the storm by taking short video snippets earlier. The structure seen I found most unusual and I was amazed. The whole base did not appear to show rotation and the lowerings and ramparts were brief to say the least. In many cases, I was lucky to get one photo. Photo 4 - I could only obtain one photo. It was brief too. Looking at it, it appears to be a funnel or something but it was not sustained for too long.
In much of this, I was noticing cloud building below the base, then briefly rotate before merging into the base. I was timing my photos to get the best I could. I was able to photograph the whole event. I did see a shelf cloud push north towards me ahead of the rain to the east of this structure but it was not significant. I also noticed that once the shelf cloud raced toward me, much of the storm was in decay except the north west portion.
Another feature of this storm is that I was hearing constant thunder rumbling from the anvil shield near and above me. This was continuing even when I left to chase it.
However this structure started to end just as I was leaving Anzac Hill. There was a second storm to the north west that was travelling north. It appears that the north west portion of this storm came too close to that other storm and eventually merged with it. I did experience two storms between Goulburn and Crookwell that were very close together with only a brief break in between and both produced hail.
It certainly showed some great structure and proved to be a significant storm in terms of the weather conditions I experienced along the Crookwell Road towards Crookwell.
Harley Pearman
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Wow there is some great images and videos from the last few days. LC, Harley and Jimmy - awesome stuff! Jimmy the Nimmatabel video timelapse has some lovely structure. Looks like a nice bit of rotation in the low-mid levels half way through too.
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Some great photos and reports, well done!!! The original plan today was to head further down the coast well west of Bega, but a last minute decision saw us heading towards Braidwood( slack shear was the main reason behind this decison).
Our first storm of the day occured west of Araluan where we witnessed a scrappy line from a distance.This chucked out the occasional distant CG but little else. This line died gradually but a rain free base on the northern edge of it caught our attention.
This RFB transformed from base to duluge in a matter of minutes This was taken 2kms south of Braidwood just as the storm was becoming organised. To the right you can see another RFB which was the beginnings of the Braidwood to Nerriga storm. To the left is what I suspect the right mover.
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v168/pingtang100/_MG_0794edit.jpg)
We headed towards Bungendore. We pulled over 10kms northwest of Braidwood and grabbed some more footage. Heaps of pulsating cgs were available at this stage as well as a brief wall cloud and inflow bands. There appeared to be some rotation in the base at one stage.
We hit the road again and this was the view as we headed towards Bungendore!!
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v168/pingtang100/_MG_0811edit.jpg)
We continued another 5kms after this shot before pulling over and taking the shot below.
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v168/pingtang100/_MG_0816edit-1.jpg)
We wanted to see what was in this thing so we let the core pass overhead. Most of the time the hail was only 2cms, however we had a few minute patch where 2-4cm stones started falling.In the heat of the chase we thought a few may've been approaching 5cms, but we highly doubt this now. But I can assure you 3-4cms without any doubt, though the biggest ones were few and far between. Quite nice hail though! Was it a supercell? I doubt it, despite showing some really nice features at times.
We the got onto another cell near Bungendore but this was much weaker. Nethertheless some nice bolts some approx 500metres away with nice thunder.
Unfortunately the Braidwood/ Bungendore area was getting cluttered by numerous cells and the atmosphere was getting de-caped. The radar revealed a big storm near Collector heading for Goulburn. We attempted to catch this storm and got within 15kms, but we were on the wrong side of the storm and never saw any structure. The storm merged into a complex of weaker storms near Crookwell where we picked up some more CGs. We also noted heaps of leaf litter north of Goulburn and some left over hailstones.
A fairly fun chase overall, but nothing too amazing.
Will post some video in the coming days.
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Hi Pintang,
A fairly fun chase overall, but nothing too amazing.
I think you are being hard on yourself here. This is pretty amazing with high contrast photography - photographer's and chaser's dream. I was hoping you guys got into position to show this structure! Well done - seriously! (This is the sad reality of people having to measure up because of the term 'supercell' - a good storm be it multicell or supercell from perfect position makes for an excellent frame - period!
Most of the time the hail was only 2cms, however we had a few minute patch where 2-4cm stones started falling.In the heat of the chase we thought a few may've been approaching 5cms, but we highly doubt this now.
Excellent! That is larger than from the northern cell and this cell qualifies as a possible supercell from what I can see structure wise and you said there was a storm split.
Was it a supercell? I doubt it, despite showing some really nice features at times.
I would not doubt it at all and I think it is a contender. I have not seen radar but from the structure alone and given the conditions on the day, there was marginal environment sufficient for at least brief rotating storms. Vorticity along boundaries can be enhanced and you do have a wall cloud intwo pictures. I wish you guys would get some timelapse - even a dash moubt on this event would have been sufficient. But of course who is talking that does not have a dash mount himself.
The seocnd photo is also interesting and it seems like some inflow feature above the wall cloud feature. How long did the wall clouds last?
Anyway, excelelnt footage of a high contrast severe storm possible supercell!
Regards,
Jimmy Deguara
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Hey Jimmy,
Heres the radar loop from the day. It makes for some interesting viewing.
http://www.theweatherchaser.com/radar-loop/IDR403-canberra/2011-01-21-23/2011-01-22-23 (http://www.theweatherchaser.com/radar-loop/IDR403-canberra/2011-01-21-23/2011-01-22-23)
Thanks for the comments!!!!! I agree, I was a tad hard on myself. Considering I nearly targeted the Bega to Bomala reigon I should consider myself very lucky. Im glad we got onto this cell! the Goulburn storm was covered almost completely so it was good to get onto a different cell! Its one of those storms where you look back at the footage and appreciate it even more.
Regarding that supercell/mulitcell comment, I completely agree with that.
In regards to supercell I should've said possible instead of doubtful. Given such a wall cloud,and the presence of some 4cm stones, you'd have to think its possible. I was dubious because of the shear, but i'm well aware that supercells do occasionally occur in marginal shear enviroments.
We witnessed two separate wall clouds. The first was very brief maybe lasting a minute or two. Unfortunately theres no footage of this, as we were driving down a crappy road and it dissapated before our eyes. The second wall cloud lasted for atleast 10minutes at a conservative guess. Pics 2 and 3 show the same wall cloud,and its not far away in the first pic!
Anyway I've posted a video. Enjoy.
Regards
Michael
Possible supercell and lovely wall cloud( Braidwood, NSW) (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j86D9RNd2aA#ws)