I was awoken from an afternoon nap by the unfamiliar sound of deep rumbles to the west. 3pm, and a developing storm out penrith way revealed a well defined anvil rim extending like a blanket over parramatta out to the coast. overhead features of well defined mammatus were complimented by some structure over the cell core in the form of a brief display of an inflow band. So as Jeff had described earlier, the storm certainly displayed some decent structure. It did dissipate quite quickly after 4pm. Instability in the atmosphere was still evident around 5pm with the northern sky again displaying some nice downward convection in the form of mammatus offset by some castellanus to the west.
Sunset revealed further decaying mammatus clouds and fibrous anvil remnants over the coast to our east. To the western sky and the area between Blacktown and Penrith a cell was developing with a high base but not much definition in the base. The onset of twilight though, exposed an intra-cloud flash of sheet lightning. Well that was the trigger to get this dormant storm photographer into go mode. A reserve near home was my best vantage point to capture the lightning which by now, 8pm was becoming quite active. It was in an arc between Blacktown and Castle Hill. Some lovely c.g's around blacktown and anvil spikes to the north gave way to further cg's between the Hills district and Hornsby. Strikes were very brief with little or no pulsing. Rain was disappointing with just a few spots out of the anvil. Lightning was frequent, every 2-3 seconds . This was a welcome event in a rather passive storm season thus far .The day's features certainly proved that our atmosphere is alive and still dynamic , albeit too briefly. Looking forward to seeing your photographic efforts from the day too Jeff, Cheers, Con.
