Author Topic: Heavy supercells, Possible tornado : Slovenia  (Read 12669 times)

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Offline Andrej Flis

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Heavy supercells, Possible tornado : Slovenia
« on: 18 July 2008, 11:27:40 AM »
Hi all. On 13.7.2008 we had severe storms in Slovenia.


There was alot of wind and hail damage. (photos by Markuš - ZEVS forum)

Incoming





Wall cloud (photo cumulonimbus - ZEVS forum)



We would like to hear what do you think about this pictures. Was this a tornado or not? And what scale could this be?









There was also hail admage





Later this storm moved on but it was still as powerfull (photos by Pontiac - forum ZEVS)


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5KeD7o-wjgQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vfPDQcIBfGE








And the radar at this time

Possible hook echo
« Last Edit: 18 July 2008, 12:08:19 PM by Capillatus »
Time diference between Australia and Slovenia - I am 10 hours behind :):)

Offline Andrej Flis

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Re: Heavy supercells, Possible tornado : Slovenia
« Reply #1 on: 18 July 2008, 11:37:09 AM »
Hail photos can be found here (photo - Igorca)
http://forum.zevs.si/index.php?topic=1342.0


Hail was very large



Here are photos of the next day.
That day was another severe storm(on the photos), but there was no recorded damage from the funnel
http://forum.zevs.si/index.php?topic=1343.0
« Last Edit: 18 July 2008, 03:17:01 PM by Capillatus »
Time diference between Australia and Slovenia - I am 10 hours behind :):)

Offline Jimmy Deguara

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Re: Heavy supercells, Possible tornado : Slovenia
« Reply #2 on: 20 July 2008, 02:07:55 AM »
Hi guys,

Nice storms there with some inflow features on the right hand side - looks like a right moving supercell but of the HP variety. The 'funnel' is very hard to see on my monitor so I really cannot comment what it is. Was this related to the damage? The damage at first sight looks like microburst damage - house roofs lifted off and thrown forward, massive areas of forest levelled with descending air down the hill towards the house. I would need to see more pictures outlining the damage path which could include aerial shots to show the real damage patterns. I would like to see spiral damage from inflow jets etc. It looks too wide to be damaged associated with a small 'wet funnel'.

Then I take a closer look and there seems to be a tree felled leaning in a direction up the hill. Could someone indicate the direction the storm was coming from and where the damage was associated with the storm? Which way was the wind going? There seems to be a need for more photographs of the region with damage. The radar image looks very nice - pendant? There is a nice V-notch on the storm too - definitely looks  supercellular. I assume the inflow is associated with the region near this hook or pendant feature.

Any other thoughts?

Southern Europe has really copped a battering this year.

Regards,

Jimmy Deguara
« Last Edit: 20 July 2008, 02:23:21 AM by Jimmy Deguara »
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Offline Steven

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Re: Heavy supercells, Possible tornado : Slovenia
« Reply #3 on: 20 July 2008, 02:52:03 PM »
Hi Capillatus,

Tornado? Hmm, I'll be the judge and I can't see any tornadoes, and if there are any where you have highlighted, I have a hard time distinguishing them on my monitor (it could be some kind of cloud effect or scud cloud). But I agree that these storms definitely packed a punch in them and the damage that I see is either caused by microbursts or severe down drafts. Look at how the damage is scattered and splayed out over a small distance. Tornadoes usually leave a small but very destructive path don't they?

Steven

Offline Andrej Flis

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Time diference between Australia and Slovenia - I am 10 hours behind :):)

Offline Andrej Flis

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Re: Heavy supercells, Possible tornado : Slovenia
« Reply #5 on: 21 July 2008, 04:29:14 PM »
http://forum.zevs.si/index.php?topic=1343.0

Pictures in this topic are from the day after the heavy supercells.
This day was colder than day before, but still there was a funnel
Time diference between Australia and Slovenia - I am 10 hours behind :):)

Offline Jimmy Deguara

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Re: Heavy supercells, Possible tornado : Slovenia
« Reply #6 on: 22 July 2008, 11:32:59 AM »
John,

I viewed your comments with interest as you swayed back and forth:)

When you have extreme straight line wind events, and especially over hilly topography but not necessarily, you are prone to gettting eddies due to the vorticity that can arise locally. Even trees can be twisted off and snapped due to winds of an extreme nature. Tornado damage is usually quite clear in most cases - this event tends to have the hall mark of microburst written all over it. The government departments have already suggested this right? Have they got access to doppler radar?

I also asked for directions in relation to all of these pictures so all I can do is speculate unfortunately.

Regards,

Jimmy Deguara
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Offline Andrej Flis

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Re: Heavy supercells, Possible tornado : Slovenia
« Reply #7 on: 22 July 2008, 02:24:35 PM »
Yes. The governments departments have made official report that this was damage from strait line winds.

Here are pictures from air.   
http://www.sendspace.com/file/qm79dy  (NEURJE KAMNIK)

I have a question: In many houses there was debris in the walls(metal, some wood), can microburst do that?
I will try to find pictures.

The governments departments doesn't have access to Doppler radar.

Pictures of wind direction are to be found in those links.(they are currently unavailable. Some problems with the forum)

http://forum.zevs.si/index.php?topic=1351.0
http://forum.zevs.si/index.php?topic=1367.0
http://forum.zevs.si/index.php?topic=1339.0
http://forum.zevs.si/index.php?topic=1337.0
http://forum.zevs.si/index.php?topic=1336.0


I must also say that there are many people who claim they have saw a rotating column of air.

Regards,

Andrej
« Last Edit: 22 July 2008, 02:45:00 PM by Capillatus »
Time diference between Australia and Slovenia - I am 10 hours behind :):)

Offline Jimmy Deguara

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Re: Heavy supercells, Possible tornado : Slovenia
« Reply #8 on: 22 July 2008, 11:31:19 PM »
Hi John and Capillatus,

Definitely microburst based on the fanned out pattern in the tree felling specifically in a few of the photographs. The path is also rather wide suddenly which indicates that it had to be a wedge touch down and lift.

John, microbursts have been known to exceed 170km/h. Even here in Australia, the January 21 1991 supercell that devastated the norther suburbs of Turrumurra and St Ives as well as the Kuringai National Park. The wind strengths were estimated to have varied between 180 to 230km/h although engineering estimates of toppled transmission power lines suggested based on the angle 180km/h wind strengths could have done such damage.

As to the embedded debris in walls, with such power winds, microbursts can also embed objects in walls. The wind strenths in this case are of the order of F2 damage - what was this damage rated at by the way?

As John suggested, the eddies created by micrubursts can give the appearance of rotation and it is not uncommon for tornadoes to be suspected in the case of severe microbursts not excluding the 21st January 1991 event referred to above.

Having said all this, one still cannot rule out brief tornadic spinups with this storm given the hook echo and pendant.

Regards,

Jimmy Deguara
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