Author Topic: Central NSW Storms 6th - 8th Feb 2007 - Lithgow/Mudgee/Scone Supercells  (Read 147585 times)

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Offline David Brodrick

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Re: Central NSW Storms 6th - 8th Feb 2007
« Reply #30 on: 10 February 2007, 05:40:47 AM »
We went for a drive Narrabri/Boggabri/Mullalley/Coonabarabran/Narrabri yesterday afternoon. Before dark a few nice cells had formed in the area, such as this fella over the pilliga forest:



The LI was pushing -5 but there was very low shear so I doubt there was any rotation in the cells, but I'll offload the timelapse and have a good look tonight.

One other thing that really stood out - between Mullalley and Coona we noticed where the tornado crossed the highway two years ago. The tree damage was astonishing but there is a fair amount of regrowth now.

Regards,
  Dave

Offline scottme

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Re: Central NSW Storms 6th - 8th Feb 2007
« Reply #31 on: 10 February 2007, 07:27:39 AM »
Hi all,

I'd just like to say that the timelapse footage is superb. It really illustrates the intense inflow and rotation well.

Offline Mike

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Re: Central NSW Storms 6th - 8th Feb 2007
« Reply #32 on: 10 February 2007, 07:37:49 AM »
Jeepers.  Totally insane and textbook stuff!  Great photos and reports.  The place was going off its head by the sounds of it.  even my mate in Oklahoma viewed the soundings and LI/CAPE graphs and wanted to know if I was going to chase with you guys - well sort of if i want to drive 1800km SE to beat the cells!!!!! 

Fantastic viewing guys!  I'm envious as hades.

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Offline Harley Pearman

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Re: Central NSW Storms 6th - 8th Feb 2007 - Lithgow/Mudgee/Scone Supercells
« Reply #33 on: 10 February 2007, 11:32:34 AM »
Hello

The photographs are awesome. Fantastic pictures.

I was aware of these storms but was at work.

However, before I left work Wednesday, I was watching on the Canberra radar with Merryn a significant Supercell storm SSW of Braidwork and south of Canberra. Are there any reports on this and what it was doing? It was sustaining rainfall at the top end of the rain scale for quite some time and clearly had rotation.

It was curving NE but sustained a very large core.

Even Merryn who knows little about storms could make out rotation. There was even a smaller storm behind it that also rotated but tracked SE.

It was part of a cluster but the big supercell referred to was at the northern edge of this cluster. Any reports on this storm would be worthwhile especially given its size.

I was watching the Blue Mountains storms as well. While I could not get out to chase them I was rewarded with a beautiful sunset and mammatus formations at sunset which I photographed. Normally I do not photograph these but in this instance, the light, sun angle and the brilliance of colours and reds made it worthwhile.

Harley Pearman




Offline Jimmy Deguara

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Re: Central NSW Storms 6th - 8th Feb 2007 - Lithgow/Mudgee/Scone Supercells
« Reply #34 on: 10 February 2007, 12:23:21 PM »
Hi Harley,

First, conventional radar do not exhibit rotation although they exhibit features that may be linked to rotation. I am not suggesting it was not a supercell, but we must be careful about labelling storms as such without evidence of perhaps deviant motion or features such as a hook echo.

The other important point is that I believe the Canberra radar over estimates it's echos making the storms look far more impressive than they really are. I made this comment on the thread on last Saturday's 3rd February storms - comparing one storm with two radars getting two different intensities.

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Jeff Brislane

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Re: Central NSW Storms 6th - 8th Feb 2007 - Lithgow/Mudgee/Scone Supercells
« Reply #35 on: 11 February 2007, 03:15:30 AM »
Jimmy,

Is it a case of over estimation or could it be simply that it's a new radar with better resolution than the old Sydney Radar.

Jeff.
« Last Edit: 11 February 2007, 03:22:50 AM by Jeff Brislane »

Offline Jimmy Deguara

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Re: Central NSW Storms 6th - 8th Feb 2007 - Lithgow/Mudgee/Scone Supercells
« Reply #36 on: 11 February 2007, 03:35:23 AM »
Hi Jeff,

You possibly could be correct but that would be embarassing if Sydney (population 4 million) is using an old style radar. I am open to any other suggestions but I know that both radars are not reading the same into the same storms.

I wanted to also suggest that since then I saw radar of the cell Harley refers to. It is very linear and does not seem to indicate supercellular behaviour. Certainly the claims of observing rotation on radar is certainly unfounded.

I have spoken to Harald Richter to get some higher resolution scans of the supercell. He suggests that he can pick out 2 supercells on the day so it will be interesting which ones they were.

Regards,

Jimmy Deguara
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Offline vrondes

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Re: Central NSW Storms 6th - 8th Feb 2007 - Lithgow/Mudgee/Scone Supercells
« Reply #37 on: 11 February 2007, 05:49:32 AM »
Jimmy,David and Paul,
Very impressive timelapse and stills of the Lithgow supercell. On a day where the atmosphere is exhibiting such a dynamic setup, how do you decide which location will give you the opportunity that combines all the ingredients so brilliantly as Lithgow?.
The rotation in that storm is so fluid and organised, it is a joy to watch. Rotation in nature whether it be floodwater whirlpools or classic supercells is a discovery process for us all to enjoy.
Cheers to you all, Con.

Offline David C

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Re: Central NSW Storms 6th - 8th Feb 2007 - Lithgow/Mudgee/Scone Supercells
« Reply #38 on: 11 February 2007, 11:01:36 AM »
If you take a look at the Sydney radar loop I think you might be right Jeff. The supercell that we chased was producing 6 cm hail although radar reflectivities were not really indicative of the storm's intensity for the most part. I don't think attentuation, due to other storms being in the path of the beam, should have been a problem.....at least until near it's demise when the southern storm merged with it and disrupted it.

I think conditions last Wednesday favoured large hail and Canberra radar reflected that.

Regarding Haralds ID of two supercells: There was an interesting storm that tracked southeast in the Mudgee area and a few on the southern tablelands that looked interesting. I'm not convinced that the Merriwa stuff was supercellular, although was intense. Clearly multi-cellular behaviour until east of town -- cell merger there and larger updraft develops.....possible HP which tracked just to the south of Scone. These are my impressions based on the radar.
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Offline Harley Pearman

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Re: Central NSW Storms 6th - 8th Feb 2007 - Lithgow/Mudgee/Scone Supercells
« Reply #39 on: 13 February 2007, 11:29:01 AM »
Jimmy

Thank you for your answer. It was certainly an interesting storm cell that I was watching on the Canberra Radar.

If you do get further advice, I was watching it between 4.45 pm to 5.15 pm Wednesday night and it was showing an intense storm south of Canberra during that time (Then again, I hope the radars are actually picking up what is really going on).

I am aware that two different radar observations can give two different views of storms and rain cells and I see that when looking at the Sydney and Newcastle radar.

Harley Pearman

Jeff Brislane

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Re: Central NSW Storms 6th - 8th Feb 2007 - Lithgow/Mudgee/Scone Supercells
« Reply #40 on: 13 February 2007, 02:19:51 PM »
Two other possible factors that came to my mind were the elevation of the Canberra Radar and the fact that it often has a clearer veiw of the back of storms to it's north than the Sydney raday would by looking more westerly.

Some pics from the 7th

Beaver Tail


Supercell Updraft post Hail


Mud, debri and flooding over road plus hail fog


Mammatus and Sunset


More Sunset


Lightning


More Mammatus








Offline Rodney Wallbridge

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Re: Central NSW Storms 6th - 8th Feb 2007 - Lithgow/Mudgee/Scone Supercells
« Reply #41 on: 15 February 2007, 05:24:25 PM »
Hi all, I have finally had a moment to sit down and post some comments about this day. 7th Feb was a group chase With Dave-wx, Flip, Shane, lil Ben and Ben from South Australia who specially drove over to chase for a few days with us. Thankyou to Michael Bath who has hosted all of my pictures from this day.
                 The day for me started off from Bathurst with the sky pumped full of accas everywhere at 9am or so after I woke from a late night out chasing south of there. We fired up my one week old laptop and began with a sat picture which certainly showed the Victorian cloud mass from the previous day encroaching on the Goulburn area, which was almost visible to our far SW in amongst left over previous nights storm activity. It was decided we should get going and move north to Mudgee and get another look at the sat picture there. While having lunch in Mudgee congestus was really building up with lots of other unstable clouds to our east. We decided to make haste to Cassilis as road options east west and north were good and gave a reasonable chance to stay with the storm. The trough line was NNW SSE oriented so small cumulus fields were visible just to the west of our target area on the lunchtime sat picture.
                  After arriving at the Golden Highway intersection with the Mudgee road we proceeded west for about 6kms and found a nice spot to get off the road safely for three cars. Small congestus towers were now clearly visible to our west. These first storms appeared high based but not short on moisture - nice thick anvils persisted all the time. After a while it became apparent that the northern most cell was getting a huge RFB and began to dominate and move forward feeding on the reasonable sfc inflow of about 10knts.
                  This storm proceeded eastwards and encountered a small range west of Merriwa which IMO could have helped this storm with some orographic assistance. Intensifying rapidly, numerous CGs were now powering and suddenly outflow was visible by a dust plume along the ground in front of the storm. A guster was rapidly forming. One of the cars behind us then yelled in the radio Gustnado! and we all were really excited at seeing one so close!
                  This storm now began its RFB lowering development near or just east of Merriwa. Lots of turbulent looking areas and heaps of greenage (Vault region). Still once again powerful CGs visible but couldn't linger as we didn't want to get swallowed up by a duster guster :).
                   Now we proceeded non stop to Scone and at times blasted by severe outflow winds from the storm's NE flank. I started using my A530 out the window in vain attempts to capture a rather well organised storm. After showing these to MB he also commented on a meso/wallcloud like feature amongst them which I had seen in them too.
                   Now through Scone and heading north to escape any chance of a direct hit from its core we still had to battle severe outflow winds and dust which managed to blow down a small tree and a large branch. Flanking line with pileus leading to the Storm to the right of the frame.
                   I think the storm was powerful enough to have at some stage an organised appearance and perhaps was long lived enough to be of a multicell at the start and a singular cell for a good part of its passage from Merriwa eastwards. A link of all Images for that day is here:

http://australiasevereweather.com/rodney/photos/2007/rw20070207.html
« Last Edit: 16 February 2007, 03:51:45 AM by Michael Bath »

Offline David C

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Re: Central NSW Storms 6th - 8th Feb 2007 - Lithgow/Mudgee/Scone Supercells
« Reply #42 on: 15 February 2007, 05:56:13 PM »
Top stuff Rodney,  and the gustnado is just amazing!

Still on this event,  I have put a rough cut of video of the chase up at:

http://www.australiasevereweather.com/video/movies/flash_video/2006-2007_stormchasing.htm

Beware it is a very large file, so do consider that before viewing. Unfortunately it does get a tad pixelated at times, I have not attempted to optimise it yet.

Hi Con, yes I guess you have to weigh up the merits of the different areas. There were several possible targets though, for supercells, southern extent was considerably more favourable. Once storms develop  it is a question of observing the near storm environment.


 
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Offline Brad Hannon

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Re: Central NSW Storms 6th - 8th Feb 2007 - Lithgow/Mudgee/Scone Supercells
« Reply #43 on: 15 February 2007, 06:23:39 PM »
Great video David - I enjoyed that.  That was indeed very impressive rotation and timelapse.  How long were you guys onto this cell?  Were there any specific variables that could've been better on the day for tipping this cell over into producing a tornado?
hmmm June 2nd......

Offline Jimmy Deguara

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Re: Central NSW Storms 6th - 8th Feb 2007 - Lithgow/Mudgee/Scone Supercells
« Reply #44 on: 16 February 2007, 06:25:17 AM »
Jeff, that supercell updraft showing it leaning is quite nice. I recall on your digital camera screen showing the striations a little more. I was talking to David and wandering whether this looked like an "Independence Day" structure. What are people's thoughts?

David the video does well to show the whole perspective of the storm chase from beginning to end. Storm chasers can be a little camera shy I guess haha.

Rodney, great gusnado again and the storm produced some erratic lightning behaviour - great to capture!

Regards,

Jimmy Deguara
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