06/20/11 Squall

The dry line lazily rolled closer to Wichita with a whimper of threat.  Storms were firing in Salina, but down here, wind.  Nothing seemed to be happening so I went a little north to watch the storms. 

 To the south, a single cumulus tower began to rise and soon all hell broke loose.  Before the storm even seemed to mature the National Weather Service issued a Severe Thunderstorm Warning for the area.

Clouds began stacking up on the dryline and  we had a squall line.

Hail, high wind, and lots of rain.

The line took over an hour to move thorough town.  There was wind related damage (trees, a couple roofs, and power lines), but no significant hail.

 












Afterwards mammatus clouds were very visible on the tail end of the front showing lots of turbulence up above.  The temp dropped about 25 degrees and we finally lost the blast furnace wind that hit most of the day.

Inspirational moment of the Day

Do something tomorrow that will change next week.
Do something next week that will change next month.
Do something next month that will change your life forever.

Moon

Forgot to mention the moonrise tonight.  With all our attention focused to the north, I caught a glimpse of something on the horizon.






I may try to make these into one print.

06/17/11 video

I have not sped up the film.  This is as quick as the lightning happened.

June 16th 2011 storm

I always know something's afoot when a friend texts me and asks what's going on in a certain area.
McPherson - 80mph winds, large hail, maybe rotation.  Too good to pass up.  Left the house and headed about two miles to the north and then a quick jog east.  The lightning was incredible, this storm looked very much alive and somewhat angry.

The lightning crawled all over this storm.  Constantly with the fine little bolts.
I thought about heading up to Newton to see this storm, but the way the lightning spread out from this, I didn't want to get any closer and take photos.



The storm moved slow and I did notice the anvil making progress to the south.  Before long Sedgwick Co. was under a thunderstorm warning.

I love photographing lightning with digital camera.  I know it's a functional Darwinism exercise.

Also people would drive up to the intersection and watch us for a long time.  If you do that and notice they have a camera . . . please turn off your brights (at least).

I know I look like a sasquatch with a tripod in a lightning storm.

The fronts stalled out near the city so tomorrows clash could mean more chasing.

Lightning June 9th and 16th

06/09/11 chase now with video

Video shot during wall cloud observation.