Among the most spectacular supercells I’ve ever seen, this dazzling storm cruised eastward across the nocturnal Nebraska sky, bathing itself in almost continuous light from its own furious generation engine for intracloud lightning. The storm itself took on the shape of an enormous breaking wave, while shear-induced, parallel bands of laminar low clouds (containing real waves!) accentuated the otherworldly beauty of this scene. The ground was lit, inadvertently, by the headlights of a storm-observing friend who, unknown to me, was parked about a quarter-mile to my east. Instead of being a nuisance, however, it rendered a textured foreground of light and shadow across fallow field furrows that cements the uniqueness of the composition. This shot, and another in the Majestic Supercells gallery, were but a fraction of those I took of this storm. Then, a couple of hours later into the night, but into a new day on the calendar, along came another…
1 NNW Alma NE (19 Jun 11) Looking NNW
40.1183, -99.3699“Breaking Wave” Supercell
Among the most spectacular supercells I’ve ever seen, this dazzling storm cruised eastward across the nocturnal Nebraska sky, bathing itself in almost continuous light from its own furious generation engine for intracloud lightning. The storm itself took on the shape of an enormous breaking wave, while shear-induced, parallel bands of laminar low clouds (containing real waves!) accentuated the otherworldly beauty of this scene. The ground was lit, inadvertently, by the headlights of a storm-observing friend who, unknown to me, was parked about a quarter-mile to my east. Instead of being a nuisance, however, it rendered a textured foreground of light and shadow across fallow field furrows that cements the uniqueness of the composition. This shot, and another in the Majestic Supercells gallery, were but a fraction of those I took of this storm. Then, a couple of hours later into the night, but into a new day on the calendar, along came another…
1 NNW Alma NE (19 Jun 11) Looking NNW
40.1183, -99.3699