SkyPix

A digital photographic storybook of clouds, weather and water by Roger Edwards.

Desert Mountain Flash

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Following a very brief but beautiful little sunset storm to the northwest, another cluster of convection developed to the north, as outflow ran up a low mountain range on the Tohono Oʼodham Indian Reservation.  This activity didn't last long either, but spit a few "striking" cloud-to-ground flashes into the higher terrain and the twilight. 7 SE Why AZ (2 Jul 21) Looking N 32.2138, -112.6322 … [Read more...]

Brock TX Tornado

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After a protracted, slow-moving spectacle of supercell structure and a couple tornadoes, the former Millsap supercell developed a new mesocyclone very close to, perhaps even somewhat over I-20, which then retreated slightly northward and deeper into the storm before producing this fuzzy, tilted, conical, sporadically multivortex tube.  Drivers were very fortunate that this supercell didn't spin … [Read more...]

Tornadic Trunk

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The Hill City tornado from 2005 is shown here with its ambient wall cloud, a couple minutes before a somewhat more-zoomed shot, using the same unknowingly and unexpectedly grainy roll of slide film.  Still, this supercell offered us a memorable afternoon of storm observing, starting with the eruption of this supercell just east of the dryline, and several miles southeast of our position at the … [Read more...]

In and Out in a Flash

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Later and to the west of a profuse round of in-cloud and cloud-to-air lightning, a few cloud-to-ground flashes decorated the trailing precipitation region of the storms to my north.   This one traveled through a tilted rain core along its path of least resistance.  A short time exposure let in only a little ambient late-twilight light, yet still blurred the moving clouds, creating a rather … [Read more...]

Twin Twilight Flashes

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Twin twilight flashes dipped in and out of a rainy thunderstorm base above a large central Kansas wind farm.  I was struck, not by the lightning (fortunately), but by the two-dimensional symmetry of these discharges above the gently arching skyline of wind-energy turbines.  The surrounding countryside and sky were darker than this, but time exposure drinks in more light, making a deep twilight … [Read more...]

3 CGs and Crawlers

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This was one of several lightning episodes I shot from in, or an easy stroll of, the small motel where I was staying for the night.  Here, seen from the building's south-facing upstairs balcony, three cloud-to-ground strikes that appeared to have a common source, and a variably bright burst of crawlers, erupted in one visually perceived flash, beyond the traffic of Interstate 10.  Horizontal red … [Read more...]