The “storm chase” on this day was as easy as it gets: up an elevator and onto the roof. Seen from fortuitous ringside, high atop the National Weather Center, this astonishing supercell cruised southeastward across Oklahoma City and eastern Norman, dumping copious amounts of large hail and bathing itself in glorious sunset hue. For all the supercells that have crossed these parts in the past few … [Read more...]
Mesocyclonic Winds: Twilight Tracers
The year 2024 offered a disproportionate number of late-twilight and nighttime wall clouds and tornadoes for me. I generally don't seek to chase at night, but sometimes will continue from daytime if familiar with and confident in a storm's morphology to safely route a viewing angle, with lightning behind the area of interest for illumination. In this case, the storms were slower to develop than … [Read more...]
Turquoise Divider
A striking, turquoise-colored chasm between two areas of lower cloud base hinted at the immense volumes of large hail that this storm was manufacturing aloft, between Broken Bow and Ansley. Can you see the similarities and differences in evolution between the earlier "Wild Storm" stage and this? It was a large, complex, highly dynamic and fast-moving supercell that didn't allow casual, leisurely … [Read more...]
Night Mesocyclone: Convergent, Rising Dust
A long day of driving up from Norman, and observing spectacular supercells mainly in Nebraska, concluded on the way to my motel room at night, with another one forming along a trailing part of the same outflow-reinforced baroclinic zone. Staring straight under the mesocyclone and wall cloud here, with a formidable rear-flank core at left, and given the stabilizing inflow layer, I knew this storm … [Read more...]
Rainier in Sunrise
A lightly breezy dawn feathers the lake and forest reflections of Mt. Rainier, king of all the Cascades. Getting up early for this wasn't easy, but absolutely was worth it! The sunlight and reflections evolved over the minutes into an altogether new, yet wondrous scene, and the zoomed view into the glaciers at this hour was gorgeous, memorable and special too. 20 NNE Packwood WA (15 Aug 16) … [Read more...]
Comet Tsuchinshan-ATLAS
A pretty comet with a unique mouthful of a name appeared in the sky for several mornings, then evenings, in fall 2024, barely visible to the naked eye but easily picked up in cameras. This was a post-sunset view between altostratus pieces, and just above a weakening contrail. Even with the comet's being many millions of miles away, the perspective gives an illusion of its dodging clouds to be … [Read more...]
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