SkyPix

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

“Ground-Scraping” Wall Cloud

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Menacing as it looks, this extremely low wall cloud never produced a tornado, and was only weakly rotating through most of its lifespan.  The feature sometimes extended below the visible horizon, and likely was drawing condensation right off ground level in brief intervals.  Seen from anything but a hilltop perspective, an inexperienced spotter at this distance might have been fooled.  Wall clouds … [Read more...]

Small Multicell

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Arising on a boundary left behind by earlier and long-deceased convection, this cumulonimbus erupted shortly before sunset, wearing a brilliant crown of glaciated anvil material visible prominently from the National Weather Center.  Soon, this storm also collapsed and dissipated in a huge heave of stable outflow.  The anvil pointing toward the WSW, the backshear pointing E, and the time of year … [Read more...]

The Inspirational Cascade

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Rare and deeply treasured are those moments in life that are both inwardly and outwardly so beautiful and transcendent, that all sense of self, time and worldly distractions effortlessly evaporate into the ether of awestruck wonder.  At that time and from this vantage, Seljalandsfoss swept me so fully into that moment, over and over in continuum, as if I were recursively riding each drop that … [Read more...]

Stuck Astern

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After this supercell produced several tornadoes, including one classic cone, it jumped flanks and leapfrogged southeastward into a road void, the hail core and hook blocking  our only east and southeast options, leaving us on the back side with no safe paths suitable for getting back to the front before dark.  Thus restrained logistically, and satisfied with what we had seen, we simply admired the … [Read more...]

Little Orphan Anvils

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One fine early afternoon near a dryline-outflow intersection, two "Little Orphan Anvils" appeared.  These ice-crystal formations were spit into the sky from a pair of small towering cumuli, each of which glaciated, briefly becoming a tiny single-cell cumulonimbus before dissipating.  Though individual members are usually doomed to die from dry air entrainment, concentrations of such "orphans" and … [Read more...]