SkyPix

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

Seastack Skyline of the Quillayute Needles

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The Quillayute Needles, part of a large, namesake, offshore national wildlife refuge, form a majestic rampart of sea stacks across the surface of the Pacific, as viewed through the cool, misty twilight of the Olympic Peninsula shoreline.  Typical for the Northwest coast, a deck of stratus with some fractostratus imparts a cool and somber mood to the scene. La Push WA (25 Jul 11) Looking … [Read more...]

Wind Farm Tornado: Multiple Vortices

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The "Wind Farm Tornado's" main cone got fuzzy for a short spell, with ragged but visually fast-whirling condensation vortices on both sides.  Positioned along the east (left) rim of the main mesocyclone, and eventually shunted eastward by a segment of the rear-flank downdraft, the tornado translated at a very oblique angle to the alignment of the facility.  This kept some part of the wind farm in … [Read more...]

Iceland’s Dyrholaey Coast

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Solid and liquid water, along with solid and liquid rock, sculpted this sweeping and majestic vista.  The mesa from which this photo was shot, as well as the one at distant right, were parts of the mainland originally, then as the big, stormy waves of the North Atlantic pounded gaps around their resistant volcanic ledges, they became islands.  The small pinnacle at middle right was a sea stack.  … [Read more...]

Sunset-Lit Supercell Base

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On an intercept day with several visually vibrant supercells, including one that swirled over nearly the same area less than half an hour prior, this may have been the most breathtaking.  Being near the back side of a complex array of convection and clouds, windows through the cloud cover opened to permit the setting sun's rays to cast warm tones across the storm's base, and to redden the rain … [Read more...]

Sunlit and Striated in South Dakota

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We already had seen two fantastic supercells on this day near South Dakota's run of US-12:  one looming over the highway near Aberdeen and another with rings-of-Saturn striations closer to the Minnesota border.  That just wasn't enough!  Even though this young, clearly spinning storm was becoming elevated over rain-cooled air from an earlier gob of storms, its internal dynamics maintained … [Read more...]

Apricot Light

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The fading day's rays shone fruitfully upon convectively sculpted cloud towers of a supercell receding away from us and across the northwestern outskirts of the Oklahoma City area.  We had intercepted a briefly tornadic supercell farther north, watched it disintegrate, then headed over to this, the succeeding storm.  That move was well worth the effort!  This supercell followed us eastward for … [Read more...]