SkyPix

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

Dying Twilight Tornado in Rain

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After several years of ignoring it due to the low-light noisiness of my first DSLR, I finally decided to post this image and its story.  The parent HP supercell had put on a nice structural show for us in the Oklahoma Panhandle, before becoming even more deeply rain-wrapped as it eased east-southeastward into deepening twilight.  We honestly did not expect to dig out a tornado after it looked so … [Read more...]

Autumnal Okie Sundown

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These famously colorful central Oklahoma sunsets are a marvel to behold year-round.  Still, the long-lasting ones of late fall seem to be the most deeply immersive for the observer, when the sun sets at a steep angle and colors linger long enough for cloud forms to evolve noticeably through the tonal progression.  Even for a sunset here, this peak-phase show was exceptionally brilliant and fluidly … [Read more...]

Midlevel Sunrise Lenticulars

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Sunrise over the Kiamichi Valley brought a nice little surprise in the form of a middle-level standing-wave cloud, a ragged lenticular formation downwind from the Kiamichi Mountains (a range in the Ouachitas).   Normally the terrain here, with rises "only" around 1000–1500 feet above the valley floors, would not provide enough lift in standing waves above the boundary layer to support such … [Read more...]

Contrails Crisscrossing

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Flights over "Flyover Country" spread contrails commonly, and we residents of the Plains States are quite accustomed to skies like this when few other clouds festoon the wild blue.  When humidity in the upper troposphere is high enough, but not saturated, condensed water droplets natively present in cooling jet exhaust freeze quickly to crystals, and can linger for many minutes and linear miles … [Read more...]

Lakeside Floral

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Fall-blooming waterside wildflowers reflected beautifully on a Ouachita Mountains lake.  This looked like the perfect place to pop a topwater lure across the water lilies and haul out a frog-slammin' hoss bass, but alas, no such fish fell to such splashy temptations.  Instead it was time to be content with the natural beauty of the place and the moment, which was more than fine enough. 3 NNW … [Read more...]

North Rim Jolt

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A dark desert storm delivered a 30,000-ampere parting kiss to the North Rim, as it headed southeast across the 5,000-foot-deep chasm of the Grand Canyon.  Add up several million of these thunderstorms for flooding rains, along with about as many freeze-thaw cycles, and a turbulent major river.  That's how a high, nearly flat plateau gets carved into wondrous and majestic forms like this in a … [Read more...]