An electrified twilight sky, thanks to the back side of a supercell-containing storm complex, kept spitting sparks as ambient light faded. The two cloud-to-ground discharges happened within just a few seconds, but were separated by many miles between the main core region (distant left) and the translucent, trailing anvil area of light precipitation (right). The latter lit up the lives of … [Read more...]
Early Supercell Growing Mustache
My late friend and scientific colleague Al Moller said, "Beware storms with mustaches!", a storm-spotter caution referring to the early stages of wall-cloud development. This young supercell, with midlevel rotation gradually developing downward, was in the process of growing one from the detached, fractocumulus scud chunk rising atop rain-cooled forward-flank air. The core at right, and lift … [Read more...]
Snowdrift Topography
The Christmas Eve blizzard of 2009 left behind many fascinating drift effects not often witnessed in these parts, including highly variable drifting, flimsy ripples on high, exposed surfaces of underlying ice, and sastrugi. Here, thin and flat-topped layers developed, the edges of the ledges resembling contours on a topographic map, rendered to an oblique perspective that imparts a … [Read more...]
Tunnel Vision: Deep Convection
Lessening light and spreading, thick anvil from a severe storm complex to our southwest created a light sandwich on the northern and eastern horizon. That was interesting to see from the vehicle as we headed east for dinner and lodging. What changed things from interesting to special was when a band of cumulus clouds grew around the anvil's edges, in what was left of a daytime … [Read more...]
Sparking at the State Line
Headed north through outflow, out of Colorado and toward a late dinner and lodging in Kimball, Nebraska, we stopped quickly by the state line when an otherwise innocuous-looking, elevated line of "showers" started blasting tall, forked discharges like this. Even across several miles, the crack of the thunder was sharp and crisp when it reached us, gliding through the cold northwest winds to reach … [Read more...]
Electrical Web
Strung across the upper reaches of supercellular towers like a mass of cobwebs, a brief burst of intracloud and cloud-to-air lightning was but one of numerous similar discharges seen just from this spot. I had tracked the supercell and its immediate, intertwined predecessor, from late-afternoon initiation near the Kansas line, through a glorious sunset, then farther south, twilight lightning … [Read more...]
- « Previous Page
- 1
- …
- 88
- 89
- 90
- 91
- 92
- …
- 413
- Next Page »