- Storms 2010

17/12/2010

After severe storms had lashed SEQld the past 2 days I finally got a day off work which enabled me to chase where I wanted . The air was capped today but there was a low level trough moving into the target area which on top of 36c and 20dps it was going to be enough to break through and storms would fire up . Storms were always going to fire up in to mid level instability anyway regardless of the Cap. Shear today was strong but next to no turning in fact it was very lineal . All up a fairly hard day to target an area , however what tipped it for me was the low level trough location sitting out across the Darling Downs. So Toowoomba was the area for a start but when I arrived and tried to chase the cells it was rainy mess , cells were splitting and hidden by anvil rain thanks to the shear. I decided to punch through these cells and sit just west of Toowoomba that way I could keep an eye on the Dalby area that was firing also. This western line was moving NE away from me so I decided to head north and worth with it but making sure I stayed in clear air on the southern side as I had seen fresh towers going up!

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I headed North towards Goombungee and the line a cells , after 10 mins of driving I could see a faint shelf cloud to my left at the rear of the line Hmmm Great I thought as it would give me some hope of photos. Over the next hill and about 5 mins later big thick branchy pure white and blue CGS started hammering down from the RFB, it was then I saw a rotating wall cloud and the shelf cloud attached to the south was growing by the second!!!

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I planned my next road move even before I had stopped to grab photos cause I knew the steering winds would push things along today. Due to the CGs being very close and the shelf cloud pushing forward fast I really had to bolt for it so I could get into another position ahead of the rapidly growing Supercell ! So now I was heading due East pretty quickly as this cell was right moving and breaking away from the main line,..

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Time to grab some photos again or was it? The cell was actually catching up to me so now I was very urgent in my escape . I breifly would stop and grab a few pix then go again that was until I ran out of road and hit a T intersection . With the wall cloud on my right and the shelf cloud behind me and on my right I did 3 u turns in the intersection trying to decide which way to go... In the end the telling factor was to rip it south across the front of the supercell the road turned slightly into the core of the cell and I was toast ! Massive 130km / hr gusts almost blew me off the road when the insane total utter white out hit us...keep going i thought lets get through this before the monster hail in the RFD pounds me for soup! Or drops a funnel ...

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I drove past a few really big gum trees and they were loosing some limbs as the cross winds almost pushed me off the road ... this would only get worse as I continued into the heavily treed HWY. Big limbs hit the car and leaves splattered the windscreen , I looked up and freaked out... the tops of the trees were snapping off ... I had to get off this road ! A small driveway presented itself so I charged through the wire fence and out across an open paddock , here I stopped in shock and video the trees back on the HWY. The next worry was large hail, how long could this white out rain keep up before the big hail smashed me out of the RFD. So I took off down near an irrigation tank and hid against it until the rain stopped .

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The main road was a mess.... just 20 meters down the road from where I got off a car crushing gum had fallen down . Monster 3 foot trunk iron bark trees had fallen, along with a traffic billboard sign. I surveyed the car for damage but nothing , just covered in leaves grass sticks and mud , so even with my experience a preplanned road escape and breaking speed limits I still got caught out , this is only the Third time in my chasing history and I was lucky!

SeQld Flooding 11/10/10

200mm of rain had fallen over night in parts of Brisbane and the Brisbane River Catchments Including Wivenhoe and Somerset Dams. In places around North Brisbane and Gold Coasts Springbrook the total for the week was up near 400mm. I had contemplated going into the Brisbane flood zone but feared of to many road closures ect. I instead decided to head inland to Rosewood and along the Brisbane Valley HWY through Fernvale and Esk in an attempt to reach Somerset Dam. Along the way we encountered moderate flooding at Rosewood some roads cut and where the water had come close to a number of residents...

From Rosewood I continued along the Brisbane valley Hwy towards Fernvale where there was similar flash flooding . I stopped in at Wivenhoe to view the spillway and continued north Towards Esk...

Just past Esk I thought I would be able to do a loop around Somerset and back down the M1 towards the Gold Coast, but here is where the problems started. Radar was showing continued heavy rain through the area with rivers and creeks rising fast , the Somerset Dam / Kilcoy intersection just past Esk was being closely monitored by police and traffic control

As I continued towards Kilcoy the rain rate and flash flooding increased dramatically! I stopped in for some photos of the raging Brisbane River right where it runs into Wivenhoe, here I asked a local about the road ahead which he informed me it was cut to all vehicles !

It was time to make a mad dash back to Esk and hope the road wasn't closed by police or impassable due to the fast rising water , if it was we were stranded... Just as I arrived the traffic control were placing up the road closed signs and police were only letting heavy vehicles through. I trusted I had enough clearance with the pajero and kind of pretended not to see the traffic control and police officer wave at me to stop from the other end.

Somerset later reached its maximum flood capacity of about 2.3 meters above full supply and opened the flood gates, Wivenhoe reached about 2.7 meters above full supply which was high enough to open all 4 flood gates to ensure the dam stopped rising. Evidently Wivenhoe has a MASSIVE flood storage of 1,450,00 ML or more than double what it normally holds !

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Some flash flooding starting around the Northern Gold Coast after the first wave of heavy rain on Sunday 10/10/10.

Jeff.H.

Storm Chase 29/09/2010 - Beaudesert to Beenleigh

My first day off work in ages and being able to chase proved a real test to plot where and when storms would fire up! A low level trough had moved through the day before and produced severe weather across SEQld. an Upper trough was still lingering over the area and a strong SE change or second surface trough was moving North in from NSW. It was this combination the interested me and BOM had mentioned more storms for today... The biggest worry was dry air pushing in from the west, and if anything that went up would be right on the coastal plains due to lingering moisture and a fresh feed of moisture from the SE change.

The temp and dp of 29c/17c was enough to get things going along with the surface change. Cells only formed 30km inland from the coast and quickly moved East, strong mid level winds blew the updrafts apart and carried avil rain well off away from the main updraft so things were unable to get to severe. There were a few CGs around with some nice solid downpours.

Looking back towards the Gold Coast

Greenage SW of Waterford

Downdraft towards Beenleigh

Jeff.H.

Supercell Thunderstorm Kyogle 25/10/2010

I was sitting at home editing some lightning photos from the night before , it was 10am and I decided to load the radar out of pure habit. Wow I gestured when I saw that storm cells had already started to fire SW of Rathdowney , I chased up a few obs and was happy to pack the camera gear and race down that way. Because it was early the cells were rather weak and just drifting slowly towards the coast, but down in that area there are no raods that lead east so I could just watch them float away. These cells gained strength and became very strong up through the tweed valley area .I was sure if anything else was really going to get going or build to the north towards Beaudesert the chase favored area, so I kinda drove back n forth did a couple of circles and loaded the radar. A very strong single cell west of Casino was tracking NE towards the Kyogle area and it didn't look like it was going to weaken. I was 70km away from my guesstimated intercept , but that 70km was through very windy national park roads and ranges, kinda like what you would see in the WRC overseas somewhere. I rang Leanne for her advice and she just said go.. get down there cause you dont get to chase storms much due to work! So off I went in rather a hurry , once over the main range I caught a better sight of the vertical updraft and I was impressed ...

I didn't stop for updates just switched to visual chasing only as time was against me due to the distance I had to travel... Once I came out on the main road and headed south towards Kyogle I had to do some quick calculations! The cell has passed to the west of Kyogle and was now left moving hard and moving due North, so I used the radar and Google earth on my iphone to plan and intercept or vantage point ahead of the storm...

One of the first things I noticed was the inflows bands coming in on the southern side which without looking at obs with a definate SE Change moving along the coast and thus pushing the cell on a more Northerly track, ok time to get one step ahead of this storm!

OK perfect position right here, good contrast and farm house and ranges for a backdrop as the beast came over the hill it was obvious it was a Supercell ... It had double inflows from the NW, a solid core with wall cloud . I set up the vid cam and ran 15mins of approach, I had also decided that I was going to core punch as I had limited road network...

This was so close here now, the solid white out rain curtain was only a few hundred meters away! The windmill was doing about 5000rpm in the 80+k hr winds , the RFB was directly overhead ! I core punched the cell about 5 times - 3 times on a north south axis the twice on an east west axis , the rain rates in the RFD were unbelievable ! Like insane waves of total white out , the heaviest rain you could get and then came the hail just what I was after, mostly 2cms and the odd 3s but it was only in the very Rear of the Rear Flank Downdraft , just as the sun was coming back out through the rain on the western edge. I played around with this area 3 times being on a favorable road . Flash flooding was this storms main threat.

I headed off back towards Beaudesert through the ranges , A storm chaser friend had mentioned a small cell starting up near Rathdowney right where I was heading back to , so again I got my finger out especially once I saw how crisp the updraft was! Once over the range and nearing Rathdowney I found a great location to sit back relax and take some photos and a great long time lapse of the boiling updrafts ...

And almost back at Beaudesert the setting sun put on a nice display against the collapsing storm...

Severe Storms Lash SEQld 24/10/2010

Severe storms built up early over inland Queensland and slowly spread east, they gained more moisture off the ranges and formed a big thunderstorm line that stretched from Lismore to Kingaroy. I didn't chase early as I wanted to focus more on lightning as I have hardly shot any with my new camera. I headed up to Mt Tamborine and joined a number of locals watching the storms roll nearer. The bolts were embedded in the rain so they were hard to get and the line was still 50 away ...

After an hr the storms finally drew closer and the back lit structure was impressive...

The only feature missing was some good clear air bolts, the southern section of the storm line moved forward over Canungra and began to sweep from left to right, It was an awesome sight

What happen next made you feel uncomfortable being there, the base of the thunderstorm lowered and I could reach up and touch it ... well actually I was in it ! Looking down under the base to the valley below Mt Tamborine the lightning showed just how close the storm was ...

Ok it was time to retreat down the Mountain to my halfway vantage point back ahead of the storm. When I first stopped to see what was happening it was pretty quiet but in the faint light I noticed a very heavy new storm base just to my west. I played around trying to get into a good position and ker bam!!! Big fat branchy bolt drops down right near my work mates place a few klm away. And another in between my camera shutter being closed ... I had to really think about what camera settings to use now as the lightning was totally different to the top of the Mountain. I had been using long and open exposures to get maximum light in so I could see the clouds , now these bolts were going to be bright so I wound the camera up tight ...

I thought after that shot my settings were ok but when the next bolt came down it not only burnt my eyes that tree over there and slightly burnt onto my camera lens too!

A few more bolts came crashing down through the valley but I was in a difficult spot to shoot them...I raced back towards the Gold Coast and found a fresh updraft dropping a number of bolts over Helensvale ...