Topic: VIC, NSW, S QLD Severe Storms 7 - 11 November 2010

[Harley Pearman]

St Marys Thunderstorm (Western Sydney) 8 November 2010

Please find below a small number of photos that I took of a strong thunderstorm that hit the St Marys region (Western Sydney) this afternoon. I took a half day flexi specifically for this weather event.

Following my lunch at 1 pm, I went to the top of the Auburn Council car park at Auburn and snapped numerous photos of a developing thunderstorm that was situated over the lower Blue Mountains to the west. There were other thunderstorm cells and cloud towers south west of Sydney at the time but I decided to target this storm (Pictured) because it kept producing new updraft towers and showed no signs of decaying.

Following this, I drove down the M4 Motorway towards Penrith. Near St Marys I found myself close to its base and began to experience heavier and heavier rain. I turned onto Mamre Road, drove north towards the St Marys Town Centre where I drove into high winds that was stripping leaves and bark off trees.

I drove into torrential rain and near the railway station, I drove into hail. As the core was overhead, I drove into a side street and parked the car. The St Marys locality was hit by at least three bursts of hail at least in the range of 1 to 2 cm in size although I did see a few hailstones that seemed to be larger on the ground and I did hear a few louder thuds on the car roof from falling hailstones. I could not get out of the car due to the amount of rain and hail that was falling.

One of the photos I took following the storm is a flooded road in Carinya Avenue. This shows how much rain fell. The storm weakened further to the east but appears to have had a significant impact around St Marys.

The photos referred to are attached below.

Harley Pearman

[Harley Pearman]

St Marys Storm 8/11/2010

Following the thunderstorm that occurred at St Marys, the storm went into a decaying phase, however I moved into the open and looked skywards and saw a developing updraft tower occurring almost overhead to where I was. It seemed that a portion of the storm was developing a new lease of life. I could see rain curtains and possible hail dropping from near its base but I could also see cloud building into a single new cloud tower. It developed rather quickly before building into a new anvil that merged with the parent anvil cloud with some mammatus formations.

I have attached 3 photos to show the cloud tower observed at the rear of the storm at St Marys today.

Harley Pearman

[Harley Pearman]

Storms south of Blacktown 8/11/2010

Following the thunderstorm at St Marys, I drove back to Prospect to get a better look at new thunderstorms developing to the south. I went to William Lawson Park at Prospect to observe thunderstorm cells develop to the west and south. I did not chase these due to peak hour traffic but I was able to take some very good photos. The storms were developing to the south west and seem to train echo (Follow one another) towards the south east. One of the photos provided shows a significant base. Cloud to ground lightning was observed from most of the cells that developed.

I have provided three photos to show what was happening between 3 pm and 6 pm today south and south west of Blacktown.

Harley Pearman

[Hardy25]

massive cell over sydney atm

all flights diverted to brisbane or melbourne,

dopplar is going nuts, and the storm is massive very very big

i hope you guys are out with your lightning triggers on your cameras, be safe too night storms are dangerous

[Richary]

Things certainly fired up quickly this afternoon. I had checked the radar about 20 minutes before the EWN warning came through to see all the action was the other side of Canberra. When the storms developed they all came up quite quickly and with little warning.

At Chatswood we just had a bit of rain and thunder with no lightning seen. Coming home I saw some lightning to my south, but home at Rydalmere we missed most of the action with some heavy falls further south around Liverpool and Campbelltown, also with some severe warned storms further south. Though we did get some very small hail about 5:30.

From about 7:30 there would some good crawlers visible to the SW, but as it got closer and I thought about getting the camera out low level cloud came in and obscured the view. From around 8:30 a band of heavy storms came over, though most of the lightning was rain wrapped so again I didn't get the camera set up, though saw one close hit near Ermington and after the bulk of the storm passed over the sky lit up and a bolt hit behind the house somewhere within a couple of hundred metres - I was looking the other way where most of the action was. We have only had about 10mm here.

Reports that Holsworthy managed 47mm in an hour between 5:30 and 6:30, and Kurnell had a wind gust of 82 kph.

[Antonio (stormboy)]

We have had such heavy rain here in Ballina with 38mm recorded at Ballina airport but me closer to the coast im sitting just off 70mm the attached rainfall rate and rainfall in total will show you just how heavy it was between 4 and 6

Antonio.

[Michael Bath]

Some impressive falls there Antonio - would not have known unless you posted as we got ZERO lol

Sydney was certainly in the firing line yesterday. Must have been some sort of boundary anchored across the southern half of the basin with so many cells following similar tracks until the main trough line pushed northeast late on.

It was a busy afternoon for the BoM with 14 detailed STWs between 2pm and 9pm !


64km Radar Loop for Sydney (Terrey Hills), 02:00 08/11/2010 to 12:00 08/11/2010 UTC

[Antonio (stormboy)]

Some impressive falls there Antonio - would not have known unless you posted as we got ZERO lol

It sure was i went to bed at 1am and realized a orange cell just to the northeast was coming in but i said oh itll be just a quick shower but i woke up and what do you know almost 70mm!

My nan lives in Wentworthville and she said yesterday 3 storms missed her but then she witnessed hail she said just below 5C coin size although she tried to take a picture with her phone for me she did not succeed.

Thursday looks like a good day for the NR as well as Wednesday so bring it on

Attached 4pm Thursday cape.

Antonio.

[nmoir]

I hadnt intended to chase yesterday due to ther committmnets but fortunatly they came to me , they had quite high bases , but cell in particular started north of parramatta and had a bit of a right mover tendancy and ended up moving hard right once it crossed the coast near Kurnell. these pics are when it crossed the coast at 7pmish and taken from tempe looking east sth east

[Antonio (stormboy)]

As i am typing the rain has gone NUTTY

the rain is falling at 10.5mm in 15 minutes and my yard is getting more and more flooded you dont even want to know what the other side of it looks like !!!

76.5mm since 1am and that is still climbing!

and rollover time had just transitioned but already 2mm and thats why there is a huge drop in the chart from rollover time

Antonio.

[Shaun Galman]

Upper Western N.S.W. Storm Panorama 7th November 2010

Hi guys,

I'm just in the process of editing all the lightning photos from last night -we had five highly active storms all round us!- but here's a two shot pano of the large cell that was between here and Collarenebri that fired up on Sunday afternoon.

This photo was during the secondary pulse of the main updraft which was evident on radar. There was a few CG present but as you can see the light wasn't kind enough for lightning photography though I really enjoyed watching a nice cell out on the plains.

Kindest regards,
Shauno.
  
 

[Colin Maitland]

STW issued again for this afternoon in NSW.

Locations which may be affected include Scone, Cessnock, Maitland, Walgett, Coonamble and Lightning Ridge.

Radar shows scattered/shattered storm cells fragmented through out the region unlike yesterdays sweeps of well structured formations.

Just hot and muggy in Brisbane and no action for us.

Take care

Col

[vrondes]

Yesterday's , 8th November 2010, storms that fired up after 3pm to the south of Parramatta certainly had some interesting base features to them as indicated in the following photos, with the bases ingesting then gusting out , the 3rd shot was the best of the rfb's in the afternoon bracket before the main line came through







the 3rd shot was the best of the rfb's in the afternoon bracket before the main line came through after sunset where the following images were taken between 8 and 9pm












Cetainly  a very lightning active system with some nice structure from the bases early on, Cheers, Con,

[Shaun Galman]

Keeping an eye on things here but it's a bit grey, messy and showery currently. See what develops later on.

Upper Western N.S.W. Storm Report And Photos Monday 8th November 2010

Just went through and sorted a few lightning/structure photos from last night so I can get a few up now.
I ended up heading out around 6:30pm EDST only to realise there were five active storms all around us. Four of those were part of that nice frontal line of active storms and one was a separate cell sitting out to the NE. This NE cell was the most active for the beginning but the approaching line really went nuts around 8pm.
Not much in the way of structure (as is the usual out here) but there was some really strong outflow at times! I had my pupils blasted with sand particles and it felt like a severe case welders flash when I got home.
I stayed out there until the storms converged overhead and it started to rain. There was some nice Mammatus and inflow banding at times! There's a bit in some of the photos.
Temps were up around 35˚c and humidity was high so I was excited to get out there amongst it and blow the cobwebs out of the old Canon  

I'll post the same photos that I post on the photography sites around the place hence the names on them. This saves me doing several at once. I'll try and do them in sequence. The first four are of the storm cell sitting to the North East. This merged with the main storm line around 8:30pm EDST. The last photo is what was behind me. This was the main line of storms coming from the North West. Town is right in the middle of the last photo. That line had a partial shelf here and there along with nice inflow banding. I will post another photo of that soon.

It's definitely good to be back at it!
Take care if chasing.
Kindest regards,
Shauno.  

[David C]

Back to Sydney (8th Nov).

Had an observation session with Paul G on the work carpark at Nth Ryde beginning around 4pm. We watched as cells put out nice bases and dumped / gusted out as they tracked SE across the southern metro. Not the sort of left propogating behaviour that we were interested in! Finally a cell took off and developed a shelf cloud....looked ok esp with some savage CGs.

Decided to 'chase'  so headed down towards Lane Cove. While in traffic I noticed scud rapidly moving into the storm, and figured things would get interesting. Finally decided to pull over at Five-Dock just as the main cell organised nicely. Quite dramatic infeed from the north / north east, I'll put some video of that up later.

Some video captures.