Hi,
1st January 2007.
After a verifying check with Michael, he urged me to do the yards and head north. Nick Moir was unable to attend that chase. I headed north towards Cobar via Hillston - a good 300km stretch alone with nothing in between besides Mt Hope - population - one pub.
On arrival at Cobar, rather than look for hotspots, I verified with Michael the situation. Storms seemed to me to be headed ESE. I met Alison at the Cobar Bureau of Meteorology Office who allowed me to view up to date lightning tracker. It was going crazy. The most active headed crossed the highway west of Cobar so I gave that a miss. It was the next developing cell that although high based looked decent. It became lightning active and missed Cobar. From 30km east of Cobar, I found some reasonable clearance amongst the Eucalyptus jungle! Some excellent bases and lightning striking frequently within the core and ahead of the cores. I followed this east as the storm passed over. Some hail and very heavy rain recorded. Further east within 50km west of Nyngan, I was experiencing some downbursts. Dust being picked up was a reminder of the drought. Lightning was quite impressive and some deep booms of thunder.
At this point given I was veering away from my target and possible activity later, I headed back to Cobar. Cobar Bureau of Meteorology Office once again with its great views. The complex was developing north of Cobar that became the trouble making for Bourke and its district. Very lightning active as well and very heavy rainfall.
I gave this a miss given I wanted to remain within reach of any activity nearby that developed later. This turned out to be a bad decision because upon checking the data, the atmosphere had been stabilised somewhat and recovery would take some time.
David called during the evening to assure me of good conditions north of Bourke the following day!
2nd January
After a flash of lightning from a dissipating storm to the west of Cobar, I began the day at Cobar Bureau of Meteorology Office where I was able to check the lightning activity (although pretty early near Bourke). Thanks for that once again Alison.
I headed north and intercepted the storms south of Bourke moving gradually east. The amount of water in the fields and side ditch was incredible and great for the drought stricken area. This was fairly lightning active but I knew I had to let this go. I wanted to remain north.
Thanks for a verifying update from Michael, I headed north towards the border. There were storms but they were relatively weak. I remained near a patch of altocumulus castellanus with deep turrets. One of these gradually developed a provided ample timelapse opportunity. Everything in the areas was high based so I knew not to head north at this point in time.
In fact I was about 40km north of the border and I noted that the conditions were better further south. The northerly winds were fresh to strong and creating areas of raised dust. In some cases the dust reduced visibility. I made my way to the border town when I noted a developing boundary!
Nick Moir was on the way up but I had little reception. You wouldn't believe that he had made great advances on distance and time and whilst having lunch at the border town, he had not received my message and had gone almost all the way to Cunnamulla.
He did an about turn and was headed straight back. What made events interesting here was that both our vehicles were thirsty for fuel. The pumps in this border town had been affected by the rain and were not able to supply fuel! Luck was on our side as the intense storm was approaching. What gradually unfolded amongst all the powerful inflow and dust was a pretty impressive structure - a sort of weather tease! It was one of the most impressive shelf cloud structures I have observed on my own storm chases. There were inflow bands at various levels and smooth laminar appearance on the shelf cloud. Timelapse was impressive. What also was impressive was the lower bases. Dust was racing in towards the shelf. Luck had it that there were little trees for a change to hamper any views! We eventually gave it one more move northwards before the structure engulfed us. Heavy rain and small hail observed. Larger hail may have remained further south of our location but we were not concerned.
As we headed north, we moved out of this mass of precipitation and found another core to the west of the road. Anvil bolts were piercing the earth behind us. We had to stop soon for at least some lightning activity.
Here Nick and I were able to capture some pretty impressive and close bolts - one was within or about 300 metres distance from our location. Of course we were in the car by this stage. This signalled the end of our structure chasing and the only option given fuel consumption (and Nick having travelled all day from Sydney) was to punch the second core. Only small hail and very heavy rain was observed. The fields were again awash with water. We made the Cunnamulla area about 7:30pm. With Nick having to pass across some pictures to the paper, fading light and the fact that when we set out eventually, kangaroos were going to be a problem despite the waterlogged fields, we decided to give the storms a miss. We finished with a steak back in town!
Finally an impressive day with decent footage!
Regards,
Jimmy Deguara
