Chased yesterday (20th) to the Hunter Valley with Feral. I have rarely seen a cap (or lack of ) break so quickly. At one stage on the expressway near Moonie Moonie the view north and northwest was cloudless blue, yet by the time we made Raymond Terrace it was convective popcorn. Unfortunately this limited what had potential for a nasty day.
We pushed west of Maitland to Branxton where we encountered a severe cell. The outflow winds would have pushed towards 100kph, enough that a tripod could not stand. (my have some film later)
The shear was very quick and literally within 2-3 mins of the above images we were overtaken by the wind and hail. The very first stones we saw looked close to golfball, but were very isolated. I think Feral's X Trail got smacked on the side by one of these (we forgot to look for a ding). As hail increased the size dropped to 2-3cm.
Very short lived and we headed back to Maitland.
The situation did not look that great, it was now quite cool and all CAPE had been mopped up and the storms were heading NE. We knew from the early cells that we had no chance of running down the line, so we headed home.
However we did score a very photogenic an isolated cell near the Hawkwsbury River, even a possible mid level shear funnel.
