Storms and lightning 8/19/09

today there was a decent chance of severe weather, but unfortunately nothing happened to close. a dying line of storms came thru just north of town around sunset so i went out to my spot north of town and took a few pics. i then went east on 680 across the morman bridge and found exit 1, where i took the exit and went north over the bridge to some gravel road on the other side. there i got a few pics, but unfortunately the lightning wasn't that frequent and it was getting further and further away.


skinny tower trying to survive

again

first of 3 real good lightning shots that i caught

it almost looks like this strike is upside down with the way the 2 strikes come together

cool shot of the clouds as the storm passes

big bolt of lightning several miles to the east

Lightning pics 7/31/09

i went out and took a few more pics last night. unfortunately i waited a little too long so the storm was already pretty close by the time i got to my spot. also the storm was weakening so the amount of lightning was decreasing pretty quickly too. the storm was alot stronger further west and had strong winds with it so as the storm was coming in it had a nice shelf cloud with it that you could still see at night with the city lights. it would have been really cool to see this storm during the day, you could tell it had really neat structure to it. there were about 4-5 really cloud to ground strikes that i missed so these are the best i got!

the first pic i took

then the lightning stopped!

you could still see the cool structure though

you can really see the striations

i wish there would have been a nice cg strike in this one

Evening lightning pics

i've added some pics that i took of a storm that formed west of town about 30 or so miles. it was kindof a cool scene. i knew there were some storms west and southwest of town that were moving south, so not towards town. so just before sunset i went out on our back deck to see if i could see any lightning. there was a little bit that was being blocked by trees but i also saw a pretty healthy looking developing thunderhead off to the west as well that wasn't producing any lightning. i thought i would go west on fort to 156th street where there is a high school that has a nice parking lot and it sits high enough up that you can see a long ways to the west. as i was driving the little sliver of the moon that is remaining came out from behind the departing thunderhead just as i got to my parking lot. the first couple of pics were just the moon and the storm clouds. but then within 5 minutes the thunderhead suddenly started to produce lightning. it became more and more frequent, and almost immediately i started to see these "finger" lightning bolts that would actually shoot out from the tower to the side into the clear blue sky that was behind it. unfortunately i only got one of these and it was fairly faint on the camera, which is another reminder that i would really like to get a better camera that gives me more options on a night like this!


scene when i first started taking pics

zoomed in pic, i love taking pics with the moon and a storm in the same pic

you can just barely see the lightning shooting out of the cloud in the middle of the pic!

nice shot

lightning bolt that tried to "escape" the cloud

some more in cloud lightning shots

again

Lightning pics 7/8/09

a nice little storm blew through town early this morning around 1 am. it was severe warned for winds of 60 mph and there was a gust of 63 mph at the airport. here at the house, there were winds of probably around 50 mph and about 3/4" of rain. i went out to the end of nebraska avenue where i get a nice clear view to the north and northeast of town. the lightning with this storm was mainly cloud to cloud, but it lit up the underside of the nice shelf cloud that was moving with the storm. finally i got a couple of good cg strikes right before the rain and wind really hit. this time of year is normally quiet for severe weather and storms if they occur are normally overnight, so hopefully there'll be more lightning opportunities coming.


the clouds lit up by the lightning always had a cool bluish color to them



some low scud clouds developed looking kindof cool

a nice couple of cg strikes, wish
the pic would have been more centered

again, a bigger strike

the red and blue streak at the bottom of the
pic was an ambulance going by on the road!

Car accident 6/12/09

i normally only post storm related stuff on my blog, and i have debated whether to add any other updates, but have left it to my storm chasing and lightning pics. i've decided to add my pics from my car accident because it was a pretty big deal to both sarah and i, and its just another place to post some of the pics of the demolished malibu as well.
most of you know the story of what happened, but i'm going to tell it to those who don't! i was on my way to work on friday, june 12th just before noon. i hadn't gone very far when i came up to the intersection of 132nd and fort. i was southbound on 132nd and i wanted to make a left hand turn onto fort st. the light was green so i got into the turning lane and entered the intersection to wait for traffic to come through that was heading northbound on 132nd. while waiting in the intersection the light turned yellow and then red. there was one car that blatantly blew through the red light heading northbound that i waited for. assuming that this was the last idiot that would run the red light, i started to make my left hand turn to get out of the intersection. i was partially blinded by what i seem to remember as a van directly across from me in the turning lane that was waiting like it should be bc the light was now red. anyways so i started to turn left and almost immediately saw this black car barreling down on me. i knew it was too late to do anything so i braced myself for the collision. i know this is going to sound dramatic, but i remember actually thinking that i was going to die or get very seriously hurt. the black car, which was a late 90s model lumina, luckily saw me and swerved slightly to the right. since i stopped right away and she swerved oh so slightly, she drilled the front right corner of the malibu in front of the right tire. the force of the impact spun me around back to the north and into the "ditch" that was along side the northbound lanes of 132nd street. both airbags had blown, and the car had died. there was smoke inside the car from the airbags, and coming from the hood. i didn't have any brakes so i couldn't stop my momentum while rolling down the hill. i finally rolled past a tree and was able to turn up an embankment to stop the car. while rolling down the hill i was able to check myself over and didn't feel any serious pain anywhere. after stopping, i tried to get out of the car, but the door wouldn't open all the way. i squeezed out and looked back up the hill. there was already a man running down the hill towards me. it was a man named beau. he asked if i was alright and called 911. i waited down by my car until the cops came. i also called sarah and she left summer school. when the cop came he stopped up by the intersection where the other car had stopped. i went up the hill, and the first thing the cop said was where's the other car? i told him it was down the hill and he then asked what happened. the lady who was driving the other car tried to say that the light was green when she came through the intersection and that i turned in front of her. i said the light was red of course. the cop eventually called the witness, beau, that had called 911 and asked him what happened. he verified my story, and so she was issued a citation for running a red light, and i wasn't given anything. next began the insurance process. the info given by the driver of the other car was incorrect! luckily the wrong insurance company was able to track down, the correct insurance company and we filed a claim with them. the following monday i talked to my insurance and hers to make my statement. my insurance company found me at no fault, and then would not be paying anything to the other driver. i only had liability, so my insurance wouldn't be paying anything on my car either. when i spoke to her insurance company, the lady there told me that nebraska has a law called contributory negligence and i could be found partially at fault! according to her i should have been ticketed for failure to yield to the right of way. how could someone that ran a red light have the right of way still?! well now finally this past week, they have made their official decision. i think its just a number she grabbed out of a hat, but they somehow determined i was 25% at fault!!! so i only will be getting 75% of the value of the malibu. if the car was worth more, we would probably fight more to get more, but the car was really only worth about $2200. yesterday, we received a call from a guy that will be sending the check, and he told us they would be sending $2300 plus tow charges?! don't know how they came up with that amount, but that's more than the car was worth to begin with! so here's some pics of the aftermath. it almost looks like a can opener was taken to the front of the car, it was hit with such force. to this day, i still have flashbacks everytime i drive through that intersection, especially when i am making a left hand turn. i guess in that sense i am glad we are moving next month!

SE Nebraska, NW Missouri Supercells 6/7/09

Writing my entry for this chase, I am left feeling disappointed again that I didn't see a tornado, but the chase overall was pretty fun at times. I returned home from a camping trip around 2 pm and immediately checked the latest weather forecasts, models, etc. there was a moderate risk of storms this day and it still liked like things could get active. my friend casey and i left town by 3 pm with an initial target of marysville, ks, just across the nebraska/kansas border. as we headed south out of lincoln, we noticed a cell that was just south of beatrice moving to the northeast. originally i was going to let this storm go as it wasn't impressive at first and the spc talked of more explosive development further west a little later. as we pulled into beatrice i pulled up the radar again and this first storm was showing a pretty impressive hook, so we decided maybe this would be our storm for the time being! we started to head east as the storm was now approaching pawnee city. several minutes later a tornado warning was issued! the storm was producing rather large hail, at least golf ball sized, so we didn't want to core the storm to get back in front of it so we had to try and find a road that would take us south and around it. we found a road and began to take our "detour". soon however my computer lost internet, which i'm still unsure whether that was my computer or that verizon's broadband service actually wasn't available. after some further issues with road options we eventually ended up in pawnee city but were still behind the storm! just before town we stopped when we noticed some large hail on the ground. there were alot of quarter sized stones, but also alot of ping pong/golfball sized stones too, so we stopped and got some pics. as we pulled into pawnee city, i was looking up at the back of the storm and noticed a little "finger-like" funnel. this lasted only about 20 secs before it vanished. we still were heading towards our original storm when finally i had internet again. the update now showed me the storm we were after had weakened slightly and was now only severe warned, but there was a storm that we had seen on radar earlier that was now the dominant cell and was tornado warned heading towards the missouri border. we changed paths and headed towards this storm. eventually we hit I-29 and raced south to the exit we wanted to take to get east into missouri. just before we got to the interstate we began to run into tons of storm chasers that were trying to also catch up with this storm. along the interstate we crossed several spots where there was large hail in the ditches. the storm was still tornado warned and had an amazing hook echo on the radar this whole time. driving up to the storm was absolutely amazing. it was probably the most impressive looking updraft and storm i have ever seen!! the tops of the storm were estimated at 60,000 feet!! also there were reports now of baseball and larger sized hail falling with the storm. we turned east into missouri still trying catch up to it. it's amazing how hard it is to catch up with a storm when it is only moving at 30-35 mph! we weaved our way around nw missour finally catching up to it near hwy 169 and hwy "d" near cosby, mo. here we saw a bunch of chasers and finally a larger funnel. we quickly pulled over and took some good video. the funnel only lasted about a minute before it dissipated though. after this we hopped back in the car and continued on. at this point though it was getting later and later in the evening and i was nearly out of gas. i found the closest gas station with the gps and we decided that with only about 1/2 hour of daylight left and still no tornado we would break off the chase and go get gas before going home. we decided to stop at the top of a hill that had a good view of the storm looking east. my stupid computer had quit working again, so we just watched for a bit. when it came back on a new tornado warning had come out with now a tornado reported on the ground near amity, mo, only 6 miles away!! the chase was back on! the storm continued east and we caught up with it near maysville, missouri. as we pulled into town the rain was whipping around in what seemed like all different directions and the tornado sirens were blaring. there was also probably close to 30 storm chaser vehicles and the TIV. i had to stop and get gas and then we were on again. there was a report now of just a rotating wall cloud and baseball sized hail with the storm. again we stopped to turn around as it was officially dark and if there was a tornado it would be rain wrapped. we ran into a guy though that we had met back at the gas station in maysville, and while chatting with him another amazing storm report came out of multiple funnels and grapefruit sized hail!! so one last attempt was made to get close to the storm. finall after another 10 or so miles we stopped for good. we again sat there and watched the lightning show and chatted. we then noticed lightning back behind us that seemed to show up out of nowhere. looking at the radar we discovered storms rapidly developing to the southwest of us. we were just east of I-35 on hwy 6 now so we headed back to I-35 and then south to hwy 36 and then went west. we ran into the newly developed storms and had to pull over due to the very heavy rain and the hail now falling. radar showed up to 2.5" hail was coming so we didn't want to be driving in that. we tried to pull under a canopy at a gas station just north of cameron, mo. here for 15-20 minutes we experienced flooding rains, hail that would get up to quarters, and very gusty and rapidly changing wind directions. the storm let up and we started west once again. we still were watching the radar and it looked like a hook was starting to form on the storm just to the south of where we were. about 10 minutes after we left, there was a tornado warning issued with rapid rotation right north of where we were! this storm went on to produce a possible large tornado with damage northeast of there near gallatin, missouri. we continued to head home to finally arrive in omaha about 130 in the morning. final tally for the trip was over 500 miles and 11 hours in the car!

storm summary from kansas city weather office:
http://www.crh.noaa.gov/eax/?n=severe-jun072009

reports page with pics and videos from stormchasers that day:
http://stormtrack.org/forum/showthread.php?t=21021

short video of funnel cloud we saw near cosby, mo:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v3FAns0dN8w

longer video showing different parts of our chase:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R46-NGIbnho


severe weather outlook with moderate risk

hook echo on supercell west of pawnee city, ne

view of the backside of the pawnee city storm

closer view of intense updrafts of storm near pawnee city

again

great view of intense storm near pawnee city

near golf ball sized hail just west of pawnee city

again

close up view of supercell in nw missouri

again

pic of funnel cloud near cosby, mo

closer shot of funnel cloud

tornado warned cell near amity, mo

again

backlit shot of storm at sunset near gallatin, mo

Southeast Nebraska 6/1/09

well for the 2nd day in a row, i was able to go out chasing. today's setup wasn't really any better than the day before though. originally, the forecast was calling for a pretty good chance of tornadoes along a warm front that was going to set up along the ks/ne border. however once again the stronger upper level winds were displaced way further north than where the best instability was. so despite plenty of juice in the atmosphere, there was nothing there to turn the storms. storms exploded rapidly by 3, but almost immediately turned into a huge multicellular mess. storm motions were often less than 15 mph too so where the rain fell in southern nebraska and northern kansas amounts were up to 5 or more inches in places. i went out again, just to go, because the season isn't that long! i went to lincoln and then south towards beatrice. there was a pretty good cell that was moving north towards tecumseh, ne so i headed that way to intercept it. as i was heading south, i came upon the front edge of the cell. the first real good view showed a nice inflow tail, that actually began to look real interesting for a while as it stood more up and down vertically, almost taking on the look of a funnel. it was pretty easy to see it wasn't rotating though. the storm went just east of tecumseh, and i started to head west towards some more cells. these stronger cells were almost another hour away though, and i figured that by the time i got to them and the way the storms were behaving they wouldn't probably be nearly as strong as they were now. so i turned around and started heading back in a general direction towards home. i drove through the first storm that now was nothing more than very heavy rain. just south and east of nebraska city i came near a very impressive looking storm that was already to my southeast. i stopped along a gravel road and took some more pics there as well and some short video. this storm also had a nice looking lowering for a while as well before it dissapated. after this i drove the rest of the way home. i am really getting antsy for a nice tornado chasing day before the "season" is over. hopefully the rest of june will not disappoint, as this has been a very slow season so far.

view of the storms to the south from south of lincoln

close-up of anvil of one of the storms

first severe warned storm near tecumseh. notice the interesting looking lowering!

pic of the lowering on the storm a few minutes later

first storm, notice the striations on the edge of the tower


another pic of a developing looking shelf cloud

lowering just before it disappeared

second storm southeast of nebraska city

again, notice the heavy rain and hail shaft of the storm

northern edge of storm near nebraska city

again

nice lowering with an inflow tail on the southeastern edge

lowering a little larger on second storm now

storms moving into omaha at the end of the evening