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VIC storms: 7 Oct 2011

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Hamlan
Storm Chaser
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Location: Northern suburbs

VIC storms: 7 Oct 2011

Post by Hamlan »

Short, unplanned chase to Sunbury during lunch break!

I posted this earlier today in the breaking weather thread:

glad someone noticed! I was on that cell just west of Sunbury and can report rotation and a small funnel approx 2.15pm. Unfortunately I havent got my camera or video at work with me today but was lucky enough to be near the airport when I noticed the storm structure (albiet a small cell) and obvious southerly motion against the flow. At this stage I thought there were signs of outflow dominance and a line segment developing however the main cell strengthened and low fractus was being drawn up rapidly as I watched from the eastern side of the airport toward Sunbury. A low fat inflow appendage rapidly condensed on the western side of the cell and midlevel inflow was obvious from the east. I then noticed to my disbelief that a brown dust or smoke was being drawn up toward the base. I almost convinced myself that it was smoke, I was up to 10km away and it was just a coincidence it was under a rapid development but then noticed it was moving laterally to the north and rotating while the cell movement was to the south!?!? The smoke or dust ceased raising after a minute or so and continued to rotate slowly into the base and I guess I will never know.

The low structure lifted somewhat and I noticed that the cell had developed a nice rain free base and decided to move NW toward it on the Sunbury Rd. As I made my way passed the northern side of the airport the RFB became quite interesting to me and I observed new fractus being drawn up again on the western side of the base. I continued just west of Sunbury where I stopped and witnessed again what appeared to be an outflow push of sorts that structured up like a weak squall which was almost overhead. Inflow from the east was again evident and the RFB was dark and laminar in parts. The area of interest however was in the middle of this structure almost overhead where rotation was discernable and a short funnel emerged for 30 seconds or so. I think this rotation was due to an outflow push causing localised vorticity but it was really cool!

I have some phone cam pics and video. I'll check if they are any good and post if they are.

Just checked the radar myself and the motion of this cell against the flow is quite evident.

Not a bad short chase seeing as I was just out for lunch!

Here are some shots (mobile phone cam only) of the Sunbury cell/s between 1.49pm and 2.14pm today. Note the base structure in the early shots taken from the east side of the airport looking to Sunbury - this developed very quickly (less than 1minute) and lasted 5mins or so on the western side. Cropped shots intend to show whatever was rising up below and appeared to be moving laterally and rotating up but I dont know what it was as it only lasted about 1min and dissapated. Seemed too short in duration and too brown for smoke, too big for dust from a car on dirt and yet it seems hard to believe it was anything else under such a small cell but it was fighting the sea breeze as Karl has said and funny things can happen on boundaries. A gustnado perhaps?

The rest of the pics show the same cell after I drove at it to west of Sunbury where it strengthened again, then appeared to be outflow dominant but with clear rotation almost above me and produced a nice slender funnel out of the middle of the rotation just before the multi-prong funnels in the pano. 5mins later and it had gusted out and I went back to work!

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crikey
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Location: tweed shire NSW and nDUNOLLY.. Nth Central district VIC
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Re: VIC storms: 7 Oct 2011

Post by crikey »

Here is a couple of web cam snaps taken tonight and the slide show of the album can be viewed from link below.. which has better quality pictures
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Slide show of some colorful webcam shots taken from Melbourne storm this evening.
Click on this link.
http://s1081.photobucket.com/albums/j34 ... =slideshow" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
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Rivergirl
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Re: VIC storms: 7 Oct 2011

Post by Rivergirl »

Wow pretty good for a lunchtime chase Brad, what timing! Good pics. Interesting cam stills crikey. It's great to be able to have cam stills like that when you're not there
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Meso
Supercell
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Re: VIC storms: 7 Oct 2011

Post by Meso »

Here's a few photos from my short chase last night. Pretty stock standard storm. Not very tall, remember thinking it was similar to another early season storm from last year in that regard. could make out a bit of shelf cloud feature and saw some interesting scud floating around the base, but due to the road network could never quite get close enough to have a proper look. Witnessed a couple of impressive CG's, but despite the AM radio indicating plenty of activity, I didn't catch sight of too many more.

Nevertheless, nice bit of light entertainment on a Friday evening.

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