Hello darlin'...

Now I've gotta say, as far as storms go, this one wasn't particularly spectacular, but it had its moments and a little later on dumped a whole load of hail on Claresholm, Southern Alberta. Of course, it did the amazing hail dump well after I'd given up chasing. But there was some nice lightning in the build up, which mad for great viewing.

This shot was taken on highway 7 heading west from Okotoks towards Big Rock. The crack on the bottom right of the picture is from the windshield of the Honda CRV I was driving in while taking the photo. Multi-tasking... Don't always recommend doing it this way cos there's no time to check how well the photo came out and often you end up shaking it or not getting the dimensions right etc. However, I've had some great pictures from this method so I guess it's worth it sometimes.

I haven't seen as many great storms this year as I'd have liked - at least, I haven't been available to capture them at the right time when they've occurred. One particular storm I regret not capturing occurred around the end of June / beginning of July over Calgary. The system was heading east onto the prairies, but the lower winds were from the south, creating the potential for sheer, not to mention a massively unstable airmass over the region: all the right ingredients for a supercell. I'd just come out from the swimming pool with a friend and noticed the storm brewing. What I also noticed was a swathe of cloud curving at the base as though the storm was starting to rotate. Looking at the direction of the upper clouds and comparing this with the lower clouds and where I could feel the wind coming from I immediately became suspicious of this storm. If anything it looked like it could produce some nasty hailstones. It was already active with much lightning.

We drove alongside it as we headed back to my friend's house and the kids all watched for lightning. It tried to rain a little but only managed a few splashes of large raindrops every now and then. We weren't close enough to bear the brunt of its force. I could see it was heading east abeam of us so I didn't think we'd see too much action. By the time we got home I'd missed the better angle and it had started to dump a whole lot of precipitation so I lost the shape too. It was a mass of dark blue interspersed with pink lightning. I sat and watched it for a while before giving up, knowing that the only chance I'd have to see what this sucker had got had already passed me by. Still, I wondered whether it was concealing something exciting behind that precipitation curtain.

A couple of hours later I discovered via the news that it had formed a funnel cloud but this had been shrouded by rain/hail from my perspective. Luckily someone had submitted a photo to the Weather Network so I didn't miss too much. At least I could still say that I witnessed the storm even if I didn't see the funnel cloud myself (although the suspicious looking swathe of cloud was probably the beginnings of it...)

But aside from that I've not seen many great storms. I've watched as an enormous cell headed north of the city and tracked it on the radar because I didn't have the means to chase it. Watching it pass by and seeing its structure was both exciting and painful - sensing it could produce some interesting stuff yet knowing I couldn't chase it. I monitored the radar back at home and watched the bright colours grow, change shape and form the usual 'hook effect' to indicate that the storm was rotating. I tuned into the Weather Network a little while later and anticipated their report: funnel cloud over Red Deer. Ha! I knew it!! Another one bites the dust.

So enjoy this photo. It's the best I've taken so far this season. Probably not the best shot but I haven't had as much chance to take many photos this year. I shall just have to immortalize inwords the ones I didn't shoot with a camera. C'est la vie...