Tri-Supercell Chase!

November 15, 2005

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Wow – what an awesome day!!!  A nice upper trough was pushing into NE NSW/SE QLD with a strong southerly surge behind it.  I was wondering what would happen…there was a coastal trough through SE QLD/NE NSW, and then another trough with the southerly sitting well south, backing up towards Goondiwindi.  It was a hard day to pick where to chase…in the end I decided that I’d play my luck around SE QLD with good mid-level wind shear (tongue of 20-25 knot SW winds @ 700mb, and 35-40 knot WSW winds @ 500mb and 70-80knot W winds @ 300mb), supporting the instability.  The LIs were only -1 to -2 over much of SE QLD, but I had a feeling they were going to be undercooked as there was a strong stream of moisture, and the 925 dry slot was just south of us in NE NSW.

Mother Nature made it easy for once though with a storm developing at 6am at Texas near the NSW and Queensland border.  It did quite well to still be going at 8-9am when I was talking to James about it…but instead of dying, it actually began to intensify!!  So I decided to head out earlier towards Gatton and then drive south to meet it.  It was quite interesting as the storm was developing right along the edge of a clearing cloud and rain band.  I’m not used to leaving for stormchases when it’s just 20 degrees!  But I headed out in the rain and shot west.  Soon enough, the cloud cleared and I was greeted with blue skies with ACCAS, and more distant CJs towards the Downs.  Interestingly, the storm seemed to be moving on a boundary as there was a single line of ACCAS to the NE of the storm and was attached, of which the storm pretty much followed that exact line for its lifetime while I was chasing it!

I headed down route 80 (I’ve had many failed chases on this road…almost to the point where I’ve become superstitious and tried to avoid it!)  But not today…though I did head down to Mount Sylvia initially…sorta like the Lost World (well, it felt like it), with no speed limits and only recommended speed limits through the towns it had a nice feeling, along with being in a nice valley which was even greener than everything else in the surrounds.  The thunder was impressive…constant rolling thunder with crawlers overhead (which normally indicate a long-lived storm, or sometimes even a weakening storm), but the storm continued to strengthen with the warmth of the day still building to its north.  

I shot back northwards towards Gatton and got a nice pan of it moving towards me before shooting eastwards.  There was no shortage of CGs, except for when my video camera was on (as always!)

I shot back to the highway, but had to go east a little before going north…that meant one thing, just about driving into this beast which was looking nastier by the second!!!  I skirted on the edge and received winds well into the 80-90km/h mark with some small hail (just riding the outflow), the main precip core was so close you could almost reach out and touch it!  

But I just managed to escape it and fly northwards.  I spoke to some of the truckies on the UHF, then all of the sudden heard a barrage of swearing and fear as their trucks got slammed in by severe winds and 3cm hail.  I didn’t hear any larger reports, but the storm did look more like that it’d contain lots of smaller hail rather than giant hail.

Just north of the highway I had to stop for a photo though – the most incredible white hailshafts were being blown sideways and underneath from the guster region!!!!!!!!!  

I got goosebumps realizing how close I came to being in the storm and just managed to escape it.  I had some incredible close CGs…within 50m or so while standing outside the car…once again scared the life out of me, and jumped in the car and continued to hurtle northwards.  

It was a good directioned road, so I was able to stay ahead of the storm with ease and that removed the concern of being caught up in it and was able to get some nice shots.

Unfortunately the storm began to cross the ranges west of Brisbane near Esk…I had the option to continue chasing it, but thought that the storm would just continue eastwards and move out to sea near Caloundra…along with it also weakening (though its RFD packed a punch after watching branches being ripped off trees as it went over me!)  And generally outflow dominated HP supercells don’t tend to last too much longer.  But on the Sunshine Coast it got a second wind and kept going and hit Gympie later on before collapsing!  The storm lasted 12 hours – just incredible!!!!!  I decided to head back south (not without getting a satay chicken pie from the Fernvale Bakery though!  First pie of the season from there…it’s been too long!!!)  Before heading back to Gatton with a massive dome on another storm down near Warwick.

I took route 80 again towards Clifton…but things were looking a little cluttered, and there were storms just near Toowoomba and I was nervous that I was doing the wrong thing as the Toowoomba storms had potential to do well and go into the Brisbane Valley, not to mention would possibly cause this other cell to weaken when it got closer to Toowoomba.  It did cause the storm to weaken…but the structure oh!!!  It had a nice (but rapidly weakening and deteriorating meso) on the northeast edge.  

But it was jus going to go back over the road I came on and 20km of windy, partially rock-fallen roads with canopy like trees wasn’t my idea of a good chasing road.  So I decided to punch through the rain falling ahead and see if anything would develop on the western edge.  Well, it did…sorta – (it sorta did and it did…ok I’ve confused myself too).  The sorta part was, the storm was rapidly becoming outflow dominant, but not without producing an awesome guster on the RFD courtesy of the high moisture levels in front from the other storms.

Once again the ominous white hail shafts could be seen racing ahead, so I gunned it to get to the New England Hwy to head north.  

But what a sight further north!  Massive storm, still rotating slowly, with incredible guster!!!  I continued to head north (the guster was moving northwards at around 70-80km/h so it was a struggle!)  

And continued to get some good shots of it, before it lost a lot of its definition and shape just near Toowoomba.  But the outflow kicked off another storm just west of Toowoomba.

I decided to head up to Crows Nest…this part of the chase was much shorter – but the storm rapidly produced another nice guster in the high moisture environment.  I pushed northwards, but the storm was going to go NE and the road went NNW.  

However the storm weakened, but it had a decaying supercell look to it…along with twisting in the updrafts still evident.  I ended up in Yarraman, and then decided to head back down the Brisbane Valley highway back home to end what was a fantastic day of chasing!!!  Three supercells, don’t think I’ve ever been able to chase in close-range three before in a day, and to think one of them was during the morning!!