Monday November 27th 2006

Storms looked quite likely on the Northern Tablelands with very strong instability present, however other commitments meant I could not chase till after 9pm. Luckily, a line of weaker storms seemed to develop in response to outflow from a massive evening supercell on the Northern Tablelands, and these moved through the Northern Rivers during the evening. I was at Ballina with some friends, enjoying the show from the river, but went out on chase to a favourite spot near Alstonville after 9pm. I watched the mostly in cloud lightning flash away for about 20 minutes before CGs began to appear, and became reasonably frequent. It was a pretty active show!

The lightning eased off a fair bit, so I decided to head home. On the drive, it was obvious that massive anvil crawlers were ripping through the sky overhead, but were obscured by low cloud. On arriving home, this low cloud cleared, and revealed some of the most spectacular anvil crawlers I've seen in a while. I set the camera up on the roof and caught a few images of them. There was no lightning locally for about 5 minutes, then a crawler started in the distance, moving quickly towards me. Then FLASH!! It arched down into a CG only a few kilometers away! What a sight! About 5 minutes passed, and again a crawler started moving towards me. Suddenly I was dazed by an incredible flash, followed by the loudest crack of thunder I have ever heard!! Again, the crawler had arched down, but right next to our house. The photo I took doesn't show the CG, but does show the anvil crawler responsible along with a landscape that is lit up like daytime! A few more similar anvil crawler/CGs hit nearby, but none as close as the one next to our house. It one again proves that even if the storm is a fair way away, it is not safe to be outside!

Full size photos available in Dave's Gallery on:
Page 70 and Page 71

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