Mean Green

TOP IMAGE: A shelf cloud approaches from the southwest along a strong gust front around 5:33 PM, CDT Friday, June 29, 2012 as seen from the protective front entrance overhang at Noelridge Christian Church in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. The leading clouds took on a greenish-gray appearance as they plowed through and gobbled up temperatures in the mid-80s with dew points in the upper-60s. MIDDLE IMAGE: A base wind velocity capture taken of the area at 5:32 PM. Blue areas show 60-80 knot wind speeds, with green indicating 50 kts. or less. The white "X" at top shows the relative position of the camera. BOTTOM IMAGE: No apparent damage took place around my spotter's position at the church, but about an hour later back at home I discovered that a medium-sized branch had fallen on our roof (the only such damage for blocks) and had, ironically, disabled my roof-mounted weather station, breaking off the wind vane and anemometer arm!

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Eleven Miles High

This cumulonimbus storm cell, which appeared to the motorist like it was just over the hill eastbound along Interstate 80 just east of Newton, Iowa was in fact about 80 miles distant around 3:51 PM, Monday, May 28, 2012. The cell had achieved severe status by this time. The edge of the anvil was about 55,000 feet and an overshooting top soared even higher, around 60,000 feet (about 11 miles). The overshooting top can be seen as the higher and lighter protrusion toward the right side of the cloud structure in the top image. The bottom radar image shows our vehicle's position relative to the cell as a superimposed star in Jasper County, east of Des Moines. The most intense part of the storm cell is located in southern Johnson County south of Iowa City.

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Not As Bad As It Looks

This photogenic cumulus structure looked a lot more menacing than it really was in this view looking west from Bowman Woods Park in Cedar Rapids, Iowa just before 8:00 PM on Wednesday, June 20, 2012 (summer solstice). The "scarecrow" cloud was a classic example of dry conditions all season that have prevailed in the eastern part of the state, inhibiting storm formation energy. The small cell slid west of town and quickly died out. In the background is Bowman Woods Elementary School.

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Buffeted By RFD

The storm chase team of Ryan Alliss, Ethan Milius, Bryce Link, Tyler Roney, Nick Carletta, Sam Schreier, Tristan Morath and myself stopped in the midst of Rear Flank Downdraft (RFD) winds of around 50 mph at this location on Keystone Avenue at 330th Street, about eight miles south of Ida Grove, Iowa on Saturday, April 9, 2011. These video frame captures looking north show the blasting winds and lightning flashes every few seconds. The top image, shot around 8:09 PM, includes chaser Ryan Alliss at lower left. The bottom image, shot about two minutes later, shows a CTG lightning bolt a two pieces of debris (arrows) swiftly blowing across the road from left-to-right. In the car monitoring the situation on his laptop was Ethan Milius. We didn't have long to wait to see another tornado--about ten minutes later to our north as we drove east (right in image) on 330th Street (County Road D54). RFD winds are descending regions of warm dry air forced down from mid-levels of the atmosphere that wrap around the back of a mesocyclone. They form when middle and upper troposheric winds encounter the storm's updraft. The winds, typically from the southwest and sometimes reaching 100 mph, yield evaporative cooling which ultimately leads to their formation. Some RFD can actually choke off the formation of a tornado. Due to our SE positions to the storm system as we followed it, we pretty much experienced RFD winds from 7:50 PM to the end of our chase just before 10:00 PM.

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Arthur Tornado Road

Members of our storm chase vehicle yell, "Let's go!" to the occupants of our accompanying chase car while standing alongside County Highway M31 and looking north near the intersection of County Road D54 (330th Street) around 8:19 PM on Saturday, April 9, 2011 (top image). The chasers are from left: Bryce Link, Ryan Alliss and Ethan Milius. Both groups would resume their chase toward the tornado seen in the background, at this point about 8 miles from our position. The town of Arthur, Iowa in the western part of the state was about 7.5 miles toward the small light at right center. The tornado has touched down a couple minutes later in the bottom image and formed into a wedge. Ryan Alliss drives the chase vehicle at left. The tornado would later be rated an EF2. Several minutes after this image was taken the tornado further morphed into a stovepipe shape before quickly dissipating. This was a strong cyclic storm system producing several tornadoes on this night. These are video frame captures made possible by flashes of lightning.

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Watching and Waiting

The Storm Prediction Center (SPC) had issued a moderate risk for severe weather for Western Iowa early on the morning of Saturday, April 9, 2011. My son Ryan and I left Cedar Rapids before 11:00 AM that day, heading west--first to Ames to join up with six meteorology students from Iowa State University. In addition to our vehicle, another car was used for the coming chase. After consultation in Ames around 1:00 PM, our storm initiation point was deemed to be Avoca or Minden, Iowa, just NE of Council Bluffs. After arriving at an old abandoned convenience store/gas station site just .2-mile north of the Minden exit off Interstate 80, we waited. Temperatures were unseasonably warm--in the low 80s with dew points in the low 70s. Strong winds buffeted a sunny sky as the atmosphere began to mix and percolate. The top image shows the chase team waiting for possible storm initiation around 4:10 PM. Standing from left are: Nick Carletta, Sam Schreier, Ryan Alliss, Tristan Morath and Bryce Link. In the passenger side of the foreground car is Ethan Milius checking radar on his laptop. Not pictured here was Tyler Roney. The bottom image shows a cumulus tower beginning to form in the north just before 4:30 PM. At 5:00 PM the chase was on--west to Interstate 29, then stair-stepping NE through Western Iowa--and into a significant tornado outbreak!

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High Beam Cumulus

The tops of these two cumulus clouds seem to glow as they reflect the setting sun just before 8:00PM on Wednesday, June 20, 2012. This view looks east from Bowman Woods Park in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Sunset was 8:45 PM.

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Punchless Panorama

Although conditions at this hour favored some "action"--87 degrees F, 66-degree dew points and southerly winds around 15 mph--this isolated and weak storm cell never got going as it moved in a northeasterly direction west of Cedar Rapids, Iowa at 8:00 PM, Wednesday, June 20, 2012. On this summer solstice day, a long line of thunderstorms moved through the state of Iowa, actually becoming severe in Des Moines, but fizzling out as they reached the eastern part of the state. That trend has been the norm throughout the 2012 season--storms dying in the east due to lack of moisture and daytime heating and a persistent northern jet stream alignment. By the time the line reached Cedar Rapids before midnight, it offered little but some lightning flashes and a total of .35 inches of rain at this location. This image looks west from Bowman Woods Park. Bowman Woods Elementary School is seen in the background.

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"Adventure" Outside The Park

This cumulonimbus storm cell was some 80 miles away as seen from our vehicle eastbound on Interstate 80 at the US Highway 6 interchange near Adventureland Park in Altoona, Iowa. As we were in the process of returning home to Cedar Rapids from a day in Central Iowa on Memorial Day, Monday, May 28, 2012, the drive almost felt like a storm chase. The cell, however, kept us at bay even though we were traveling toward it at 70 mph. The closest we would get was about 40 miles, at which time we  turned north onto Interstate 380 toward home. Photo was taken around 3:18 PM.

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What A Difference A Decade Makes

My then-13-year-old son Ryan Alliss accompanied me to the top of the roof of our house on Inwood Court NE in Cedar Rapids, Iowa on the evening of May 30, 2002 to view and film a beautifully structured "mothership" mesocyclone, part of an isolated supercell storm that passed just north of town. In the upper group of Sony Handycam camcorder videotape stills captured by my camera from our TV, the Harding Middle School 7th grader takes in the long-lasting memories of the storm. This, and many other storms, left a lasting impression on Ryan, who soon decided what his future career was going to be--in weather. He studied for his meteorology degree at Iowa State University from 2007-2010, graduating on December 17, 2010. His first "captured" tornado would be during a school-influenced storm chase near Medford, Oklahoma on May 10, 2010 (left photo in bottom group of photos). The middle bottom photo shows one of about 10 tornadoes viewed during an amazing chase in southern Minnesota on June 17, 2010. Almost duplicating that tornado count was a memorable storm chase in western Iowa on April 9, 2011 (right bottom photo). Ryan has been a meteorologist with Rockwell/Collins in Houston, Texas, since May, 2011 and is currently working there as an aviation meteorologist. Dreams realized.

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Dry Rain

A weak rain shaft protrudes from the bottom of a cumulus cloud in the east sky as seen from Archer Drive at the new Bowman Meadows housing development just south of Boyson Road in Marion, Iowa around 8:24 PM, Wednesday, June 13, 2012. The extended dry conditions over most of the state of Iowa precluded this meager attempt of rainfall from ever reaching the ground. Weather system patterns this year continue to form in the western part of the state only to peter out before reaching the east due to a lack of sustaining moisture.

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Speedy Updraft From The Speedway

Rapidly rising updrafts push the tops of the cumulonimbus cloud in this image to over 45,000 feet. A partially visible overshooting top can be seen in the upper right portion of the cloud. Overshooting tops form when the rapid momentum of an updraft breaks through the equilibrium level (anvil) in a cumulonimbus cloud and forms a dome-like structure above it. This view looks east along Interstate 80 about a half-mile west of the Iowa Speedway exit (Exit 168) in Newton, Iowa around 3:48 PM, Monday, May 28, 2012. The Memorial Day storm cell would become severe-warned.

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Power Polaris

Ambient lighting reflects from high tension towers and their accompanying crisscrossed power lines in this view of the north sky from Marion, Iowa around 9:54 PM, Saturday, June 9, 2012. At the center of the image and between the towers is the North Star, Polaris. The towers are located near Boyson Trail in Donnelly Park a short distance from the confluence of Dry Run and Indian creeks. This image is a 34-second exposure at f/11, 250 ISO and 18mm focal length.

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Sunny Delight

The top image is the approximate color of the sun as seen through my Celestron F60(EQ) Mylar Solar Filter which gives our closest star a bluish cast. The bottom image was color corrected to give sol a more natural appearance. The solar filter was fitted to my camera's 200mm HB-37 lens hood. Although not overly crisp images, one can clearly see sunspots on the discs. The sun sports numerous spots at this time because it is nearing its 11-odd year Solar Maximum cycle. Sunspots are base points for coronal loops and appear dark because--though they are far from "cool"--they are cooler than the surrounding surface areas. These photographs were shot at 5:40 PM, Monday, June 11, 2012 from Cedar Rapids, Iowa and were imaged at 1/320-second at f/13, 200 ISO.

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Daytime Searchlight

A strong beam of light stabs here through a gap in a passing thundershower cloud. The small opening created this sun-produced optical view in this view looking west from the grounds at Noelridge Christian Church in Cedar Rapids, Iowa around 7:25 PM, Thursday, May 24, 2012.

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Scud Horizon

Low hanging scud clouds from a passing thunderstorm are seen in the north sky beyond the grounds at Noelridge Christian Church in Cedar Rapids, Iowa around 6:42 PM, Thursday, May 24, 2012. 74th Street NE runs horizontally between the baseball diamond and the houses.

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Holiday Road

Eastbound on Interstate 80 just west of Newton, Iowa one was witness to this beautiful cumulonimbus cloud with a spreading anvil top on Memorial Day, Monday, May 28, 2012 around 3:47 PM. We were returning home to Cedar Rapids from a day in the Des Moines area and were treated to this visually evolving structure all the way to our destination.

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Won't Happen Again For A LONG Time!

The next time Venus transits across the sun's face as seen from Earth will be on December 11, 2117, so this was a rare treat to observe. However, weather conditions were not at all favorable from this location at Echo Hill Presbyterian Church in Marion, Iowa on Tuesday, June 5, 2012. Clouds obscured most of the show, which started just after 5:00 PM and ended with sunset. Two exceptions were the images seen above. The inset image was captured from a 60 X 700mm refractor telescope using a Celestron mylar solar filter and shot aiming my camera into an HM25mm eyepiece. The smudges within the disk are clouds. It was photographed at 7:25 PM. The background image was photographed at 200mm focal length around 8:23 PM and faintly shows Venus within the sun's glare.

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Beamin' Through

The sun makes a brief appearance as it tries to shine through the clouds of a thundershower just after 5:00 PM, Tuesday, May 15, 2012. The small window for the sun created these beautiful shafts of light. This view looks west from the grounds at Noelridge Christian Church in Cedar Rapids, Iowa.

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Receding Sunlight

A thunderstorm approaches from the southwest (left), overtaking the last remnants of sunlight as seen from the grounds at Noelridge Christian Church around 8:42 PM, Friday, May 25, 2012. The cell produced significant lightning but stayed west of this position.

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Big Bend Vista

Retro photo. Layered cumulus clouds billow south of this arid scenic overlook from the SW Rim along the South Rim Loop trail at Big Bend National Park in SW Texas on Monday, May 28, 1984. The altitude at this point was around 7,000 feet above sea level. This view was part of a two-day backpacking trip along the 12.4-mile trail which in addition to me included friends Tom Bellinger and Chuck Parks.

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Aesthetic Anvil

Except for its color, the cumulonimbus cloud in the top image looked very much like a real anvil as it billowed upward just before 5:30 PM on Memorial Day, Monday, May 28, 2012. This view looks SSE from Bowman Meadows, a new housing development under construction in Marion, Iowa, just south of Boyson Road and west of Alburnett Road. The anvil was part of a long line of storms that fired up in Eastern Iowa Monday afternoon, stretching from NE Missouri to southern Wisconsin. An arrow points to the storm cell in the bottom echo tops radar image (shown as a red rectangle), which at the time was reaching around 45,000 feet in altitude.

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