Flood Deja Vu

Looking very much like five years ago along the Cedar River in downtown Cedar Rapids, Iowa in the top image, flood waters pass under the First Avenue bridge toward the Second Avenue bridge around 3:20 PM, Saturday, June 1, 2013. The river is expected to crest around 21 feet the next day on Sunday. The bottom image looks west across the river from Mohawk Park in Cedar Rapids around 3:40 PM Saturday. In the background inundated boat houses at the Ellis boat harbor can be seen. The epic Cedar River flood of 2008 crested at 31.3 feet. The river would eventually crest at 18.23 feet early Sunday morning, below earlier projections. By Monday the level was down two feet. Flood stage is 12 feet.

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Underachieving Bow Echo Storm

With the eastern third of Iowa and most of Wisconsin and Illinois under a tornado watch since 12:30 PM CDT on Thursday, May 30, 2013, anticipation for the arrival of significant weather in the Cedar Rapids, Iowa metro area was felt. What arrived, however, was a garden variety bow echo storm in which wind speeds never exceeded 30 mph at Echo Hill Presbyterian Church in Marion, where the top two images were captured. They show the approach of a shelf cloud from the southwest with C Avenue in the background. Rain and some lightning accompanied the passing of the storm. A corresponding DVN radar screen is shown at bottom.

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Mammatus For All Tastes

Mammatus of different shapes and colors graced the skies of Marion, Iowa on the evening of Tuesday,May 28, 2013. The formations began to appear after 7:30 PM as the underside of the anvil of a severe-warned storm located about 60 miles away in southern Washington County slid eastward. The top two images, taken at 7:54 and 7:58 PM, look northwest from Archer Drive in the Bowman Meadows housing development. The lower mammatus image, shot around 8:00 PM, looks the opposite direction and shows a dark gray shade. Also visible at lower left is a string of cumulus towers located about 60 miles to the east in Clinton County near the Mississippi River. The bottom image shows a radar perspective of the same time period. Mammatus exist in a very moist and unstable middle or upper level in the atmosphere, overlying a drier layer below an anvil produced by an adjacent cumulonimbus.

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North Skunk River In Iowa Overflows

Heavy and prolonged rain caused the North Skunk River in Iowa to overflow its banks on Sunday afternoon, May 26, 2013. These images, shot around 6:15 PM, show the flooding as seen from Interstate 80 near Mile Mark 176 between Newton and Grinnell and look southeast. The top image shows farm land just west of the river, middle image at the river and the bottom image just east of the river. Many parts of central and eastern Iowa were under flash flood warnings on this day.

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CC Activity In Passing Storm Cell

Cloud-to-cloud (CC) lightning emanates from a passing storm cell around 9:13 PM, Sunday, May 19, 2013 in this view (top image) looking west from the parking lot at Noelridge Christian Church in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. The trailing edge of the storm, located about 30 miles distant in Benton County, can be seen at left. The storm was moving to the northeast and missed this location. The bottom image is a radar screen capture of the same moment showing the camera's position (white arrow) and the storm's track (red arrow). Top image is a 16 second exposure at f/9, 200 ISO and 18mm focal length.

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Planetary Triumvirate

The planets Jupiter (left center in image), Venus (lower) and Mercury (right of Venus) were gathering for a close conjunction beginning on the evening of Thursday, May 23, 2013. Venus and Mercury are setting into the haze of the horizon. This image, shot around 9:30 PM, shows their triangular formation in the WNW sky as seen from Christ Community United Methodist Church in Marion, Iowa. Lights from traffic in the background are on East Main Street. The planets gather even closer in the next few nights. Viewing them here though, may be a big challenge as cloudy skies with rain promise to be dominant in the weather forecast. Jupiter is shown at magnitude -1.92, Venus at -3.90 and Mercury at -1.01. This image is a 2-second exposure at f/9, 320 ISO and 55mm focal length. The star seen at top is 1.62 magnitude Elnath in the constellation Auriga.

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Teasing Sky That Never Materialized

As we headed to our cars following our softball game at Noelridge Park in Cedar Rapids, Iowa on the evening of Monday, May 20, 2013, the sky in certain directions appeared tantalizing. With reports of advancing severe weather in Central Iowa to the west conditions promised to be advantageous for some photo opportunities. This however was about the best it would get on this night as the storms from the west lost energy and died out at Cedar Rapids' doorstep. This image shows mammatus formations at about 20,000 feet on the underside of an anvil belonging to a storm system to the ESE and looks over Harding Middle School, location near the ball diamonds at Noelridge Park. Photo capture time was about 8:15 PM. Below is a radar screen capture comparable to the image above with the white arrow showing the camera's view.

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