Victoria's week of storms Dec 6 - 13 2004

Sunset Dec 8 and Dec 9 2004.

Stormy conditions persisted around Victoria for more than a week, due to alow pressure system which remained over SE Australia for the entire period.  While work commitments limited chasing activities, the stormy conditions also provided some spectacular sunsets.  Mammatus from a storm north of Melbourne on December 8 provided a picturesque spectacle.

Similarly, December 9 provided another spectacular sunset.  These photos were taken at the start of a night time chase.

Saturday December 11 2004 saw an opportunity to chase, following a shortened ASWA barbecue.  I went out with David Simpson, Jane ONeill and Clyve Herbet. This chase yielded some 135 photos, a selection of which appear below, with comments...

Minutes after departure, taken from the Keilor area - the sky showed promising signs.  I was 15-20 minutes behind the others, due to dropping some food off on the way.

In convoy north of Woodend, after meeting with the others at Woodend...

Near Marong, west of Bendigo, we encountered this cell with an interesting updraught.

Wonder what the locals thought of all those strange people looking at the sky... ;-)

An updraught developing in the outflow of a decaying cell.

After the first cell started to decay, we proceeded north and encountered this one between Bendigo and Bridgewater. Didn't notice the wall cloud in this shot until afterwards.  This cell caused some tree damage and flash flooding in the areas it affected.

Stopped to get a closer look (and a lot more photos) of this one...

A closeup of the inflow area, showing a lowering.

After 20 minutes, the outflow started to become interesting.

We continued northwest to Bridgewater, and then turned east and stopped again 5km east of Raywood.  This put us almost behind the previously photographed cell.

Looking south to a distant cell in the Ballarat area.  Reports later received indicated severe weather around Ballarat.

Overhead was some spectacular mammatus.

An interesting thing we noticed a bit later was that we had approached the tail end of the storm from the west, where conditions had been dry, but there had been a sudden transition from dry to wet conditions.  Note the abrupt end of the wet section of road.

An interesting view of a storm framed by trees.

Less than 2km from our previous dry stopping point, we struck flash flooding.  A local farmer estimated 1 1/2" (around 38 mm) in less than 3/4 of an hour.

Stopped to get a closer look at the flash flooding.

A cell to the north of our location started to look interesting.  Unfortunately, I had run out of time and had to return back to Melbourne, leaving the other chasers to take a closer look.  Here's a few shots of the cell.

All photos are copyright Tony Langdon, unless otherwise specified.  Photos may be used for personal or non profit purposes, provided the source is acknowledged.  Other users please contact me at vk3jed@optusnet.com.au if you'd like to use any of my photos.