20th November 2008 - Hunter Valley and
Hawkesbury, NSW
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Desperate
for a chase in yet another dry and moisture starved Spring
myself and Steve targeted the a Hunter Valley setup
today (4 hours distant). The Hunter Valley is renown for turning on
storms against the odds. This is partially due to heat build up in the
upper Hunter, but also often just slightly better
moisture.
It took
a while for things tp get going, but we were rewarded finally. Here at
Branxton we are about to engulfed by strong wind and hail .
The storm quickly passed with wind and
hail, the shear was taking the storms NE well beyond any chance of
keeping up given the Aussie roads. We thought the day was over as it
was looking very dry and stable back towards the south, but
we were wrong..............
Just north of Sydney near the
Hawkesbury river an isolated cell quickly built into the sky.
We thought for a
brief while that we may have been able to intercept the storm, but it
moved east of the only road . Note the mid level funnel
cloud. The video below shoes clear rotation.
It was quite an
impressive anvil from a relatively small storm.