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STORMPLANET - Severe Event Reports
Storm Chase!!
Tuesday December
2nd 2003
Melbourne, Victoria.
Images below show
the storm becoming organised & preparing to deliver a deluge of
golf-ball sized hail over Lilydale. The 2nd image demonstrates the
incredible 'greenage' with the storm.
Overview | Videos |
Afternoon Storm Images (digital) |
Afternoon Storm Images (35mm)| Radar
Loop Hail Event | RHI & PPI Scan | Lightning Images |
Hail Damage Images |
Media Links | Other Reports
for this event| Media Requests |
....golf ball
sized hail ravages Lilydale & surrounding areas and that evening
Melbourne gets an amazing rain deluge and lightning show, rescuers use boats to save stranded
motorists on the Eastern Freeway!
As The Age Newspaper wrote upon quoting Kevin Parkyn from the BOM...
"The thunderstorm cells then
gathering in Craigieburn's skies were something else. "It was a
completely different thunderstorm," said the Bureau of Meteorology's
severe weather meteorologist, Kevin Parkyn. "It was a totally new being
or entity." The tropical
weather - warm, humid, unstable air, with little wind - were ideal
thunderstorm conditions. And so around Melbourne's north and west grew a
bank of black cloud nearly 15 kilometres thick, extending up to the
tropopause.
Over the following six hours the
clouds dumped a multi-gigalitre bucket of water over Melbourne while
slowly moving south-east to Westernport Bay. The bureau issued its first
severe thunderstorm warning at 11.38pm based on radar observations.
"A single storm developed in
Craigieburn and then other storms developed shortly after," said Mr
Parkyn. "They intensified as they moved closer to the city."
Overview
A low pressure trough lingered over north-eastern Victoria as a high
pressure system drifted slowly across the Tasman Sea. 
Image courtesy
Weatherzone.
Image courtesy
NASA Earth Observatory
Below: Cropped NASA Aqua
satellite image of Victoria, 1km resolution, showing the storms over
central & eastern Victoria. Click image for higher resolution or go
direct to the NASA Image and choose your resolution
here.
We had widespread moisture and
instability across Eastern and Central Australia and this led to
thunderstorms from the NT through Western NSW and across Central and
Eastern Victoria.
During the evening a large storm developed to Melbourne's
north just prior to midnight with other cells spawning to the northwest.
For over two hours the main cell was almost stationery which gave us an
incredible lightning show and a rain deluge that flooded homes and
business, washed out roads and stranded many motorists.
Videos
Video 1. 3.1Mb 1.5 mins
The cell that tracked from Tullamarine to Lilydale intensified as it
moved overhead Croydon/Chirnside Park and deviated of it's track
slightly to the left. This video shows the cell becoming more intense,
the outflow/downdraft winds commence & greenage is seen in the cell.
Video 2. 1.6Mb 57secs
Same as above, with hail shaft, strong outflow winds and rotating scud.
Video 3. 1.1Mb 38secs
As above, winds reach estimated 70kmh+
Video 4. 3.2 Mb 43secs
The hail commences!
Video 5 3.1Mb 27secs
More hail footage
Video 6. 4.8 Mb 1min
More hail footage
Video 7. 814kb 50secs
Time-lapse as the storm approaches Lilydale after deviating left (NE)
Video 8. 634kb 31secs
Time-lapse of Lilydale cell as base takes on a (short-lived) organised
structure with rotation.
Video 9. 1.38Mb 1.3mins
Lightning highlights
Video 10. 793kb 41secs
Lightning highlights
Video 11. 1.12Mb 1.1mins
Lightning Highlights
Afternoon Storm
Images Seen
below are images taken East of Coldstream parallel to the track of the
Lilydale cell, until it veered left. Also included are images taken
later on this day, in the Healesville area.
Afternoon Storm
Images (35mm scans)
Radar loop from
Lilydale cell (courtesy
BOM &
ASWA)
Click on image
RHI and PPI scan
- Lilydale Cell (with many
thanks courtesy of BOM
Melbourne)
Radar stills from the evening deluge (courtesy
BOM)
0710UTC
0720UTC
0730UTC
0740UTC
1320UTC
1400UTC
Evening
Lightning Images
Here is just a selection of the lightning
Images from this evening of intense activity over Melbourne.
Photographed from Chirnside Park, I commenced filming at around 2230
hours AEST and finished around 0230 hrs AEST the following morning (Wed
3rd) however the show continued fir a few more hours after that! Half of
these images are from a digital still camera, the 2nd half are lifted
from digital video so the quality of these is not as high. Take a look
at the awesome structure of the cell that wrought havoc on Melbourne, the
lightning really shows up the wonderful structure of the cell,
particularly in images vidlift12, 13, 18, 19 & 23.
Hail
Damage Images (taken with great appreciation
at Brian Glynn Ford, Lilydale, Vic. )
The following two images Copyright John Kirk,
Beyond Images. The Lilydale cell taken from NW side.
Media Links
David is
interviewed by A Current Affair on Channel 9 on Wed 3rd Dec 2003
regarding this event and on 774 ABC Radio (3LO). David's images have also appeared in three
newspapers and one magazine reporting on this event.
Herald Sun Newspaper Article
The Age Newspaper Article 1
The Age Newspaper Article 2
Other
reports to this event
Australian Weather News
Australian Sky & Weather
Ern Mainka
Photography
If you are from a media organisation and interested in
high-resolution images or footage from this event feel free to
contact Stormplanet. |
T a k i n g A u s t r a l i a b y
S t o r m ! 
