went to bed, bumped my head, and got up and it was raining!

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NZstorm
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Unread post by NZstorm »

Graeme, excellent photos, well done.

I would like to know the total lightning count for northern NZ last night.
The static on the am band was continuous for about four hours.
Central Auckland got the best part of the storm between 1am and 2am with lots of forked lightning through the sky and the sky Tower looked to be hit a few times. I took some lightning photos on my SLR bulb, so pics still in the camera. But I was to disorganised, my camera got wet, so I feel I missed out on good photos.

I expect a few new thunderstorms to develop over northern NZ this afternoon with hail and very strong wind gusts possible in the storms.

Currently partly cloudy in central Ak with 17C and adjacent cloud building.
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Unread post by tich »

I first heard about those northern storms on the radio news this morning - they were the first item. It rained here overnight (from sometime after midnight, after I'd gone to sleep) and at first this morning, but it soon cleared up. Now it's sunny, with only scattered clouds in Chch, but certainly alot colder than yesterday.
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Unread post by GraemeWi »

NZstorm wrote:I would like to know the total lightning count for northern NZ last night. The static on the am band was continuous for about four hours.
From roughly 10pm through to 2am the frequency of the visable lightning in my location was on average 1 every 30 seconds. Nearly 500 just for me! The view from here would cover from the Waitakeres through to Kaipara so thats a fair amount of area.

Cheers,

G
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Unread post by Manukau heads obs »

http://www.destin.co.nz/weather/lighteninggraph.gif

shows 155 last 12 hours

the strikes have now scrolled off the graph

(ignore the total since noon number)

bookmark that url :)
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NZstorm
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Unread post by NZstorm »

Already couple of cb's about . Hopefully lots of sunshine in the next 2 or 3 hours to get good thermal destabilisation.

currently partly cloudy , 18C
NZ Thunderstorm Soc
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Unread post by NZ Thunderstorm Soc »

Hi you lucky people up north.
So, you had a 'feast' overnight ! :)
I was picking up continuous distant sfrerics between 11pm when I got home and they were still going strong when I went to bed just before midnight. They were very very distant tho', I wonder if they were from those storm?
Good pictures Graeme, very NZTS potential shots!!

As Ben said ,it rained overnight with quite strong southerlies blowing with 9.5mm of rain here overnight before clearing up this morning.
Nice and fine now and becoming mild again. Very light SW


JohnGaul
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Unread post by GraemeWi »

I've managed to tweak another image

Image

It's a shame I can't pull any more detail from the central portion, all I can say is it was close and very very bright.

G
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Unread post by Michael »

[quote="NZ Thunderstorm Soc"]Hi you lucky people up north.
So, you had a 'feast' overnight ! :)
I was picking up continuous distant sfrerics between 11pm when I got home and they were still going strong when I went to bed just before midnight. They were very very distant tho', I wonder if they were from those storm?
Yes they probably were AM travels huge distances due to the ionosphere skywave at night I was trying to get Magic 693 last night and the lightning in addition to the usual interference was wiping it out ;)
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Unread post by tich »

Only scattered high cloud persisted in the Chch/Banks Peninsula area today, though I could see thicker cloud persisting well to the north. (Kaikoura possibly still wet) The cold southerly overnight did leave a legacy of a fresh dusting of snow on the tops of Banks Peninsula (melted by midafternoon) and on the foothills. I was at Amberley around middday and early afternoon, and there was a white coating on nearby Mt Grey down to about 700-800 metres.
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Unread post by Thunder »

Cool shots Graeme. ;) Oh how long until we get something like that down here :( ...... What else can I say......??????

Cheers
Aaron Wilkinson
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Unread post by NZ Thunderstorm Soc »

Cool shots Graeme. ;) Oh how long until we get something like that down here

Looks like it could be tonight according to the latest MetService forecast for Canterbury, Aaron!!!

BE ON FULL ALERT

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Michael
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Unread post by Michael »

Sunny here today but not as pleasant outside as it looks however due to a 40 knot SSW and quite cool
Thunder
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Unread post by Thunder »

WILL DO!

I saw that forcast, what does your opinion say John? You know best!

I remember metservice forcasting thunderstorms once and the day was a brilliant sunny one (brilliant because it was winter and we hadn't had one in a while), you posted a message saying " I feel sorry for all the thunderstorm damage etc people got", obviously you were being sarcastic, it was funny!!

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Aaron Wilkinson
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Unread post by Manukau heads obs »

met service lightning strikes map for the other night bob mcdavitt sent me :)
the picture says all!
>Bob McDavitt says that the New Zealand Lightning Detection
> system counted 14,895 cloud-to-ground lightning strikes
> over New Zealand and surrounding seas between dusk on
> Saturday and dawn on Sunday. The number of cloud-to-cloud
> discharges is estimated to be ten times more.
You do not have the required permissions to view the files attached to this post.
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NZstorm
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Unread post by NZstorm »

Brian, thanks for posting the lightning chart.

Something I have learnt from years of watching thunderstorms is that the cloud to ground strikes occur during the developmental stage of a cumulonimbus. The anvil crawlers(other end of lightning spectrum) come on the declining phase of the cumulonimbus. Anvil crawlers are a form of cloud to cloud lightning.

The storm line was at its peak developmental phase along the west coast, hence all those CG's and declining as it moved eastward hense less CG's. And I had noticed that the storm line had really weakened by the time it got out to sea east of the NI.
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NZstorm
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Unread post by NZstorm »

Not quite cold enough upstairs for thunderstorms in Canterbury today.
At this time of year there needs to be quite cold air aloft to get cb's deep enough for thunder in Canterbury. ;)

While on the Ts note....should be good Thunderstorms over the West Coast of the South Island later in the week. :)
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Unread post by NZ Thunderstorm Soc »

I agree Steven. There was nothing here the would stimilate thunderstorm growth this afternoon. NW Arch for most of the afternnon with thick As forms although I did notice virga trails along the Arch plus other forms of instability ie. mammatus and some glaciated cirrus.
I hope Aaron wasn't hopeful/disappointed !!!!


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Michael
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Unread post by Michael »

The wind is up to Gale Force here tonight :(
Thunder
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Unread post by Thunder »

Hi John

Yes I noticed those forms in the NW arch. I wasn't dissapointed that much, my thunderstorm senses just seemed to tell me nothing was going to happen so I'm cool, hehe.

Does anyone here think that South Island West coast thunderstorms would be good to view, for some reason I've always figured they would be a whole lot of sheet lightning, don't know why?

Cheers
Aaron Wilkinson
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