Well, the evening of Sunday of Sunday the 26th October 2014 saw the most spectacular and lightning intense storm I have seen on the Fleurieu. We are typically a storm free zone but something clicked in the atmosphere and shared the “love” around.

The entire day was unstable starting with rumbles from mid level attempts at rain and storms. This was pretty lackluster and about all we normally get. It did provide some good contrast in scenes though

And this is where it normally ends. Normally. But mother nature had other ideas. I noticed some pretty severe cells on radar going through their usual corridors over northern Yorke Peninsula. I almost closed the webpage down but a frame refresh revealed a line developing further south! Nah I thought. But…

Ok then up to the hill not expecting anything cause nothing much usually happens. It would be scenic at least. And scenic it was! Firstly there was an incoming line of daytime bolts. Hard to snap and rarely photogenic from a distance I snapped away anyway. Just one of those displayed here cause they are pretty average, but you get the idea.
The sunset though was truly inspiring. A pastel red glow, crepuscular rays to my left, to my right incoming storm cells with lightning. Beautiful!

 

As the sun set the sky exploded. Multiple flashes per second. BOOM! It was speccy. And moving like a rocket. Not much time to get images before the whole complex was on top of me and far too dangerous to be in the open. I stupidly was up there without my car for shelter (didn’t expect anything so went out unprepared!!) and whena  bolt came crashing earthwards about 2km from me I decided it was time to BOLT (bad pun). I sprinted camera in tow back to the house with bolts dropping all about me. Man this storm was moving fast! I grabbed the car and raced back to the hill, but when I got there (less than 5 minutes later no less!) the rain started. I call it rain but it was really buckets falling from the sky. No chance of pics now. I sat the cam on the dash and opened the shutter while bolts dropped all around me insanely close. Enough for me, too close on a hilltop! So drove and parked in my hayshed and again sat the cam on the dash. A shot gun BANG and lightning hit the ground on or near the house just 50 metres away from me. This bolt killed my modem, router and one PC! You can see streamers of the bolt in the pic between me and the trees just 20 metres distant. The streamers are IN BETWEEN! Thats close!

 

The storm was past in no time so I followed it to my eastern viewpoint. When I drove in it was bone dry, when I left I needed 4WD to get out! Huge puddles made the fast trip fun. The storm was insanely active and the sky was alive with crawlers as the storm roared eastwards towards the Victorian border.

What a night! Lastly one radar frame. In all my years here we have NEVER had rain like this. I know its commonplace (well kind of) pretty much everywhere else, but down here this simply does not happen – till now. No doubt I wont see it for another 10 years, but what the hell, I’ll take it!