hillsrain.com Heatwave and 8 hour lightning show20-01-06.

The Heatwave....

An official heatwave is at least 5 consecutive days over 35C or 10 consecutive days over 30C. Would it happen? It looked on the cards and by the end of the week did not dissapoint. Here is how it went....

Some stats..
It was quite a few days of heat indeed. Up here in the ranges it went like this..
19th - 34.4
20th - 36.1
21st - 37.5 (rarely gets this hot)
22nd - 35.7
4 days in a row above 30 (3 above 35 is rare) is not very common for me. January itself has been very warm here with the daily average maximum temperature being 27.8 degrees and an average minimum of 13 degrees. The huge average daily variation is indicative of the pleasant night time temps we get with the cool breezes that blow up from the Lakes most summer evenings making sleeping a much easier prospect than in the nearby city.

In contrast Adelaides Jan (to date) average max is 31.7 degrees and average minimum 20.1 degrees.

A little snippet from the Bureau's Daily Weather Notes (IDS10030)
Temperatures were well above average again today in a northerly airstream ahead of a milder southwest change that extended across western and southern parts of the State during the day. Many sites recorded temperatures near 40 degrees, with maxima to 3 pm ranging from 22 degrees at Neptune Island, to 45 degrees at Port Augusta, Whyalla, Keith and Marree. Adelaide reached 40.8C, resulting in 4 consecutive days over 40 degrees, occurring for the first time since March 1940.

Our maximum recorded temp here in the southern ranges for Jan to date has been 37.5 while Adelaides is 43.1. I know where I would rather be during summer thats for sure!!

The heat ended on the evening of the 22nd giving a much welcome respite from the temps.  By 10:30pm it had dropped from the days top of 35.7 to be 16 degrees. Dropped rather rapidy in fact and is its worth noting the rapid temperature drop of 15 degrees in just 3 hours, most of that in just 90 minutes.

The 8 hour lightning show!

A semi stationary trough centred over Kangaroo island fired up on the evening of the 19th and into the morning of the 20th.

And here is the story of the night.....

About 10pm on the night of the 19th A fellow storm chaser calls telling me that GPATS (lightning tracker online) is active over Kangaroo Island and I should be able to see some strikes from the hill. I could indeed see the distant flashes over the horizon and worked out with him that I would set the alarm for 1:30am and try to get a few hours sleep before getting up to check on its slow as slow progress. No sooner had I drifted off than the phone rang and its my stormchasing mate telling me to bloody well get up because the southern horizon is alive and very active and they are on their way down my way to catch the show. It was ahead of schedule! Bleary eyed I staggered into the thin air of the hill and OH MAN it was active alright! Cam on tripod with the 18-70 lens on and snap snap 2 pics straight away. But it was a long way away and even at 70mm the crop was too tight to get a decent shot. Off with that lens and on with the 70-300. First shot is like the toothy grin of a croc, huge strikes filling the frame, BUT out of focus. Don't shoot in haste is the moral.I get it right and start shooting and ring my mate to give direcions to Meadows and tell him that "its goin off!" He crests the hill and onto the last straight before Meadows and the intensity drops! I already have a swag of shots, but he has not quite arrived yet. Finally they make it and its a mad dash to the hill, tripods and cameras trailing madly. Its firing again! It looks solid so Tim (the stormchaser) runs back to his car for a forgotten phone and as he closes the gate on return it dies again. Hows that for timing!! Eventually it goes again but a long way away over the SW tip of Kangaroo Island. Shots are difficult but the strikes are tremendous with more feeders from the main bolts than I can remember seeing. Incredibly potent strikes! Huge pulsing (up to 5 times) CG's hammer the ground beneath. This continued till daybreak all the time trying to move northwards and all the time carking it and backbuilding all the way to its source on KI. At one stage it nearly made it with half a dozen massive bolts over the southern burbs area. Just as it looked to be gaining intensity it was gone. Just like that, switched off!!! Got some nice pics from that little display.
Anyway thats about it, Flattened one battery, 80+ pics, fell asleep for 5 mins on the pasture, got attacked by a maniacle fly, stood up, sat down. 8 hours and then the sun rose.
What a great night.

8 hour loop from Gpats from 11:30pm on the 19th to 7:30am on the 20th.

Satellite loop from the same time scale

Lightning images from the event

Some of the amazing lightning pictures I captured from the 8 hour show can be seen below. I captured over 80 decent shots that night. 34 of the better ones are in this gallery.
The album can be viewed full screen HERE.

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