Last evening, I was at work in Peoria, IL so I missed out on the evening squall line that progressed through west-central Illinois. With that being said however, another MCS formed in eastern Iowa during the late-evening and by midnight crossed the Mississippi River into west-central Illinois. Since I was actually up (for once) at that late hour I pulled out the DSLR camera for some lightning photography expecting some decent CG's (cloud-to-ground lighting strikes). I didn't get many of those however since the MCS lost control of its cold pool upon arrival. That was kind of a bummer, but shortly after midnight the gust front blew-in providing a beautiful shelf cloud illuminated by Kewanee, IL's light pollution (city lights). I really wasn't expecting anything remotely picturesque as this shelf cloud ended up being. For a decaying MCS, I was rather pleased! My only complaint on the night ended up being that I didn't get a chance to set-up at some locations I've came across for good (after dark) severe weather photography. Oh well, I was sure happy with the beautiful skyline Mother Nature had to offer at around midnight last night though. I've added a few photos of the midnight shelf cloud below:
I would have had much better results if
this shelf cloud wasn't in such a hurry...
As you probably already know I haven't had a lot of free time to actually chase/post in the past few weeks unfortunately, but of course I've kept an eye on the weather as usual. Minnesota, has been the "surprise" this year with lots of tornadoes especially over the past few weeks. Looking back at this past spring/summer I've seen some great supercells thus far...but it has been tough to get some tornado magic for this storm chaser. It's also hard when you can't chase 24/7 as well. If only we all could right?!
