ThunderDownUnder99

WEEK 1

Andrew McDonald

It was very much a driving day today. Slight chance of storms over the NE ranges of Victoria but we decided to make it a driving day in hope of better storms further N the next day. We went up the Hume Highway and then took the Goulbourn Valley Highway to the border where we joined the Newell Highway. This was to be our road for the next two days. A bit of Cu over the NE ranges in Victoria spread to most of N Victoria by 12pm. We stopped in Tocumwal for lunch and petrol. Here the temperature was a nice 24C with a DP of -2C (yes - that is minus 2C!!). We continued N along the Newell Highway and Cu had cleared by the time we reached West Wyalong in S NSW at about 3pm. The temperature here was a little warmer at 26C and the DP was back in the positive at 1C. We decided here during our petrol stop that we could easily make it to Dubbo tonight to allow for earlier penetration into the NW of NSW tomorrow. By the time we reached Parkes, the temperature was up to 28C and DP was now 5C. Cu was again beginning to develop, although it was very shallow Cu. We arrived in Dubbo at about 6:45pm with the temperature sitting on 25C with RH of 25% and DP of 5.5C. Tomorrow we are looking to leave at about 8:30am to head NW to Burke and possibly Cunnamulla. Forecast is for late showers/thunderstorms for Dubbo tomorrow and also for Burke and Cunnamulla too.

6:30am and light showers were falling on and around Dubbo with some Cu to the SW, W and NW. We could see some larger Cu in the distance to the W. Forecast still held at showers and thunderstorms for Dubbo and Burke. Greg needed a bracket for his CB radio so we headed into town at about 8:45am and got some information off the internet. LI's of -4 to -5 were forecast in the area between Burke and Cunnamulla today with CAPE forecast to be about 1500j/kg. A quick check of the sat pic showed storms developing already further W closer to the trough. The aviation METARS showed Burke to have a temp of 24C with a DP of 15C at 9am. Not a bad start to the day. The excitement level was rising at each new model we looked at.

We headed off from Dubbo and we could see a light shower about 40km SW of Dubbo. Within 30 minutes of leaving Dubbo we drove into low level Strato Cu which indicated much higher moisture levels. This, although being a good sign, had us a little worried as to what was happening further N in terms of heating. It finally started to break up once we passed Nyngan and we could make out some crisp Cu tops through the breaks in the cloud. The sky cleared fully within 20 minutes and the temperature rose like a rocket. TCu were exploding before our eyes in this clear patch of sky but this was short lived. We could see more of the low-level crap coming. We still had hopes for better things further N so we punched the moisture cloud and this thinned out quicker than we could've hoped and a few darker grey tinges on the horizon marked the edges of some weakish cells. Soon things got a little more interesting and Paul Yole alerted us to this a few minutes later by screaming down the CB - "CG, CG - Straight Ahead!!!". Just as luck would have it, Greg and I were looking out the side windows at other things when this happened. Not one minute later he was screaming at us again "CG, CG". We were pretty excited as this was our first storm of the chase.

This cell became more active as we got closer to it and dropped a few CG's about 7km straight up the road in front of us. We reached Burke at about 1:15pm and had some lunch then after a brief delay due to some keys being locked in a car we continued N towards the better storms and Cunnamulla. I had the privilege of driving this section and I pulled over about 20km N of Burke to watch the line of storms not too far to our N and NW. Storms were basically moving WSW to ENE and we decided to head through the storms to see what was on the other side as this side was relatively featureless. We encountered some moderate rain (approx. 30mm/h) and a few close lightning strikes but nothing more than your average thunderstorm. We got ahead of the rain curtain to see some turbulent bases above us and we pulled over again to watch. A new cell formed to our SW, making it 4 different cells within fairly close proximity and all of them had sporadic lightning. The thunder was pretty much continuous and a few rumbles seemed to last forever and some. We watched the rain curtain slowly approach us while we sat in the cars and watched the lightning show.

After about 30 mins we decided to head further N towards Cunnamulla through the storm again. The rain had intensified seriously and we drove for over 30 minutes in rain when at its lightest was about 20mm/h and at its heaviest, for nearly 5 minutes, at over 100mm/h. Visibility was non-existent during this time and was made even worse when a road train passed in the opposite direction. We crossed the border not long after escaping the rain and we looked back to see the monstrous storm we had just driven through. It was beginning to develop a nice gust front and further to the W where the main development area was there was a nice RFB and also some interesting lowerings. Unfortunately the road network out this far W is non-existent. There is only one road and it runs N-S and if the best part of a storm is further than 25km to the E or W of the road, you can forget it.

We watched this for a while before the rain engulfed us again and with a new cell developing ahead of this huge one the rain ended up continuing all the way to Cunnamulla. There was a fair bit of water lying around in Cunnamulla and the wind was gusting up to about 25knts at times from the NNE. I think we had arrived not too long after the onset of the storm. We booked a room upon arrival and we were soon to have our first episode of chaser convergence. Jimmy Deguara and Matt Piper arrived not more than 20 minutes after us. Greetings were exchanged and faces were finally put to names and before too long storm stories were being shared over a few drinks at the local pub. The rain continued until 9:30pm when it eased to isolated showers during the night. We knew the next day would be promising as the moisture levels would be even higher after all the rain.

We woke up pretty early this morning, full of anticipation for some action. We checked the sky to find scattered stratus ranging from 1/8 to 8/8 between 6:30am and 9am. By 9:15am it had cleared and the temperature was reading 25C with a DP of 17C. We decided to head further N to Charleville for a few reasons. There seemed to be more moisture further N and we also needed to kill some time. We left soon after on the 2 hour drive N to Charleville. By 9:50am there was scattered shallow cumulus and we took observations every half hour to keep an eye on things.

10:00am EST - Temperature: 27.5C

Dew Point: 18.5C

Relative Humidity: 60%

Possible anvil cirrus to the far N from overnight storms near Longreach.

10:30am EST - Temperature: 29C

Dew Point: 17.5C

Relative Humidity: 50%

11:00am EST - Temperature: 30C

Dew Point: 18C

Relative Humidity: 50%

By 11:45am we could see TCu to our south about 25-30km away but we continued N into Charleville where we filled up with petrol and grabbed some lunch from the local bakery. We had seen the sign to the Charleville BoM on our way into town so after eating we headed out there for a look around. We spoke to Rod Griffith who was out there "filling in" for a few weeks (he is normally based in Brisbane). He allowed us to see the current sat pics, sat pics from the day before, radar, prognostic charts, and best of all, the 0z (10am) soundings. We left the BoM at about 2pm and the DP had dropped considerably to about 11.5C. The wind was almost westerly and we knew we had to head E towards Roma to get back into the moist air. By 3pm the temperature was up to 31.5C and the DP back up to about 15C. The first TCu began to glaciate at around 4pm and we pulled over briefly to observe the development.

Photo - Paul Yole

Three separate rain shafts and the first CG of the day had us a bit excited but we continued E through Morven. We pulled over again at 5pm for about 20 minutes to observe an impressive backlit RFB with several, initially separate rain shafts. Dane's lightning detector started to pick up lightning which increased in intensity rapidly. We saw a few CG's to our W and SW as the RFB approached and new development grew overhead. We could also see some huge Cb's to our S which were in unchaseable country due to the road network being non-existent. Not too far to our W the rain shafts grew larger and began to fall much more heavily. As rain started to fall we jumped in the cars and headed further E to stay ahead of it. Just as we left we witnessed a spectacular microburst very close to us. It was about 2km south of us with raised dust and a classic extended rain foot racing east at close to 80km/h. Matt got some video footage of this while contorting himself around the inside of Jimmy’s car. Outflow from this cell was just beginning to hit Mitchell as we drove through with winds gusting to about 25knts. I think Mitchell might've copped a direct hit from the microburst due to the amount of small-medium sized branches lying around when we drove through this town several days later. We continued E towards Roma and the whole system had merged into one very nice Cb with awesome lightning and heavy rain and it was beautifully lit by the late afternoon sun.

Photo - Andrew McDonald

Another cell to our SE was also looking impressive and this soon split to leave 3 cells within fairly close range of us. As we entered the township of Roma we could see other cells further S again and one absolute monster (later confirmed to be a supercell) about 150-200km away. We could now see 6 cells all together - 3 to our SE, the monster to our S, 1 to our W and the closest one about 4km to our N. All cells were electrically active and we ended up just sitting on the outskirts of Roma for over an hour and a half just watching the lightning. Jimmy and Matt took video footage while Paul and I took some stills. We rang some other Sydney chasers, Matt Smith and James Harris, as they had been further S, possibly in the vicinity of the supercell. They had also had a successful day following cells even further S than the supercell. They had followed one cell that had a non-rotating wall cloud which persisted for several hours. We decided at 8pm that we'd better find somewhere to stay (Big Rig Caravan Park) and we got some food at the local pizza place before returning to our viewing point located down a side street on the W end of town. Overhead we could see AcCas lit up by the moon. There were a few distant flashes to our NE but nothing like what we had seen earlier and at 10:30pm we called it a night and headed back to the caravan park.

The bloody sun comes up before 5am in QLD. What a croc. Jimmy had Matt and me out of bed by 5:45am and I decided to go for a run/walk around town to check things out. AcCas was around already but the sky was fairly cloudy - almost too much for my liking. It was very humid though. Observations at 6:45am showed a temperature of 21C with a DP of 16C and RH of 76%. We took observations every hour this morning until we decided which way we were going to head. From what we had already heard this morning from Anthony Cornelius the LI's were about -4 and CAPE could get up to about 3000j/kg and the shear was not too bad either.

7:45am Obs. T = 23C DP = 17.5C RH = 70%

8:45am Obs. T = 25.5C DP = 18C RH = 65%

10:30am Obs. T = 28C DP = 17C RH = 50%

By 10:45am there was scattered shallow Cu all over the place but we decided that a short trip to Miles for lunch would be a good move just to ensure we stay with the best area for potential storm growth.

11:00am Obs. T = 29C DP = 17.5C RH = 50%

11:45am Obs. T = 29.5C DP = 17C RH = 50%

During the drive we stopped a few times to check out some TCu to our W but nothing was really getting going yet except for some distant storms about 100km back the way we’d come. We got to Miles at about 12:15pm and had some lunch at a local sandwich shop and at about 12:50pm we headed off on a quick tour of the town as we looked for a vantage point so we could watch what was happening. We found the local footy ground/race track and had an OK view from the E around to the SW so we stayed and watched towers go up but none with any real potential. We could see bigger Cu and Cb's to our SW so we made the decision to head S towards Condamine to intercept these cells. About 30 minutes down the road we got a bit more excited when we could see a nice powerful updraft right down the road in front of us and a few CG's confirmed that it was getting a little better.

Photo - Andrew McDonald

It seemed to split and a smaller updraft took off on the N side of this cell and it took on a most spectacular corkscrew shape indicating to us the amount of directional shear on this day.

Photo - Paul Yole

While this cell had most of us deeply engrossed in it, Jimmy had other ideas. He had taken a serious liking to another, much bigger cell to our W and with his level of experience in the field he soon convinced us all to leave behind this now weakening cell and head slightly N again so we could watch the monster cell come towards us. He was saying how much it looked like a supercell with the v-notch anvil and the immense proportions of it. This really got the blood pumping. It was about 3:30pm when we pulled over again just to the N of Condamine with nice views from the SSW around to the NNW with the supercell taking up most of the view now. I have never seen a storm like this before in my life and I think we were all awestruck by its intensity and colour and its mammoth size.

Photo - Andrew McDonald

Initially, we could see a secondary updraft which seemed to have split from the main cell but this had weakened somewhat. Although it was still a fair way off to the W, we had a fairly clear view under the flanking line and we could see what looked to be a wall cloud which remained there for 20 minutes or so before dissipating. We watched in awe as outflow pushed towards us from the SW and W while in the mean time the inflow from the NE mixed with outflow under the distant RFB causing some intense motion in the scud (not really rotating though).

Photo - Andrew McDonald

A new updraft went up slightly closer to us where that RFB was and again inflow and outflow mixed causing more organised motion. This cell had become extremely lightning active and the core continued to get greener and greener as it encroached on our position from the SW from the old updraft and the W from the new updraft.

An awesome guster had formed along the outflow from the core and soon thunder set in with a constant deep rumbling sometimes overpowered by the crack of a closer CG. The cell was now only about 12km to our W and the powerlines began to hum about 2 seconds before a CG leapt out of the core and struck the ground out in front of the guster. We were still focusing on the now scud encased RFB and then without any warning we saw the dust kick up. Rising fast and rotating around an invisible vortex. Shouts of joy were soon overrun by shouts of panic as we all pointed out cameras in the same direction and all of us screaming at Jimmy to "point the bloody camera that way!!!" This feature lasted about 30 seconds before dissipating, leaving the dust hanging in the air under the RFB. After all the excitement died down we decided that as no funnel was visible to the naked eye (or to those with binoculars for that matter) that it was probably only kicked up by the outflow. As it turns out, all the photos, and the video, show a nice little needle funnel pointing down to the dust whirl and so for most of us we had just witnessed our first TORNADO without really realising it.

Photo - Andrew McDonald

We kept an avid watch on that area for more evidence of rotation but it was soon engulfed by the rain. We now had a bit of a problem on our hands. We knew we would eventually have to move N again to escape being pounded by the core but the dilemma was which way after that. Our move N came about quite quickly after a few CG’s hit ground within about 3km of us and then no more than two minutes later a wall of dust and scud came racing over the trees and was bearing down on us at about 90km/h. Greg and I jumped in our car and took off followed very closely by Jimmy and Matt but Dane and Paul seemed to take their time. The road N curved slightly around to the left and we could see the dust racing across the paddock towards where we had just been parked and where Dane and Paul still were. I was screaming down the CB for them to get a move on and as the road straightened out I saw Dane’s car become engulfed by the dust. He reappeared seconds later and Paul was on the CB asking anyone if we saw them (just a bit of adrenaline at this time in case you hadn’t noticed).

A second surge of dust soon engulfed their car again and again Paul was screaming through the CB. Our decision to head E to Dalby or N then SE to Chinchilla and then Dalby had to be made in haste as we approached the intersection. A very quick consultation with Jimmy and we decided to head E towards Dalby but little did we know that this road was lined with 8m tall gum trees as thick as a pine forest. Visibility of the storm was limited to extremely quick glimpses down farmers driveways. The brief stop at the intersection had slowed us down and the guster overtook us (which wasn’t supposed to happen) and we had to try to get ahead of it again. Racing along this dead straight road with branches falling from the trees, dust and leave blowing and trucks racing into the storm made this far from fun but we soon outran the guster and we slowed our pace a little. We found a clearing in the trees on the right hand side so we pulled over for a look. It was becoming evident that is was turning into a squall line and although the core was no longer green, it was still very, very dark and still lightning active. Jimmy and Dane took off E again as the outflow approached again but Greg and I stayed to do a quick wind speed measurement as it passed over us. The highest gust we recorded was 31knts and it was more evident that the system was weakening as the outflow was a long way ahead of the rain now.

We caught up with the others and continued E towards Dalby. We eventually drove out of the trees about 20km before Dalby and we stopped immediately to get an idea of what was happening. There was the squall line extending from the S right through to the N with the N end still initiating fresh growth and then an more isolated cell further NE. We stayed and watched the squall line approach our area again and as darkness slowly began creeping across the plains the lightning in the line became more visible. It was also noticed that the cell to the NE was eventually going to join the end of the squall line. We rang the bureau in QLD during this photo stop and informed them of what was going to hit Dalby and I think a Severe Warning or Severe Advice was issued. As outflow approached our position again we headed closer to Dalby, stopping again just 2km out of town. We now had a clear view to the N end of the line and we watched in amazement as outflow from the squall line and the outflow from the isolated cell (now very close to the squall line) hit each other causing a lowering to form rapidly under the RFB which joined the two cells. Even though it was getting a bit dark, I took a few photos of this and one of them shows a funnel shaped lowering protruding from the scud. It was too far away to see if there was rotation so it will have to go down as another possible. A few quick phone calls to another group of chasers approaching Dalby from the SE had a meeting arranged (hopefully before it hit), in a service station on the W side of Dalby.

While we waited for the others to arrive, we picked a road heading NNE out of Dalby which we would take to try and get on the N side of this new cell (the once isolated cell). Very quick introductions took place as the others screeched into the service station and then we took off heading what was supposed to be NNE. It turns out that the road actually veers to the NW for the first 3km, taking us into and under that suspicious lowering we had seen just 10 minutes before. It was almost dark but we could still see that we were heading straight towards a barrel shaped lowering which was going to cross the road either just in front of us or just ON us. Greg and I were leading the group and we were too close to see if it was rotating but Dane and Paul were further back and Paul confirmed (thank god) that it wasn’t rotating and that it was most likely outflow from the heavy precipitation now falling just to our W. CG’s again began to fall in a barrage all around us as we entered this lowering (and god I hoped Paul was right about it not rotating).

Darkness was upon us and severe winds hit buffeting the car. This, along with a wall of torrential rain screaming across the road in front of us had put us in a fairly dangerous situation and once the debris started falling off trees and rocks began to hit the side of the car we decided enough was enough. We pulled over to let is pass but after sitting there for 10 minutes in the torrential rain we decided we had better get back into Dalby in case the storm flooded the road and leaving us stranded 10km out of town. CG’s were still falling all around us as we drove back to Dalby and the rain and wind continued for another 5 mins. There were a few sketchy spots on the road where there was 4 or 5 inches of water but it wasn’t too bad. Once back in Dalby the rain has eased to a mere drizzle compared to what we’d just been in. More formal introductions took place between the Queenslanders, New South Welshman and the Victorians and we stood undercover in another service station discussing excitedly the days events. All the while the storm was still producing frequent lightning overhead and to our E and W. A few absolutely awesome CC’s ripped across the night sky and one strike started off as a CC, took off across the sky and then became CG as it struck something not far out of town. It was getting a little late so food was now on the cards and a quick look around found us at McDonalds eating and organising accommodation at the same time. After ringing around a few motels we soon found one with TV’s, allowing us to watch the days’ footage. Although some of us dosed off fairly quickly we were soon to be woken by the oooh’s and aaaahh’s as we watched the tornado and other footage over and over again. All in all a fantastically successful chase and as I put it just after the tornado came in to view, "this is what we came here to see!!"

After yesterday’s excitement, we decided that we needed to head a little towards the coast which would also bring in the sea breeze factor if storms were close enough to the coast. We left Dalby fairly early and it was again fairly humid. The LI’s were getting weaker as the system moved further E and today was borderline with figures of 0 to –3. We thought we’d try our luck up the coast towards Gympie so we headed off along the road we’d started heading up last night before we’d turned back. There was evidence of the flooding we’d driven through last night and there was some smallish braches lying off to the side of the road. We stopped about 25km N of Dalby near the town of Bell to take a few photos of some solid looking TCu and we could also see some bigger Cu to our SE but we figured these would soon dissipate. We continued up to Kingaroy where we had some lunch. After a quick look around after lunch, we headed slightly W towards a small town called Proston as we could see some weak cells out that way which we hoped would develop. These quickly turned into a narrow band of rain/storms but nothing too interesting. After driving through some moderate rain for about 15 minutes we came out of the rain and found a hill jut out of Proston where we waited for a while to see if anything would develop in the warm, even more moist air. Small TCu would go up but nothing really took off and after sitting here for nearly two hours waiting for something to develop we decided to head back to the highway towards Gympie. Just after leaving out vantage point near Proston we drove over the top of another hill to be greeted with a nice Cb and a quick call to the BoM informed us of a severe thunderstorm warning for the Sunshine Coast and the Wide Bay Burnett area. We were still about an hour and a half away from the coast and the road network between Gympie and Brisbane is nothing short of terrible. We attempted to chase this Cb although some people would’ve preferred to have just casually driven along and given it a miss thinking we wouldn’t make it. It turns out they were right and the cell had dissipated before we got to it. We reached Gympie and another cell had now fired up to our S in the middle of a national park with no roads whatsoever. After a quick phone call to my sister, Claire, who informed us that if we could, we should head to the coast and then S towards Nambour where she thought the cell would head out across the coast. We were still over an hour from Nambour but we headed that way anyway. Anthony Cornelius kindly offered to have most of us stay at his house for the night and after a quick phone call to his parents our accommodation for the night was arranged. We watched this cell get closer as we headed SE towards the coast and after the sun went down we could see some lightning from it. It was far from frequent and still a good 25-30km away and heading out across the coast to our South. The sunset lit up the storm in a brilliant red but I don’t know if anyone got a photo of this (I think James Chambers may have video of it). We stopped at a service station for a drink, a quick look at this storm and a stretch of the legs before continuing into the heart of Brisbane where we set up camp for the night on Anthony’s lounge room floor. It turned out to be a fairly amusing night with all of us (except Paul for some reason) had a run in with "Thunder", Anthony’s dog, who was very friendly (if you can call it that) especially with Matt Piper. While the day was technically a bust  it was the 4^th day in a row we had seen storms. On behalf of all the chasers we’d like to thank Anthony and his parents for their hospitality and for putting up with half a dozen storm crazy chasers camping in their living room. Big thanks  very much appreciated.

We’d had a quick look at the models the night before to see what the day would bring and we had two options. We could head back up the coast to Gympie into LI’s of 0 to -2 to milk this system for all it would give OR we could head back out west to wait for the next system to move into chasing range. After another check of the models this morning we had a better idea of our options. The LI’s were still negative to our North near Gympie and the forecast was for showers and chance of storms in that area along the weakening surface trough but the conditions were far from inviting. Our other option was looking better with LI’s forecast to get down to -4 to -8 out west in a few days as the next system pushed into the state. A quick meeting and we made the decision to head out west but not totally ignore the negative LI’s. We thought that by heading out to Dalby we could see if anything developed on the trough. As there was no chance of storms out west today or tomorrow we lounged around at Anthony’s watching storm videos, while Ross and Greg attempted to fit an old CB radio into Ross’s car for the trip out west. We headed off at about 1pm to Dalby and by 2:30pm it was evident that nothing was going to happen in the area so we continued out west to Roma, where we planned to stay for the night. We left Dalby and headed out towards Chinchilla, finding out that this road would’ve been a better option two days ago when chasing the supercell as it had clear views and no trees. As we headed further W the DP dropped pretty quickly, soon down to just 9C. We stopped to take photos just outside Chinchilla after we saw two cells way off to the N up near Gayndah lit up by the setting sun. During a brief leg-stretch stop in Miles we noticed the river height marker started at 13 metres!!! Upon arrival in Roma at 8pm we took some obs, showing temperature of 24.5C and a DP of 13.5C  the DP had risen again as we drove closer to the next system. We found some accommodation and then raided the local pizza shop just on closing time for the second time in four days. We had now seen storms from the one system 5 days in a row. For the Victorians, it was 6 days into the two-week chase and we had seen storms on 5 of the 6 days.

We figured that another casual driving day was in order as the next system wasn’t due to enter chaseable country until the next day. Earlier in the week we had visited Charleville BoM office and they had kindly invited us to view a balloon launch and with plenty of time on our hands we took up this offer. We drove from Roma to Charleville where we went straight to the BoM and met Vince and Rod again. Vince talked us through a balloon launch and after "letting go" we ventured inside to track it on the computer and also to check the models for the coming few days. What we saw was very inviting with 500mb temperatures forecast to drop down to 17 or 18C and stability indices were looking nice - the only thing lacking was significant shear. Meanwhile, the balloon finally burst at 21km and the radar was switched back on. There were a few weak cells about 100km W of Charleville moving SSW in unchaseable country so we called it a day and headed off to find some accommodation. After booking some rooms for the night, we walked down to the pub for a few quiet ales. It was here where we encountered an interesting character known to the locals as "The Warrego Wizard." (only those who were on the trip will understand this).

A visit to the local internet café in Charleville to check the models had us heading S to higher CAPE’s and lower LI’s. Higher moisture and only a weak cap saw cells developing relatively early in the day and we stopped at 12:30pm in Wyandra to watch cells to our S and W. The cells to the W were a lot stronger but the limited road network kept us at bay. This was somewhat frustrating with an interesting lowering under the RFB of one cell which was possibly a wall cloud (with associated tail cloud) off in the distance. We watched until this lowering became embedded in rain before heading further S towards the cells which were developing just to the E of the highway about 25km down the road. As we approached, the outflow became defined by a weak-looking gust front which pushed across the road as we drove under it. We got ahead of this cell so we could take some photos of the guster and anything which developed. The cell was relatively inactive in terms of lightning and generally not a strong thunderstorm but the features were enough to quench the thirst of a bunch of storm-thirsty chasers. We stayed with this cell for about an hour, driving ahead then stopping to let it catch up several times, watching it change from a small single cell storm into a larger storm and finally into a weak squall line. After a while we called it a day and headed off to Cunnamulla which, as we arrived, was embedded in another local storm. Some localised minor flash flooding made the drive down the main street a little more interesting than usual but the flooding quickly eased once the rain stopped. An early night was had by all with increased instability forecast for tomorrow with CAPE of 2000-2500j/kg and LI’s of -5 to -7 forecast S of Cunnamulla, giving us a greater anticipation for action. We also knew that Matt Smith and James Harris were heading back into the action as well after having to return to Sydney for work commitments and we were hoping to meet up with them in the next day or two.