Sunsets – Page 9 – Cloud-maven

“Oh, what a beautiful morning”; and day its going to be

1) I like to refer to songs about weather, though the musical references I’ve used are somewhat dated, as here, a song from 19th Century I think. BTW, tapping on the link above, you’ll see a guy riding a horse AND singing at the same time because he’s so happy, so it really fits the big western life we’re all leading here in old Arizony in the wintertime and seemed apropos. I wouldn’t recommend singing AND riding at the same time, however, unless you know you’re horse reel good. Might get spooked if it was you or me singing and not the cowboy, Gordy MacRae¹.

BTW#2, if you watch that entire song link above, you’ll see whole crowds of people getting carried away with the State of OK at the end of it. But…you’ll also notice in that scene that there is a MOUNTAIN on the distant horizon in the background. I don’t think they were in Oklahoma for that song! So, maybe they didn’t really like Oklahoma as much as they claim in song…. Now, where was I?

Man, the clouds are going to be spectacular today, zipping along like a dragster on nitro! Expecting some real great lenticular clouds, those hover ones, downstream of the Cat Mountains, too. Lots of wind, as well, to add to the drama with a Big _Cold Front (B_CF) getting closer during the day, then passing us during the evening-overnight with some rain by morning. Likely to be a 10-20 degree F drop in temperature within an hour or less, as this real “bad boy” cold front and wind shift go by. Ely, NV saw a 56 degree drop in temperatures in 24h. We Need more rain; always. Cold? Not so sure about that. All in all, a “beautiful” day² coming up.

How much rain here in old Catalina?

We’re on the edge of the jet stream up there, and you know what that means, on the edge of the precip, too. So, if you’re telling your friends how much rain you expect, and as a CMJ, they will expect you to comment on it, you’d best not go overboard and say, “a half an inch between tonight and Friday morning”; play it down some.

On the plus side, this is a storm type (flow pattern type, more westerly up there) that we Catalinans get MORE rain than surrounding areas, other than the mountains. So, on the edge means a low rain prediction; but the flow pattern suggests pushing a little on the greatest amount possible for an edge storm. Here’s the range I would tell you to say to neighbors:

Bottom (since it might miss), 0.08 inches (the “8” for faux accuracy); top, 0.50 inches (yep, has a high potential due to the storm type; that is, the angle of the winds impinging overhead on our mountains). Average of these guesses, which likely is the more accurate guess-amount, 0.26 inches.

Later we will compare the U of AZ supermicro Beowulf Cluster model prediction, one that takes our best model’s overall prediction for Arizona, the one WRF-GFS, and then breaks it down into our local areas better, like here and on the Catalina Mountains, because it uses much more detailed terrain. (Not available yet here at 4:45 AM–to Hell with it then!) ((Still not available as of 6:24 AM. It is finished..publishing now.))

There’s another cold blast on the heels of this one. Hits on the 8th. Poor TUS marathoners… ‘Nuf said.

The weather way ahead

2) With the upcoming storm and cold well in hand, that is, well described by our excited met men and women, both at the NWS and on TEEVEE, where in the latter case they make a LOT of money, really, its incredible how much (well, maybe not in TUS, but LA? Oh, my) Let’s see, where was I? Oh, yeah, I thought I would look WAY ahead, two weeks, which in weather model terms is like an astrologer looking through a telescope at the giant star, Betelgeus, its that far away in model prediction terms.

Still, I REALLY think you need to see this forecast even though its so far away because its pretty giant, too, in weather terms. If you’re too lazy to click on “this”, I have gifted you with the highlights below, highlights that might be the best forecast maps I have ever seen (again). Yes, to quote the song, “Everything’s (weather-wise) going my way.” ( “My way”? To Catalina, Arizona.)

Drum roll……

Well, there they are. I hope you’re happy now. Its quite an orgasmic sequence from a weather standpoint.

Why? There’s about THIRTY-SIX hours of rain in our area are foretold from these maps, 14-15 days from now! That last one has heavy rain throughout Arizona! BTW, I’ve posted them in sizes that are proportional to their credibility, thumbnails.

Now, since I’ve been learning you up on spaghetti, I’ll let you decide whether its a Big_Outlier (BfO). Take a look here and at where the”blue” lines are. They would have to be clustering down around Rocky Point-Puerto Penasco for this forecast to have any serious credibility.

Yesterday’s clouds

Cirrus ones. As always with our deep blue skies now days, so pretty up there. A few shots:

8:01 AM. The ever-present, rarely seen Cirrus castellanus (bubble Cirrus). — 8:01 AM. The ever-present, rarely seen Cirrus castellanus (bubble Cirrus lower center).

8:02 AM. Cirrus fibratus (long, more or less straight trails, at least from this overhead view).

5:26 PM. Subtle color in Cirrus and distant Altostratus layer (deep ice cloud). — 5:26 PM. Subtle sunset color in Cirrus and in a distant Altostratus layer (deep ice cloud).

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¹Not wearing a helmut, either, which is also a bad example besides singing while riding a horse.

²Words can mean different things to different people, and here, “beautiful”, as in the title, may not be the “beautiful” day you were expecting to be described.

Airplanes slice through clouds; leave icy canals and trails

WHAT a gorgeous day was yesterday! Perfect. No wonder the northlanders come here in their droves now! Its great to see (via the increasingly larger number of out-of-state license plates) all the people that want to be where I am already!

While waiting for the storms and cold air just ahead now, this cloud commentary:

Along with the pretty high and middle clouds was a rarely seen phenomenon, aircraft flying into those “supercooled” Altocumulus droplet clouds were converting them to ice in their wakes. These are similar to contrails, called by me, APIPs, Aircraft Produced Ice Particles. That’s right, your Catalina Cloud Maven person named that phenomenon, though its not a great name since it could apply to usual contrails as well. Modest brain strained hard, but couldn’t come up with anything better. So, given that background, he’s probably going to make a big deal out them when he sees one or two here.

Its rare because the Altocumulus have to be pretty cold, -15 C (5 F) or so and colder¹, and at a level where aircraft are flying, usually in a descent or climb pattern to their normal flight altitudes up around the higher Cirrus levels (30-40 kft above sea level and at temperature generally below -35 C). Typically because of climbing or descending, the ice canals, or holes with icy centers, are short and small. Here are a few examples from yesterday, but you really want to look at the U of AZ timelapse movie to see a bunch of them going by in those pretty Altocumulus clouds and mackerel skies we had. Note that as cold as these Altocumulus clouds were, they were not producing ice:

12:21 PM. Ice strip produced earlier by an aircraft that flew through supercooled Altocumulus clouds. Usually these events lead to optical displays like this sun dog almost overhead. You have about 10 seconds to see it, but of course, Mr. Cloud Maven person was waiting for it to happen. — 12:21 PM. Ice strip produced earlier by an aircraft that flew through supercooled Altocumulus clouds. Usually these events lead to optical displays like this faint sun dog almost overhead. You have about 10 seconds to see it, but, of course, Mr. Cloud Maven person, on a hike with friends, was waiting for it to happen.

11:50 AM. Note Cirrus-ee part upper right.

And there were other fine sights! Look at this display of Altocumulus perlucidus undulatus, rippled mackerel sky:

1:19 PM during hike with friends, not just people standing there, in case you thought someone who would write like this and take cloud pictures all day might be a recluse and have no real friends. Shown are Bill and Vollie, George and JoAnn, who are admiring the Cirrostratus shield coming over the horizon. — 1:19 PM during hike with friends, not just people standing there as I walked by, in case you thought someone who would write like this and take cloud pictures all day might be a recluse and have no real friends. Shown are Bill and George, JoAnn and Vollie, admiring the Cirrostratus shield coming over the horizon. (I do see why you might think that, though.)

4:42 PM. Day ended up with a great big halo; haloes are pretty rare here in the kinds of Cirrus clouds we get. More Altocumulus out there, too.

Weathering ahead….

Looks like cold spell will last, once underway, into the middle of the month. SNOW indicated HERE in Catalina-land on the morning of December 11th from a crazy model run based on last evening’s global obs at 5 PM AST yesterday. Here’s what that morning looks like overhead, at 500 millibars:

Valid at 5 AM AST December 11th. Thinking about making snowballs that morning. Also, in appeal to youthful readers, I have texted some here. Astonishingly deep cold air piles into Arizona, Those northlanders will be piling into their jeeps and heading home. Unfortunately, an examination of the reliability via the newly named, “Lorenz plots” from NOAA, show virtually no support for this “solution.” It appears, at least for the moment, dang, as a crazy outlier, likely due to some goofy error (s) WAY upstream somewhere. But, its fun to contemplate snowballs here in Catalina.

BTW, the local weather services all around the SW are already worked up over the coming cold wave and have issued Special Statements, quite fun to read because they reflect the excitement we weather folk are feeling now as we look ahead to wind some rain, and a big frontal passage followed by cold air. After all, the weather’s pretty dull here in SE AZy most days of the year, and by “dull” I mean that not much is happening except for pretty clouds and nice temperatures, a weatherperson’s “dull.”

The End.

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1 Yesterday afternoon’s Tucson balloon sounding which I forgot to look at until now:

Rawinsonde balloon sounding data from Tucson. Balloon launched around 3:30 PM local, rises at about 1,000 feet a minute. — Rawinsonde balloon sounding data from Tucson. Balloon launched around 3:30 PM local yesterday; rises at about 1,000 feet a minute.

Severe weather pattern ahead for West and central US

Summary statement: Begins in 5-6 days in the northern US, then expands southward; goes on and on, like the discussion below, after that. Cloud pics WAY below the “novella” on spag plots.

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Our docile weather in the West for the past few months is about to end, as well as for those in the Rockies and Plains States. Wasn’t gonna blog on TG day, but looking at mods, and realized that I am the SAME person that I was as a 6-year old in Reseda, California, on January 10, 1949, that ran up and down Nestle Avenue knocking on doors to tell people it was starting to snow that afternoon (!), I realized that same “gotta tell ya” impulse lives on.

The trigger for THIS “gotta tell ya” is how bad the cold, snow, rain, and wind look for the western half of the US starting in about 5-6 days from now as cold air and storminess works its way south from the Pacific Northwest and Rockies at that time. I am sure you have heard something about this developing pattern already from your favorite media weathercaster, but I’ll try to take it a bit farther out in time, and tell you why I think you can do that in this case.

I haven’t looked at the models per se with the exception of the Enviro Can one, one in which the lasted posted output is at the start of this episode, but rather the excitement for Mr. cloud maven person was triggered by those chaotic looking, “errorful” plots we call spaghetti plots, “Lorenz plots”, if you will, posted by NOAA that tell us how sensitive a pattern is to small errors.

It seemed, too, like there was something to be learned from them, as well demonstrating a high confidence pattern of a severe weather pattern more than a week away. Many forecaster, maybe most, shy away from forecasts beyond a week because we know how often they are faulty. But there are exceptions and this is one coming up.

ann dec 4 5 pm spag_f192_nhbg — Valid at 5 PM AST, December 5th. This map shows a high confidence of a mammoth, cold trough at 500 millibars covering most of the US. Its “ginormous” as a friend used to say. You really don’t see anything like it, that is, like that black “quiet” zone extending so far south anywhere in the whole northern hemisphere!

OK, here we go.

Above I have added boxes in this plot to show you where the forecast is highly reliable and in another one, where its not. This is indicated by the bunching of those lines, height contours, the same ones, from many model runs starting with the introduction of slight errors. At first in these plots, with errors being tiny, there is no difference in them in the first day or two. But, as time goes on, the errors have greater impact. A metaphor: when you hit a ball off the tee, the error in the first inch of travel is nil in magnitude. But 5 seconds later? Oh my.

Here, the bunching of lines in most of the US is what got me going. Continuing the metaphor above, after 5 seconds and 300 yards of travel in this case, its analogous to 2 yards from the hole! In other words, the were essentially no effect of errors in the model runs; you slugged that golf ball perfectly.

But what does it mean, in terms of weather? That trough (the curved area where the “high confidence zone” is located, means a tremendous plunge of cold air into the West and Plains States. Don’t need to look at future maps to know this. You all know that a trough is a tongue, a wedge, of DEEP cold air that drags cold air at the surface southward on the west half of it, and drags warm air northward on the east side (in this case, toward the eastern US. The size of this wedge indicates a gigantic area of high pressure from the Arctic will be pushing DEEP into the West and Plains States as this pattern develops in the few days before December 5th.

Once established this pattern lasts for several days, a huge, deep and cold trough dominating weather throughout the US. And where the air masses clash at the ground presents ripe conditions for low centers to spin up, given a trigger aloft, like a traveling, much smaller wave in the jet stream where the lines are bunched.

Below, farther along in the sequence, these plots each one day later than the one above that illustrate how a confident pattern begins to erode. In this case, “uncertainty” in the central and eastern Pacific begins to spread eastward into our confident pattern; the blue lines start to go goofy (highlighted by boxes):

Last, here is the plot for 15 days (360 h) out in which those little errors have had their biggest effect, really done a number (haha) on the forecast confidence game, everything’s pretty unreliable except maybe in eastern Asia and the extreme western Pacific, and along the East Coast.

But, even with all of this chaos below, we can see that the model still thinks a trough (a bend in the contours to the south) will still be present in the mid and western sections of the US. Since we know that weather, once changing into a new pattern likes to stay in that pattern for weeks at a time (with brief interruptions), a reasonable forecast for December would be colder than normal in the Southwest and West overall, and in the central US, while its warmer than normal in the East, particularly the southeast US.

Precip? Always more dicey than temperatures, but CM is going with above normal in the interior of the West and in the Southwest, near normal to above normal here in SE AZ. Remember while reading this, Mr. Cloud Maven person is NOT an expert in long range forecasting, like for a month, and, he likes to see precipitation in the desert, and those wildflowers that follow. (“Truth-in-packaging” clause.)

In a couple of days, the Big Boys at the CPC, that is, the NOAA Climate Prediction Center, will be issuing their temperature and precip forecasts for December. It will be interesting to see what they make of these patterns, combined with other factors like sea surface temperature anomalies and northern hemisphere snow cover.

BTW, with a pattern like the one coming up, snow that falls during the storms is going to remain on the ground for long periods due to the lower than normal temperatures, those that snow cover helps to maintain (strong feedback loop, as we would say).

Your clouds of yesterday

If anyone is still with me, you had your Altostratus, your Altocumulus, and some Cirrus. Here they are:

8:31 AM. Altostratus, an ice cloud consisting of single crystals and snowflakes. Slight falls of snow (virga) can be seen at the bottom, that rumpled look. WAY too high above the ground to reach it, estimating 18 kft here.

3:41 PM. Altocumulus perlucidus (left), opacus center and right where they get solid. These clouds are comprised soley of liquid droplets; no virga is showing for one thing, and the greater detail, sharper edges goes with a droplet cloud composition. Droplets are almost always in far higher concentrations that are ice particles in clouds, thus, they have sharper edges.

5:22 PM. Pretty nice sunset, Altocumulus overhead left; in the distance Altocumulus floccus with heavy, funnel-looking virga fall, and extreme distance, some following Altocumulus castellanus, no virga yet.

5:24 PM. Close up of prior scene. Last row visible on the horizon is a nice little row of Ac castellanus.

Clouds before the storm

First, let’s see how excited the NWS is about our upcoming major, drought-denting storm, now “in the bag”:

Tucson, here and a nice NWS YouTube presentation here.

Phoenix

Flagstaff

As you will see from these links, they’re getting pretty worked up, and have issued the SAME “Special Statement” for ALL of Arizona, that’s how big the storm is. We’re all in this together. BTW, the U of AZ model forecast from 11 PM AST last night had as much as 5-6 inches of rain indicated in the central mountains of AZ over the next 24-36 h! Will the washes flow here, eventually as the major rain moves east? Hope so.

But, must point that the range of amounts that will fall here in Catalina has to be considered quite large; something from “just a nice rain” (0.4 inches total) to a gully washer (1.5 inches total) due to the fine-scale of the heaviest rainfall bands rotating around the dawdling low over the next couple of days. Its really not possible to pin it down better than a large range of possible values in situations like this, but it does appear that most of it will fall on Friday night into Saturday.

In the meantime, more pretty skies today before the deeper clouds and rain get here overnight or tomorrow morning. Very little rain is indicated here, though, through tomorrow evening,in this latest U of AZ mod run. while inches pile up just to the west and in the AZ mountains.

Yesterday’s clouds

Had pretty skies all day yesterday, even saw some clouds that as far as I know, have no name, these ones below that LOOK like Altocumulus perlucidus but are all ice at Cirrus levels. Could be called, to make up a name, “Cirrus perlucidus” I guess:

7:46 AM. "Cirrus perlucidus." It may be hard to tell for most folks, but these flocculent clouds are all ice. There's a patch of Altostratus in distance. — 7:46 AM. “Cirrus perlucidus.” It may be hard to tell for most folks, but these flocculent clouds are all ice. There is no WAY I would call an all ice cloud, “Altocumulus.” There’s a patch of Altostratus in distance, and an Ac lenticular to left of pole on horizon.

9:49 AM. Altocumulus virgae. Great example of the "upside down" storm; droplet cloud at the top, ice and snow underneath as ice forms amid the droplet cloud, grows like mad and falls out. — 9:49 AM. Altocumulus virgae. Great example of the “upside down” storm; droplet cloud at the top, ice and snow underneath as ice forms amid the droplet cloud, grows like mad and falls out. This finding, first made in the 1950s was surprising because the clouds were liquid at the lowest temperatures.

12:04 PM. Cirrocumulus lenticularis, a bit too thin to be Ac lenticularis.

3:59 PM. Ac lenticular stack in lee of Catalina Mountains. Ac perlucidus in foreground. — 3:59 PM. This view from atop horsey, an Ac lenticular stack beyond the Gap, in lee of Catalina Mountains. Ac perlucidus in the foreground.

4:00 PM. Looking S; buttermilk skies due to Ac perlucidus; lower layer of Ac opacus advancing from the the west below those mottled clouds.

5:31 PM. Brief sunset "bloom" due to a small break in the overcast just over the horizon. — 5:31 PM. Brief sunset “bloom” due to a small break in the overcast just over the horizon.

The weather way ahead

2013112100_CON_GFS_500_HGT_WINDS_276 — Valid at 5 AM AST, December 2nd. A near twin of the upcoming situation.

Now showing up on mods, as November closes out, a low center that looks an awful like the situation we’ll have tomorrow and Saturday, another vortex aloft tracks S along the coast, settling in around San Diego, then moving along to the east very slowly. As you know, weather patterns like to get in a groove and repeat themselves for awhile. Could be we’re in that phase where the SW is a low “magnet” and that would mean above normal precip over a spell of a few weeks. Above, a map for December 2nd at 5 AM AST that looks a lot like what we have coming right up. For that reason, you tend to place a bit more credibility than you might otherwise in a forecast that far away. The exact day this occurs will be most likely be off, but it is likely that a troughs/clouds and precip will to affect the SW over the next couple of weeks or more. Good bye dry spell!

If you don’t believe me, check this 10 day outlook from the NOAA spaghetti factory:

"Lorenz plot" from NOAA, valid at 5 PM AST, November 30th. Its pretty plain to see that there is a strong likelihood of a cutoff low in the extreme SW US. — “Lorenz plot” from NOAA,
valid at 5 PM AST, November 30th. Its pretty plain to see that there is a strong likelihood of a cutoff low in the extreme SW US, if you can find it. (The vast number of contours is due to a software glitch today. Usually only a few upper level contours are tracked.)

Heavenly model

From our friends in Canada, this fabulous sequence for AZ. An example:

Valid for Friday afternoon, 5 PM,m November 22nd. Arrow points to beau coup eastern AZ precip amounts — Valid for Friday afternoon, 5 PM AST, November 22nd. Arrow points to beau coup eastern AZ precip amounts.

The loop above, generated by last evening’s global obs by the Enviro Can “GEM” model might be the best a numerical model can put out for Arizona. It might even be the best model day of my life ever here (which hasn’t been that long, but still…).

Why?

1. Trough races into the precip “Red Zone”, located immediately SW of AZ. Rain moves in on Friday into Catalina and environs.

2. Trough forms circular, spinning low aloft there, that wanders slightly in place. Cloud and precip rush into Arizona, and it just doesn’t quit as wave after wave of clouds and rain move up from Mexico, the Gulf of Cal-Sea of Cortez, and the Pacific off Baja while the low center dawdles.

3. Low crosses into AZ and departs AZ late Sunday after showery day.

In sum, showery rainy conditions beginning on Friday, continuing into Sunday.

Amounts should be several inches in the mountains of AZ. Here, sans the great U of AZ calcs for the whole storm period, will go with the same “seat-of-pants” estimates of the botttom and top amounts made a couple of days ago: at least 0.4 inches (even if things don’t work out so great; low doesn’t dawdle so long). But as much as 1.50 inches on the high end here in Catalina if it DOES dawdle as this model run from last night shows and we get nailed by recurring rain bands. Best estimate, “therefore” he sez, is the average of the two, or about an inch.

It would seem some thunder now and then would also be in the mix, and BTW, we remind our reader that snow and rain mixed together is NOT SLEET, dammitall! SLEET is frozen raindrops, ones that have frozen on the way down and usually requires two to three thousand feet of below-freezing air temperatures before that happens. Also, they BOUNCE when they hit, are usually clear, and often have spikes where the water was trying to get out since they mostly freeze from the outside inward, and because water expands when it freezes, a spike or ejection of ice splinters results as freezing takes place. Kind of neat really. But its NOT rain and snow mixed together! Sorry, getting into some “sleet rage” here; need to work on it; get it under control. I just don’t want my reader to sound ignorant when rain and snow are mixed together, but rather, “precipitationally erudite.”

Yesterday’s clouds5:20 PM. Jet’s ‘n’ Cirrus. The very short contrails, formed by moisture and carbonaceous crap, oops, black stuff, in the exhaust, are short here because the jets are flying ABOVE the Cirrus.

The moon's been HUGE lately, enough where you can see quite a bit of detail. — The moon’s been HUGE lately, enough where you can see quite a bit of detail.

More rain ahead as month closes!

The End

Keeps getting better..the storm on the doorstep, that is

“Better” means wetter, of course. You don’t read this blog to read about DROUGHT! You read it to read about rain and moistness; clouds, too. Let’s leave drought for the other guys…

Here is the latest model permutation from the Canadians, one that successively, and successfully, I might add, jacks up the amount of rain for AZ as the real deal gets closer on the November 21-23rd. Take a lot at these two depictions from Canada for the 22-23rd (sorry about the small size; the Canadians are shy about their model outputs and don’t like to post large gifs or jpegs; also remote areas of Canada mostly have dial up so big files are a problem I’m guessing):

Valid at 5 AM 23 November 00_054_G1_north@america@zoomout_I_4PAN_CLASSIC@012_132 — Valid at 5 AM Saturday, November 23rd. Note streamer of heaviest rain in central AZ, The colored regions are for those areas in which rain is forecast by the model for the prior 12 h.

Valid at 5 PM November 22nd. Very heavy rain indicated for central AZ mountains 00_054_G1_north@america@zoomout_I_4PAN_CLASSIC@012_120 — Valid at 5 PM, Friday, 22 November. Note streamer of heaviest rain in eastern AZ, and over our area with lots more ahead!

The colored regions are for those areas in which rain is forecast by the model for the prior 12 h.

Note round low near San Diego in the first panel, upper left:

“Round lows out of the flow; no one knows where they want to go.”

This old weather forecasting limerick I just now made up sums this situation well. Round lows sit, spin, wobble and jerk around for awhile, and so they shovel rain and clouds over the same areas for one or two days, sometimes longer.

So, instead of a nice sharp frontal band passing by within a few hours and then its over, as happens most of the time here, bands rev up and keep spinning around the wobbling low, often hitting the same areas and the rain/snow keeps piling up. Remember the giant cutoff low in December 1967, and the MOUNTAINS of snow it produced back then in northern and central Arizona, stranding hundreds? Well, this ones not THAT big, but its big deal anyway with lots of water in it, and not so cold as the one in 1967 when “album rock” was emerging.

So, this could put a real dent in our October-November rainfall deficit throughout Arizona, a real “worth billions of dollars storm” to agriculture! I am pumped, as are you!

Great storm, too, if you’re planning on getting those spring wildflower seeds in the ground; do it just before the storm arrives and you’ll likely get a colorful return in the spring this year.

What are the chances of measurable rain here in Catalina? Oh, right now, I’d say anywhere between 100 and 200 percent. Now the NWS is NOT going to give you those kinds of percentages I might add. You only get them here.

Amounts?

Let’s go for it. I say the minimum (10% chance of LESS) is 0.40 inches, maximum (10% or less chance of more), is 1.50 inches (big top side due to stationary aspects of storm, likely thunderstorms in area). Median of these, which might be the best estimate for Catlanders (those domiciled in Catalina): 0.95 inches, all falling between the morning of the 22nd through the morning of the 24th, likely in pulses. Goodbye dust!

But in those central AZ mountains, with flow more or less perpendicular to them from the south, their best rain producing wind direction, 1-4 inches is very likely. Yay for rain and snow, maybe some TSTMS, too, comin’ right up.

Didn’t mention the US mods but they are “on board” for a major rain event in AZ. Canadian one saw it happening first, so am sticking with it.

Still another pretty good rain chance as the month closes, but a far colder situation than the one coming up.

Yesterday’s clouds

Small ones, Cumulus humilis, no ice, but pretty anyway. Also, a little smidgeon of Cirrocumulus late, with Cirrus, too, invading from the SW, and a pleasant sunset.

5:11 PM. Cirrocumulus blossomed overhead as a moist layer way up top encroached. No ice indicated.

DSCN6228 — 2:46 PM. Cumulus humilis dot afternoon skies. No ice indicated.

DSCN6234 — 5:32 PM. Cirrus clouds provide target for fading sunlight.

Rain 2 for November 2013: 0.23 inches, lightning and a couple of grape-sized hail stones

We have a monthly rain total that’s not zero! But will there be more this month? Stay tuned until November 30th! (Nothing imminent.) In the meantime, a very pretty blue sky day today pocked with residual Cumulus clouds, maybe some virga. There’ll be nice cloud shadows and sun on the Catalinas again today.

In the meantime, here are the Pima Country reports for last evening’s rain. The heaviest amount seems to be at our end of the Catalinas at Pig Spring, with 0.39 inches. Nice.

Yesterday’s clouds and why

Not exactly the way they were supposed to go, the ice cloud shield WAS on the horizon to the NW at mid-day but didn’t advance over us, but rather fizzled out. That’s OK. What was left of it enhanced a spectacular sunset through the rain.

The Cumulus clouds were the stars of yesterday, doing something in the way that the old rock band, Jethro Tull used to do. The members of JT would come out on stage as roadies, fiddle around with equipment for awhile, then suddenly turn around and began playing! Oh, who can forget Jethro Tull and that Aqualung album that roiled the rock waters back in 1971 by interrupting heavy, driving rock with acoustic interludes and flute playing (!!! )? What were they thinking?

Well, our Cumulus clouds pulled a fast one, too, after hanging around, fiddling around not doing much, then blammo, here comes the ice around 4:30 PM, followed by an eruption into an honest-to-goodness Cumulonimbus cloud with a strong rain shaft, sending forks of lightning to the ground, and pea to grape-sized hail bouncing off the roof with winds gusting to over 30 mph. This spectacular happenstance was triggered by a surge of much cooler air in conjunction with the lifting of air associated with our approaching trough just above those Cumulus tops yesterday afternoon. That steepened the lapse rate; spring-loading those Cumulus clouds as it were, allowing tops to rise and still be that bit warmer than the surrounding air and stay buoyant as they rose. Here are a couple of TUS balloon soundings rendered by the Cowboys of the U of WY:

While cloud fattening and ice was expected late in the day with sprinkles and light showers, the U of AZ mod run based on 5 AM AST data was spectacular yesterday morning in foretelling this larger eruption as that cold air moved over us. But were grape-sized hail stones and LIGHTNING expected? Not only “no”, but “HELL no”.

Here’s your day, reprised below, of which the MOST IMPORTANT part was the first detection of ice, very tough yesterday, but a precursor to the rain that began to fall a few minutes later. You can also reprise your day here thanks to the U of A time lapse films. Watch what happens around 5 PM, if you can read the tiny font in the lower left hand corner.

Here is the pictorial of your cloud day below:

3:49 PM. Clouds fattening, no ice visible anywhere yet. Nice cloud street generated upwind of Pusch Ridge, floating over Catalina. Shows wind direction at cloud level is from that direction.

4:01 PM. Nice cloud shadows and sun moving along the Cat Mountains, too. — 4:01 PM. Nice cloud shadows and sun highlights moving along the Cat Mountains, too.

4:34 PM. Something's definitely happening now. Note turret protruding on the left. Clouds evolving into larger masses to the south, the cloud street having broken up. And, these are clouds that — 4:34 PM. Something’s definitely happening now. Note turret protruding on the left. Clouds evolving into larger masses to the south, the cloud street having broken up. And, those massing clouds are upwind of us. Still, no ice evident.

4:35 PM. Ice! I can't believe it. Its going to rain! Can you find it? This is REALLY tough. — 4:35 PM. Ice! I can’t believe it. Its going to rain! Can you find it? This is REALLY tough.

4:37 PM. Close up of ice. A higher top was breaking off to the NE and was converting to ice.

5:07 PM. By this time, ice had formed in cloud clusters all around Catalina, and this beauty erupted upwind.

5:22 PM. About to strike with hail, lightning, wind and rain.

5:35 PM. While the rain and hail weren't done yet, it gave this sunset pictorial. — 5:35 PM. While the rain and hail weren’t done yet, it gave this colorful scene reminiscent of summer sunset color except that the sun would be setting WAY over there on the right out of view.

5:40 PM. Second thunderstorm with hail in formation upwind of Catalina.

The End.

Having an effect after all; sunsets, clouds, and the weather ahead

I was driving down in Tucson yesterday, kind of moping around about all the blogs I had done with little or no interest. You may recall from a blog I did a few months ago I reported to my reader that a business site had evaluated the worth of my blog, and due to the amount of traffic it brought, it was found to be worth $25.

But then as I rounded Campbell and headed northbound from Fort Lowell, I saw this sign exhorting fellow Tucsonians to watch clouds! My mood brightened. Maybe there were a few out there that I had affected after all; a whole cloud watching movement had started! I did see, however, that since the sign maker was wondering whether there were clouds in the sky or not, and there was a lot of Cirrus overhead, I saw that I had more work to do.

This sign seen near Campbell and just north of Fort Lowell yesterday afternoon.

Yesterday’s clouds

9:03 AM. Cirrus fibratus in rolls, undulations due to waves in the atmosphere associated with the strong jet stream above us. — 9:03 AM. Cirrus fibratus in rolls, undulations, due to waves in the atmosphere associated with the strong jet stream above us.

In case you were asleep, watching Monday night fubball, and NOT watching clouds, here is yesterday’s magnificent sunset as the sun underlit those dense Altostratus clouds that developed from thinner Cirrus ones during the afternoon and evening.

Today, more mid-level clouds and with strong winds aloft, we should see some lenticular clouds in the lee of the Catalinas. Videoing them would be a good thing for you to do because you would, in fast playback, be able to see how they keep forming on the upwind side and disappearing on the downwind side while holding their overall position. If the moisture increases, they expand, and if it decreases, they shrink and dry up, something likely to happen later in the day.

While that’s going on, there’ll likely be some Cumulus and Stratocumulus off to the north, and since the air is going to be much colder aloft to the north today, some ice is likely to form in them late in the day in those northern clouds, leading to some virga. Those lower clouds, according to our models, should begin appearing around here, too, in the late afternoon and evening. Alas, measurable rain is very unlikely, and with this, last little threat, October 2013 will go out rainless here in Catalinaland.

Farther ahead…..

More middle and high clouds and great sunrises and sunsets are likely on November 3rd and 4th as a little upper level trough creeps in from the lower latitudes of the Pacific off Mexico. It was once projected by the models to bring rain to here, but now it seems only a sprinkle is possible; most of the tropical moisture shunted to the south and over northern Mexico.

In the longer term, while all “fantasy rain” has disappeared for AZ based on last evening’s 11 PM AST model run, stronger than normal storms are showing up for California later in the first week of November, and with that, we’ll always have the hope that this time, the “fantasy” in that model calculations is no rain shown for here.

The End, but enjoy those pretty clouds today!

Nice sunset; slight rain due in Thursday morning

Nearby locations get shafted as summer thunderstorms go on for one more day

Looks now, in spite of a few Altocumulus clouds around that yesterday was the LAST day of our summer rain season in terms of having rain. Much drier air moving across Arizona from the west now. Kinda sad about it, still yesterday was GREAT, a final tribute in a way. Will have some stats tomorrow on how we did here in Catalina/SH compared to normal. Big trough comes in around the 25th to give a preview of cool fall weather. I suppose you’ll like that, not being hot every day.

In the meantime, your cloud day yesterday below, in detail, of course.

SONY DSC — 6:37 AM. Altocumulus, still hanging out, providing a nice sight during a dog walk.

9:12 AM. Pretty Altocumulus/ floccus and castellanus (has a flat bottom).

11:38 AM. Early, plumpy Cumulus clouds over Oro Valley and the Torts give hope for some rain. On the right, a "cloud street", one issuing off the Catalinas toward the Torts. — 11:38 AM. Early, plumpy Cumulus clouds over Oro Valley and the Torts give hope for some rain. On the right, a “cloud street”, one issuing off the Catalinas toward the Torts.

12:08 PM. Here's a promising sign. Its only 12:08 PM and there's a wall of Cumulonimbus lining the high terrain N to NNE of Catalina/SH. Could be that there is still enough water up top to support a thunderhead 'round here. — 12:08 PM. Here’s a promising sign. Its only 12:08 PM and there’s a wall of Cumulonimbus lining the high terrain N to NNE of Catalina/SH. Could be that there is still enough water up top to support a thunderhead ’round here.

12:26 PM. NOthing much going on in this cloud street. But it will amazingly enough. — 12:26 PM. Nothing much going on in this cloud street. But it will, amazingly enough.

12:47 PM. Since I want you to think exactly the same things that I do, you should have thought, "Huh. That's not a bad cloud base just over there on top of Oro Valley. Wonder if its going to do anything (form ice) topside?" At this point, you start obsessing over this cloud bottom, not leaving it for even a minute because you don't want to miss anything. Maybe you call a friend, too, and tell them about it. — 12:47 PM. Since I want you to think exactly the same things that I do, you should have thought, “Huh. That’s not a bad cloud base just over there on top of Oro Valley. Wonder if its going to do anything (form ice) topside?” At this point, you start obsessing over this largest cloud bottom, not leaving it for even a minute because you don’t want to miss anything. Maybe you call a friend, too, and tell them about it. That’s probably what you should have done.

12:55 PM. You're upset you didn't call a friend because now you see that there's a ton of ice up at the top, no shaft coming out of the bottom, but there surely will be. You could have let them know there was going to at least be rain, especially if they live over there by Saddlebrooke Ranch. — 12:55 PM. You’re upset you didn’t call a friend because now you see that there’s a ton of ice up at the top, no shaft coming out of the bottom, but there surely will be. You could have let them know there was going to at least be rain, especially if they live over there by Saddlebrooke Ranch.

1:00 PM. Just five minutes later, the shaft is already on the ground!

1:08 PM. Thunder galore by now, and a surprising even to me, strong thunderstorm. And there wasn't another one around for about 50 miles in all directions! How lucky were we? Plenty. — 1:08 PM. Thunder galore by now, and a surprising even to me, strong thunderstorm. And there wasn’t another one around for about 50 miles in all directions! How lucky were we? Plenty.

4:20 PM. The last thunderstorm of the day was over there behind the Catalinas. Could here thunder from. I love Ms. Mt. Lemmon and the Catalinas, but lately they've been letting me down. No thunderheads have shot upward from them, only morning Cu and afternoon moderate Cu, mostly, "hold the ice"; not even deep enough to form ice. Its hard to keep caring for something when its always letting you down. — 4:20 PM. The last thunderstorm of the day was over there behind the Catalinas. Could here thunder from. I love Ms. Mt. Lemmon and the Catalinas, but lately they’ve been letting me down. No thunderheads have shot upward from them, only morning Cu and afternoon moderate Cu, mostly, “hold the ice”; not even deep enough to form ice. Its hard to keep caring for something when its always letting you down.

6:36 PM. Still, it was a great cloud effort yesterday, and here even in the evening, some are still putting out. And with a couple of drops from the earlier storm to the NW, we got to register a trace of rain in The Heights.