---

There is always something about your first chase of the season. The research before the big day is intense. You don't want to start the 2006/07 season with poor storms, or even worse, a bust! Hours are spent searching the various computer models looking for signs of a good storm set up. Thankfully all the signs were looking good. A trough was sitting over NE NSW with +15 Dp's and temperatures in the North West Slopes and Plains expected to reach the 26c mark. 500 temps were around -17c, 850 temps at 12c. Wind shear was looking very nice with surface winds gusting up to 20 knots from the NE, backing to a 30 knot northerly at 900, north-westerly of 30 knots at 800, west-north-wester of 30 knots at 700, west-south-wester of 35 knots at 500 and finally a jet of 80 knots at 300. There was a lot of moisture in the mid levels during the morning however this was to move east of the area after lunch providing some very nice mid level dryness, perfect for isolated storms. Lifted Indicies were progged to reach -7 in the area during the afternoon.

I had been going through my chase gear the day before making sure that everything was in working order, video camera, camera, phones and data cables charged and packed. Maps, tripods, food, water packed. Everything was looking good except for my laptop. There was an odd smell coming from where the charger connects to the laptop. All I could do was pack it into the car and hope it wouldnt fail me whilst chasing.

I set out from Sydney around 730am and encountered my first storm of the day west of Cessnock around 9am. Lightning tracker and the sat pic showed storms had developed since the early hours of the morning from the NWSAP down to the Hunter valley and were continuing their charge east. I watched a nice shelf cloud form on this first storm for 15 minutes before moving on through the mess of rain and cloud behind it and finally into clear air north west of Coolah.

  

At a little town called Binnaway around 1130am a storm to my south was rapidly gaining size. It was aligned from the NW to SE and had a continuation of towers on its flanking side providing new pulses. It finally started to collapse around 1pm in which with only some weak towers going up to the west, I decided to head north to Gwabegar. I would have driven along the highway from Coonabarabran to Narrabri however this road is surrounded by scrub lands with limited viewing opportunities.

[img_assist|nid=2212|title=|desc=|link=node|align=left|width=200|height=133]

[img_assist|nid=2213|title=|desc=|link=node|align=right|width=200|height=133]

---

The now distinct dry-line was throwing some healthy looking cumulus around my location. One base in particular just to my NW looked strong enough to produce a storm. I headed north east to Cuttabri watching as the towering cumulus anviled out now to my S. The joy of my new found storm was short lived with dry air infiltrating the updraught and eventually killing it. In a matter of 30 minutes all the healthy cumulus was now looking very dry and thin. There was not enough moisture in the lower levels to sustain updraughts. With this in mind all I could see was my chances disappearing rapidly, or had they?

"Surely not" was my first reaction as I glanced to the south and noticed the area I'd left in such a weak state had now produced a very suspicious looking storm. The structure was fantastic from the lowered circular base through the strong crisp updraughts, right to the cumiliform anvil which was speeding off to the distant south east. A wall cloud was visible for some time as I approached my next stop to get footage of the storm.

[img_assist|nid=2214|title=|desc=|link=node|align=left|width=200|height=133]

Upon arriving the wall cloud had disappeared however the updraught was still showing strength. A RFD was in progress and the storms base had a low level flanking line to the northwest.

The occasional bolt of lightning was pulsing out of base and only very slowly could rotation be seen in updraught.

I checked the sat pic loop and noticed it had formed around 2pm just north of where I had viewed the Binnaway storm. Instead of heading east as all the other cloud and rain in the area had been, it was veering left to the NNE. With wind shear being adequate and the structure looking very suspicious I believed it to be a probable Supercell. It died to my south east just before 6pm, a good 4 hour life cycle.

[img_assist|nid=2218|title=|desc=|link=node|align=left|width=200|height=133]

[img_assist|nid=2219|title=|desc=|link=node|align=right|width=200|height=300]

---

Another storm formed to my west around 6pm and although it did

look nice from my vantage point it was not going to survive thanks to the lack of moisture. After an hour or so it finally ran out of fuel and all that was left was an orphan anvil. That was not before the updraught put out some impressive rotation.