I was at
home at Burpengary looking at large areas of rain on the Brisbane local
radar when I noticed a growing thunderstorm cell between Kingaroy and Crows
Nest moving steadily east. As it continued to move towards the Sunshine
Coast it also developed and maintained a small area of red indicating an
area of peak intensity rainfall.
After watching it
develop and move east it suddenly occurred to me thatthis could be worth
chasing. I quickly made up my mind and off I went. Itrained all the way
from my place to the coast. Because this cell wasembedded in a large rain
band the visibility was so low that it wasimpossible to see or photograph
the actual storm itself. The only way I had of knowing where to go to punch
through it, was the radar before I left. Judging by the way that
it was going I estimated that it would hit in the Caloundra area.
Just before I got
to the Caloundra turnoff the rain began to get heavierand I could make
out a large area of darker cloud to the north withlightning in it � obviously
the storm. I now had to make a decision �whether to turnoff to Caloundra
and head along the beach road so as to get in front of the storm before
it hit, or keep going north and try to punchthrough it on the Bruce Highway.
Because it was moving rather quickly west to east, there was a good chance
that it would have moved east off the highway before I got to it, so I
decided to outrun it to the coast andheaded for Caloundra.
When I got to Caloundra,
from what I saw it was obvious that the storm was going to hit further
north than what I had anticipated - in theMaroochydore area.
In hindsight I would have been better off keeping tothe Bruce Highway and
taking the Maroochydore exit. That way I would have been in Maroochydore
a lot sooner and would have been there before the storm actually hit and
might have experienced some even stronger gusts than what I did when I
arrived there when the storm was already right over the top of town.
Anyway, as I was
heading north along the coast road from Caloundra I saw many cloud to ground
strikes to the north and the rain intensity increased dramatically.
When I arrived at
Maroochydore, the storm was at full throttle. Cloud toground lightning
was happening very frequently with some strikes having up to 5 pulses.
Some strikes hit less than a kilometer from me with very loud crashes of
thunder. The rain was so heavy now that visibility was reduced to about
15 metres. At one period the wind gusts picked up to such an extent that
the rain was near horizontal and small branches and pieces of cardboard
and debris were flying through the air. Flash flooding was occurring everywhere,
in fact I drove through half a metre of water on the main highway
through Maroochydore. The lightning had also taken its toll, with many
traffic lights out or flashing and the ensuing traffic disabilities.
I did not see any hail however.
The storm lasted
for 15 to 20 minutes before returning to normal moderaterainfall. A quick
drive around town after the storm did not reveal any realdamage to trees,
power lines or properties but there was severe flashflooding and lots of
surface water, some of it quite deep.
Although this was
certainly not the most severe storm I had been in, it was the best this
season so far (for me), and a good ending to a day where I thought all
chances of severe storms had been ruined by a big rainband.
