In Soviet Russia, storms chase you

[Tim Vasquez]

The Russian website EnglishRussia posted pictures of a storm that allegedly hit Moscow "a few days ago". Since the site was devoid of detail and it is getting to be the middle of November, my BS meter was going off, so I did some digging around and found the original source here:

http://users.livejournal.com/bagira_/207658.html

Translation:
"Apocalypse Now"
Moscow-city. 06:01-06:07 am 05/06/2006 (i.e. June 5, 2006 due to non-US reverse date order)
Southwest, Kaluzhskaya metro.

OK, so this happened in 2006. Still, interesting.

Selected Moscow METARs (MPS winds converted to knots here)

Moscow Domodedovo Airport (south side)
UUDD 050130Z 10004KT 040V130 9999 SCT050CB BKN100 17/15 Q1006
UUDD 050200Z 14014G37KT 110V170 9999 -TSRA SQ BKN050CB

Moscow Vnukovo Airport (central)
UUWW 050130Z 05006KT 9999 BKN040CB BKN100 16/14 Q1005 TEMPO
UUWW 050200Z 16012G31KT 080V200 9999 TSRA BKN040CB 17/15

Moscow Sheremetyevo Intl Airport (north)
UUEE 050200Z 08006KT 9999 VCTS SCT046CB OVC100 17/15 Q1005 TEMPO
UUEE 050230Z 17010G19KT 130V200 9999 VCTS BKN043CB OVC100 16/15 Q1007

Meteorological situation that date:

Certainly looks to me to have all the signs and setups of a derecho, which was probably at its peak earlier in the night but is gusting out as dawn breaks at the time of the pics. In the picture above, I believe we are looking east or southeast and the storm is moving northward. The air mass has probably decoupled and stratified during the overnight hours, leading to numerous condensation levels as it is forced into the updraft, resulting in the strongly tiered, laminar look on the shelf cloud. It's also obvious that the trees are gusting away from the storm... so we can probably assume it's outflowish.

News report for that morning:

The night thunderstorm brought to capital an apocalypse
Olga Lazareva / June, 05th, 08:10

Last night became for the capital and its inhabitants the true test. After midnight behind a period of summer lightning, the true act of nature presented Moscow with a gale, a storm rain and thunderclaps together with electric flashes piercing the sky. It was some kind of payment for an improbably hot Sunday which was provided to the capital region by the warm front of a southern cyclone. Now various services of a megacity need to count up only the losses rendered by unrestrained weather.

Because of the strongest southern wind which speed at times reached 20-25 km/h, in some streets of city the broken trees have torn off wires therefore, naturally, movement of trolley buses and trams is delayed. For some time the electrified transport will be unavailable on Neverovskogo St, Oaklets, Sherbakovskaya, and Kashirskoe Highway in Borisovskikh. Besides, the dispatching service has received the message that breakage of a contact network has occurred on Michurinsk Prospekt.

The delays will be relieved by additional buses, which by the routes (?) temporarily absent transport that all the townspeople could reach their offices without special problems. Mosgortrans has oriented in a situation operatively enough as has heeded far not to the first storm warning for last days and it was thoroughly prepared for the future storm apocalypse – has allocated transport for start-up of compensatory routes and additional repair brigades which were on duty all the night long, expecting inevitable calls.

Till 06:00 high-rise construction has been suspended. The airports, despite the indication of strong weather, have been allowed to remain open. In this case captains make a decision on landing independently. Serious operation problems at the airports, fortunately, has not arisen. Only three passenger planes have been diverted: one has sat down in Vnukovo instead of Sheremetyevo, and later when also the Sheremetyevo was struck by the storm, two more planes heading there were forced to land in Nizhni Novgorod. But as a whole, operations were conducted in a regular mode.

Now all the townspeople are asking: what will be further? Last night's storm has supplied capital of rain deposits of 10 mm. Weather forecasters it is pessimistic assume, that for their this day will drop out, at least, as much. The sky generally will be covered by clouds, but sometimes all of them will dissipate and allow for bright sunshine.

This flood will be combined with temperature +28°С, and here and there on area and +30Â°С and forecasters will keep up on the condition especially closely. The greatest danger threatens those who suffer chronic pulmonary insufficiency, diabetes and excess weight. As panacea they are recommended to drink more than liter of mineral water (only necessarily not aerated), green tea or various mors.

Source:
http://www.utro.ru/articles/2006/06/05/553965.shtml

I think the article is partly referencing another storm that blew through a few hours before this one, and that is certainly supported by the satellite photo. Apparently this storm was one of 2 or 3 fast-moving MCSs.

I'm taking it on faith that this isn't more ripped-off shots belonging to Mike Hollingshead. The foreground does kind of look like a city, not the Plains, and it does look a lot like pictures I've seen of Moscow. So I'm going with a cautious "authentic" on these pics.

Tim

 

[Terry Tyler]

that was an great report tim...

it really is a shame there isnt more solid information on that event, but you know how it goes sometimes...

cant say i ever seen a shelf cloud like that before...just look at the shapes and colors!

 

[Tarmo Tanilsoo]

And at the same time... At 00Z on 5 June 2006 in Tallinn - CAPE 0. LI 8,83. SI 7,25... All indexes except one at Stormcon(derived from Defcon) 5. This is making me kind of jealous. Why always Russia gets the good storms?

 

[Paul Knightley]

Very nice! Looks very similar to May 27th 2001, NW OK!

 

[Gerard Jebaily]

I never would have beleived it. Thanks for the report Tim.

 

[Tim Vasquez]

I'm resurrecting this as I just got hold of high-res visible imagery for this storm:

Unfortunately slant range is a problem due to the northerly latitude and being 40 degrees off the satellite subpoint. This frame appears to be perhaps 30 minutes to an hour after the photograph above. Remember, storms were propagating northward, so with the full disc image (top two satellite images) that's up and to the left.

Tim