T. Mosley
EF0
Elsewhere in here I have mentioned links between tornadic storms and unusual electrical activity. Now let me go way back.
When I was in high school, about 1968 or 1969, I remember a magazine article titled "Is Electricity the Driving Force Behind Tornadoes?" At this time I was seriously thinking of becoming a meteorologist (I had it bad even back then) and I was fascinated by this article. For the life of me, I cannot remember the name of the magazine in which it appeared, and a lengthy search of the internet has thus far revealed nothing. It sounds as if it was a Scientific American article, but I think it must have been Popular Science or something equivalent. I have not yet been to a big city library to perform a search, but that may be coming.
The article centered around a remarkable photograph, once which I am determined to find again. As I recall, it was taken in suburban Illinois, in a typical subdivision, from someone's back yard. Fences, swingsets, and kid's toys are in evidence. The day is very cloudy, although it is more of a heavy overcast locally. The photographer is aiming south, above the horizon at the gray mass, embedded in which can clearly be discerned what appear to be two very large searchlight beams. These were a good deal broader than authentic searchlight beams would be, but otherwise, one would naturally assume that that is what they were. Until one learned that at that exact moment, in the exact location from which these 'beams' appeared to be emanating, twin-funneled tornadoes were on the ground.
The gist of the article was that the 'beams' seen were due to a manifestation of some electrical display, a "glow" as it were, the nature of which was and presumably is, unknown. The funnels themselves could not be seen from the location at which this photograph was taken, and so it was presumed that this phenomenon extended far up into the mesocyclone and parent thunderstorm. There was no word as I recall as to the funnels themselves "glowing".
SO, my question to you as chasers, people who see more tornadoes in a year than meteorologists do in a career, is simply - has anyone ever observed such a thing? Maybe this is a frequent occurrence but is obscured by heavy cloud cover, much as are supernovae, which occur with amazing frequency in the galaxy, obscured by the interstellar dust.
This observation would certainly fit well with the unusual electrical activity observed during many tornadic storms (such as that 1998 Sugar Land F2) and with the theory of that television tornado detector (assuming that can be proven to work). So if anyone has any chase data, and even better, photos, that support such a theory, I would like to hear of it.
When I was in high school, about 1968 or 1969, I remember a magazine article titled "Is Electricity the Driving Force Behind Tornadoes?" At this time I was seriously thinking of becoming a meteorologist (I had it bad even back then) and I was fascinated by this article. For the life of me, I cannot remember the name of the magazine in which it appeared, and a lengthy search of the internet has thus far revealed nothing. It sounds as if it was a Scientific American article, but I think it must have been Popular Science or something equivalent. I have not yet been to a big city library to perform a search, but that may be coming.
The article centered around a remarkable photograph, once which I am determined to find again. As I recall, it was taken in suburban Illinois, in a typical subdivision, from someone's back yard. Fences, swingsets, and kid's toys are in evidence. The day is very cloudy, although it is more of a heavy overcast locally. The photographer is aiming south, above the horizon at the gray mass, embedded in which can clearly be discerned what appear to be two very large searchlight beams. These were a good deal broader than authentic searchlight beams would be, but otherwise, one would naturally assume that that is what they were. Until one learned that at that exact moment, in the exact location from which these 'beams' appeared to be emanating, twin-funneled tornadoes were on the ground.
The gist of the article was that the 'beams' seen were due to a manifestation of some electrical display, a "glow" as it were, the nature of which was and presumably is, unknown. The funnels themselves could not be seen from the location at which this photograph was taken, and so it was presumed that this phenomenon extended far up into the mesocyclone and parent thunderstorm. There was no word as I recall as to the funnels themselves "glowing".
SO, my question to you as chasers, people who see more tornadoes in a year than meteorologists do in a career, is simply - has anyone ever observed such a thing? Maybe this is a frequent occurrence but is obscured by heavy cloud cover, much as are supernovae, which occur with amazing frequency in the galaxy, obscured by the interstellar dust.
This observation would certainly fit well with the unusual electrical activity observed during many tornadic storms (such as that 1998 Sugar Land F2) and with the theory of that television tornado detector (assuming that can be proven to work). So if anyone has any chase data, and even better, photos, that support such a theory, I would like to hear of it.
