Friday, June 28, 2013

collapsing thunderstorm


I'd not even ever heard the term "collapsing thunderstorm" before today, when we were suddenly under a weather alert for such a thing - which caused extraordinary and surprisingly strong winds (indeed, downtown Santa Fe - thirteen miles away - was without power for three hours), and dust storms, and a very flat grey sky.  The phrase seems to mean that each little thunderstorm cell goes off pop, as it were, on its own account - cold air meeting warm air in a whole series of fierce encounters, rather than all joining together as one front.  I think, but there's not a whole lot of online glossing, and after another day dealing with basic physics (who knew that Jacques Cousteau called Harold Edgerton "Papa Flash"?  I like that!) and Charles Peirce's theories of time, I'm not going to be delving too deeply into positive and negative charges.  As it is, I find each little flash of lightning a nagging reminder that I should be writing, not checking the Weather Channel's radar maps.  

As you can see, it was clearing by sunset.  That dead tree - a casualty of drought over the last few years, and a graphic demonstration of the need for rain ... there were just a few minutes of it, in all that storminess.

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