Weathernut's blog

Christmas pics of my furry kids!

2011-12-27T15:35:00.000-05:00

Here are a couple of quick pictures of my furry kids (Frankie, the dog and Krychec, the cat) on Christmas morning 2011. They scored a bounty of goodies!!!

Veterans Day Service 2011

2011-11-11T23:14:00.001-05:00

Harnett County, NC (where I reside and work) puts on a wonderful service every Veterans Day. THIS year I remembered to bring along my camera and get some pictures of the service. I hope you enjoy and remember, THANK a Veteran. They gave everything so we can enjoy everything!

Halloween 2011 photos!

2011-11-03T07:19:00.001-04:00

Here is the whole album of photos I have so far. My photographer bailed on me at the last minute, so these pictures are from friends of mine with their point and shoot camera's. Glad they got something, otherwise I would have nothing! Will try to add more as I get them, but enjoy!!!

New Halloween 2011 pics

2011-10-24T06:43:00.004-04:00

Just a couple more 2011 Halloween pictures, this time taken at night!

Halloween 2011 decorating continues!

2011-10-08T19:04:00.002-04:00

Today, more detail work and more decorations went up on the house! Here are some pictures. Feel free to comment, ask questions, or just enjoy!!!

Halloween 2011!

2011-09-16T21:08:00.000-04:00

*****UPDATE as of 10/1/2011*****
More pictures have been added as I have now begun to create the cemetery out in my yard. The pictures are in the slide show below! Enjoy!!!

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Ah yes, it's that time of year again....... one of my favorites! HALLOWEEN!!!!

I will do my best to document all the fun things I do to get ready for the event! The theme this year will be famous horror movies! I will feature scenes from movies like the Exorcist, Psycho, Nightmare on Elm Street and many more!!!

So, without further blabbering, here are some of the props I am working on for this years haunt.

Tornado damage just east of Columbia, NC during hurricane Irene

2011-08-29T05:41:00.000-04:00

Another tornado spawned from hurricane Irene. This one on the east side of Columbia, NC. Same basic time frame as the other tornado and more than likely from the same supercell from the rain bands of hurricane Irene. Imagine, the middle of the night you get hit by a tornado and then get the wind and rain afterwards from hurricane Irene. The town of Columbia also got a foot of rain from this storm and major storm surge as the town sits close to an inlet. This town sustained major damage from Irene!!

Tornado damage west of Columbia, NC from Hurricane Irene

2011-08-29T05:38:00.000-04:00

Here are some pictures of the tornado that ripped through the western part of Columbia, NC just after midnight on August 27th as hurricane Irene was brushing the NC coastline.

Flooding from Hurricane Irene

2011-08-29T05:35:00.000-04:00

There is a collection of photos taken from the flooding that occurred near Knobby Point, NC from hurricane Irene

Google+ will it catch on?

2011-07-08T21:48:00.000-04:00

Google+. (https://plus.google.com/welcome) Have you heard of it? Tired it? It is Google's attempt at competing against Facebook. Google+ has "circles" which is basically your friends list in Facebook. Google+ also has sparks (topics of interest) and hangouts (rooms where you can invite friends to chat/post, and just hang out) It certainly integrates nicely with Youtube, Google chat, picassa, and blogspot which are certainly nice features.

But is it too little too late? After all, Facebook has a MAJOR hold on this market. Who knows? Anyone remember Orkut? Although different, it was also intended to go up against Facebook and failed.

If you haven't, go check it out!

Happy 4th of July!!!

2011-07-04T09:45:00.001-04:00

I had a great opportunity to shoot some fireworks on the 3rd, and so here is a little taste of what I got.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY AMERICA!!!

Playing with lightning!

2011-06-21T22:44:00.000-04:00

Ah, the first day of summer for 2011, and what do I get to do? Play with a FANTASTIC lightning storm!!! Why was it great? Lots of strikes and not much rain! I could not pass this opportunity up to test out my Canon T2i! Considering this would be truly a first time for me to shoot a good light show, I put my camera on it's tripod and set up shop under my porch here in NC.
I tried things like 8 to 25 second exposures and messed around with the iso. Anywhere from 100 to 400 is what I was doing. The further away it was, I could set up with something like 10 second exposure and 400 iso. As the storm got closer, I would back down the iso to 100 and set the shutter time to 8 seconds.
With tons of tries and attempts, I was like a kid in a candy store having much fun!
What did I get you ask?
See below!!!!

More pictures from 6-15-2011

2011-06-21T21:17:00.000-04:00

Here are a couple of more pictures from my June 16th storm chasing trip!

BEAUTIFUL Mammatus Clouds!

2011-06-20T18:09:00.000-04:00

Chasing on June 15th, 2011 with the Silver Lining Tours gang (driving for them actually) we came across a storm in western Kansas much to our surprise. On the back side of the storm we encountered some AMAZING mammatus clouds that were just breath taking......
enjoy!

Surprise Kansas Chase! 6-15-2011

2011-06-16T01:42:00.001-04:00

What a day!!!! After a very disappointing bust in MO on the 14th, today was scheduled to be a drive back to Western KS to set up for Thursday's play in western Nebraska. On route the Silver Lining Tours gang (who I am driving for) notices storms firing up in western Kansas. What we found were a few isolated high bases super cells worth looking at. The tail end charlie storm (last one in the line of cells) had some beautiful structure to it as we got under it. We stopped to take several pictures, then get out in front of it and take more pictures. Finally the storm passed and as we drove up north to get back to Colby, KS for the night, we saw the most stunning mammatus clouds I have seen to date! Here are all the pictures (or at least the ones I processed) from today. I hope you enjoy as this was one of the best surprise storms I have ever chased!

Where I love to be...... under the meso!

2011-06-10T21:17:00.000-04:00

My bud and chase partner Patrick Martin took this picture of me. I love it! Right where I love to be.... under the meso!!!!

Storm Chase 6-8-2011Colorado

2011-06-10T14:00:00.000-04:00

Thought I would quickly put up some pictures from my Colorado storm chase on 6-8-2011. Started off fairly close to Denver and eventually ended up on I76 where Patrick and I met up with our fellow SUPS Corinne and Mike! Great to see them and soon we saw our storm. Very nice structure to this storm that had truly marginal conditions to work with. The pictures I have are from the storm as we chased it up to Hudson, Colorado.
After Hudson however, we tracked it a bit further only to see storms fire up to our west. The night chase was on with Patrick, myself, Corinne and Mike all running after some storms that showed signs of rotation. We followed a right split storm that had a nice hook and meso marker on it according to GR Level 3 and Baron. We sat right in the notch as the surface winds were all over the place. First inflow, then it would shift and eventually we got hammered with RFD winds that were crazy!!!
Great fun but these storms died off eventually, and as Patrick and I headed to Ft. Collins to get back on the interstate we just missed a storm that dumped inches of pea sized hail and a ton of rain. There was hail piled up on the side of the road and we also got to witness hail fog. Always a very cool encounter.
All in all a great little chase on a day which really did not seem at first it would amount to much!

Images:

Billings Montana June 6, 2011 Storm Chase

2011-06-07T13:16:00.000-04:00

June 6th 2011. Patrick and I started the day in Spearfish, MT as we thought there were to be storms near that area. After a quick study of the maps, we realized we needed to head to Billings, MT as the ingredients for the best storms would be near that location. We arrived in Billings at about 1pm. We grabbed a bite to eat at the Applebees there in Billings and sat there for over 2 hours pouring over data. We moved then just east a bit outside a truck stop to sit and wait. We knew the storms would fire late in the day but this was one of those days where it was just testing our patience levels. Storms finally broke the cap at about 7 and the chase was on! We headed west to Laurel, MT where we headed north to get up close and personal with the storms. We had a few data issues while stair stepping up to Hwy 3 but fortunately Patrick on his Verizon I phone got us the necessary data to make the right moves.
Patrick did get a call from the NWS out of Billings as we were in a very good position to watch the right split of the initial storm. The NWS was very concerned with this storm as it was developing a hook and could be headed towards Billings.
We eventually hit Hwy 3 and headed back south to get in the notch of this now very intense storm. We eventually found a spot where we were in just the perfect spot. The hook on radar was just to our south by about 3 miles and we had a clear view of it. The skies were dark and the motion was wonderful! The hail core as it approached looked just evil as well. Both Patrick and I got some good shots at this location and you will be able to see them on line I am sure. I will post some here after the write up.
Eventually we had to move from this location as the core rapidly approached us. We might have stayed just a minute too long as as we headed out we got some pretty heavy precip, but at least no hail.
We drove through Billings as it was our only road option to get back down to the interstate so we could follow the storm as it headed ENE.
We continued east on Interstate 94 for a good hour or so more. Driving ahead, stopping, watching, and waiting. Patrick did see some power flashes just outside of Billings but we could not determine if it was just wind or hail or a tornado that caused them. It was fun to race ahead, stop and get out of the car and feel the warm moist inflow getting sucked into the storm. Then the outflow would hit us with cold air and we would then race ahead as the storm for quite some time showed potential of doing something!
Just a few miles west of Custer, MT we decided to call it a night. The storms had formed a big MCS and clearly lost it's super cell characteristics. We drove back to Billings and called it a chase.
Great storm. Great chase. Glad we made the trek to Montana to see it all. Still no tornadoes in my two chases in the state.

Images now:

Testing a new lens!

2011-06-04T10:49:00.001-04:00

Patrick Martin and myself are about to embark on our annual storm chasing trip. This year we rented a sigma 8-16mm lens to try out so that we could get some great wide angle shots.
We rented the lens from this company: http://www.lensrentals.com/rent/canon/lenses which I highly recommend as they ship for free and have insurance on the lens.
Anyway, I thought I would post a couple of quick pictures on just how wide this lens can go and just how little distortion it has!

this shot was taken with my kit 18-55mm lens

THIS shot was taken with the rented sigma 8-16mm lens!

As you can see, it is a wicked lens, allowing a very wide angle shot with little distortion. I look forward to being able to capture some storms with this bad boy!!!

My new tattoo

2011-05-08T09:16:00.000-04:00

Got my new hurricane flags tattoo! Hope to have a 1/2 sleeve of weather related items when it is all said and done.
But in the meantime, here it is!

Video of the tornado that passed about 5 miles north of Newton Grove, NC

2011-04-17T20:28:00.000-04:00

Here is my video of the tornado that passed over I40 near the town of Newton Grove, NC. I was streaming this video live as it happened. TWC, MSNBC, CNN and other media outlets picked up or aired this footage of my chase!!!

Fayetteville, NC tornado damage photos.

2011-04-17T20:18:00.000-04:00

Here are some damage photos from the tornado that went through Fayetteville, NC on April 16th 2011. This was just one of many neighborhoods effected by this tornado

Sanford, NC tornado damage pictures from April 16th, 2011

2011-04-17T20:16:00.003-04:00

Here are the damage shots I took of the tornado that ripped through Sanford, NC on April 16th, 2011

Just north of Newton Grove, NC tornado pictures (April 16th 2011)

2011-04-17T20:12:00.001-04:00

These are some of the pictures I took of the tornado that went just north of Newton Grove, NC on April 16th, 2011

Funny faces

2011-02-08T06:55:00.000-05:00

Well while the dogs were playing the other day, I was having fun shooting them with my 55-200 lens and trying to capture some action shots. This one struck me as just funny as the looks on their faces were hilarious. Of course I can hear all the captions now one could add to the picture!!! Go ahead, use the comment section to caption the picture if you like! Lets hear some funny ones!!!