July’s first Full Moon occurred at 0219 UTC on 2 July (a second full moon occurs later this month on 31 July). Strong illumination from the moon showed river valley fog in several tributaries of the Mississippi River (for example, the Wisconsin River in southwest Wisconsin; the Upper Iowa River in... Read More

Beavertails are ephemeral cloud features that form in the inflow of supercell thunderstorms. They are horizontally long and roughly parallel to the inflow warm front. Its appearance (and presence) is affected by and influences inflow into the storm, and by inference, it affects radar returns. That is — a change... Read More

‘Orphan anvils’ typically will develop before and just as a cap that prevents convective development breaks down. They can therefore be a precursor to strong thunderstorm development. The animation above shows an orphan anvil just before strong convection (Storm Reports) develops over south-central Nebraska. The anvil development is obvious in the... Read More

A comparison of AWIPS images of Suomi NPP VIIRS 0.7 µm Day/Night Band and 11.45 µm IR channel data (above) showed a large mesoscale convective system in southwestern Arizona at 08:40 UTC or 2:40 am local time on 20 July 2013. With ample... Read More