August 23rd Recap

Wow, what a storm we had yesterday! When I got to work at the flood center at 1PM, I had a text awaiting me from Michael informing me of a wall cloud on a storm in the mountains, west of the city. I went out on the roof and saw it as well. I also took a bunch of pictures and video which I haven't had time to go through yet.

The storm persisted for almost three hours, slowly moving south and ever-so-easterly through Jefferson and Park Counties. All the while, rotation was evident and I could see the wall cloud from my roof top perch. To my surprise, there was no warning on the storm.

Eventually, the storm took on a more easterly component of movement and base reflectivity began to show a rather pronounced hook. The velocity scans were also spectacular. Finally, the storm was severe-warned and then tornado warned a few minutes later.

You can see a base reflectivity grab in my previous post here.

Though there were no tornado reports during the event, many trees were found "sheared" off and speculation is that it was a tornado. It wouldn't surprise me given the velocity couplet on the storm.



As for the Eleven-Mile Reservoir tornado/waterspout, this was a SEPARATE cell. In fact, I was watching it as the tornado report came across. There was no obvious rotation or supercellular structure to the storm. I'd wager that it was a landspout/waterspout. Here are a few links to photos and video:

KRDO Colorado Springs

KOAA Colorado Springs

FOX 31


Weather discussion for today and beyond coming soon.

Dann.