Tornado Formation!! Sunday, July 20 2008

I had been casually watching this baby thunderstorm

forming in the west, and about overhead.

It was lightly raining, and the storm appeared to be sliding

mainly south of us.

I happened to glance out the living room window,

and this is what met my glance!!

I quickly grabbed the first camera I could find

(the digital) and started shooting.

The cloud could be seen constantly changing;

tails merging, disintegrating;

only to return more organized a few minutes later

As the rain had stopped, I went out into the driveway

for a better look.

As the storm began to pass south of us,

the funnel began to organize further..

Here's the big picture...


... and presently, a finger began groping downward
at a surprising rate of speed.


...organizing into a true funnel--
Here I began to worry it would actually touch down!


...And rapidly morphed into a large, rapidly rotating funnel
intent on destruction.
This phase only lasted perhaps 20 seconds, and then disintegrated.

The whole cloud sequence was visible for probably

about 10 minutes,

and after this last one nearly touched down,

the whole cloud quite rapidly disintegrated.

I watched it for a few minutes longer to make sure!!
The cloud never touched down,

and no warnings were ever issued for the storm

which otherwise seemed harmless.