I awoke ~5:20 am to my weather radio roaring in the next room. I suspected it was just an alert for a severe t-storm watch. However, a quick glance at the radar indicated a
convective system approaching DeKalb. I grabbed my gear, ran to the car, drove to the middle school, and captured only a few images before I was overtaken by rain and 60 mph winds. I really had no time to think, so the pictures aren't the greatest ... in addition, the early morning light wasn't too friendly. Luckily, the Department of Geography webcams captured a north and west view of the approaching shelf cloud. That video follows below, after some stills and animated gifs. On the bad side, we did lose a large 6'x4' window pane on the north side of our house due to a projectile (i.e., 2" stick that happened to hit perpendicular to the window). I'm certain that won't be cheap to replace ...
Power flash as whale's mouth cruises by.
B&W gif animation showing kink in shelf to the northwest --
radar shows this kink as two finelines associated with outflows intersecting over DeKalb.
Note how the power fails in certain sectors as flash occurs.
West and north views from the Department of Geography's webcam network. Unfortunately, the east view was not saving due to a software hickup. Images have a lot of noise due to the early morning light. A rather large animated gif of the most interesting part of the west view is available here. Here is a static image illustrating the dramatic lip along the front.
