a couple of storm pix

we had one hell of a storm blow thru northern kahleefornia this weekend, spawning two tornados in sacramento, even. here are a couple of shots from my house in vacaville . first, it was absolutely beautiful out, sunny, no breeze, balmy even. 5 minutes later the sky turned black, the wind started howling, and the sheet lightning in the sky made the clouds look like a backdrop at an evening awards ceremony photo op. the rumble of thunder was constant for at least half an hour. then it started to rain...my rain gauge showed 3 1/2 inches in under 30 minutes. then, the hail started, and we ended up with about an inch of hail on the ground.

this is just as the hail started to fall. yes, that is about 8 inches of runoff in the gutter in front of the house

you can see the hail streaking across the field of view in this picture.

the sky after the hail stopped. those clouds were just barely above rooftop level. note the hail on my neighbor's roof

pretty amazing, having two tornados in northern kahleefornia, only 30 miles away. luckily for the folks where they hit, they were only F-0 force winds, but it's still a shock to have them at any level. i suppose those folks living in tornado alley would laugh at these pix, but for us it was pretty damned cool.