HurricaneJosh Posted September 10, 2012 Share Posted September 10, 2012 A dust storm hit Palm Springs very suddenly this evening-- was mildly cool. It was calm, hot, overcast, and unusually humid all afternoon. Around 8:45 pm, I drove to a restaurant for dinner. It was totally calm when I entered the restaurant. But about 5 minutes later, one of the workers warned another one to be careful with the door-- and I noticed patrons who'd been eating on the patio were hurrying in. I looked out toward the parking lot-- the trees were waving like crazy and the air was filled with dust. I checked online and there was a Blowing Dust Advisory, warning that the storm would reach the City between 8 and 9 pm-- which it did. Driving back to the house, I noticed the streets littered with palm fronds and garbage-- and it's still blowing now, with some lightning near the mountains. I checked the airport obs (KPSP), and what's most interesting is how sudden the onset of the winds was: at 7:53 pm, winds were near calm. At 8:53 pm, they were 32 kt gusting to 41 kt. Interesting desert weather. Kinda cool as I wait for the next 'cane to chase. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scott747 Posted September 10, 2012 Share Posted September 10, 2012 Oy, Continuing meltdown seems to be getting worse. 32 kt gusting to 41 kt dust devil. What exactly is hot dry dirt blowing at that speed like? Anything similar to the above 35 N rainless tropical systems and sand? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HurricaneJosh Posted September 10, 2012 Author Share Posted September 10, 2012 Vicious. Perhaps you'd prefer I call you everyday as I try to fill these empty hours with some-- any-- sort of weather pleasures? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HurricaneJosh Posted September 10, 2012 Author Share Posted September 10, 2012 P.S. Don't forget: I'm in Southern California. We don't get weather here. So 32 kt gusting to 41 is actually kinda nuclear for these parts. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
andyhb Posted September 10, 2012 Share Posted September 10, 2012 You get fire. ...and apparently a landspout tornado today... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HurricaneJosh Posted September 10, 2012 Author Share Posted September 10, 2012 You get fire. ...and apparently a landspout tornado today... Oh, cool. Where was that twister? Looks like Inland Empire? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
QVectorman Posted September 10, 2012 Share Posted September 10, 2012 Wait til you see the rotors and mountain waves of the San Jacinto mtns! Spring time gets pretty winding too through the Banning pass b/c of the density difference caused by the moisture gradient and temp gradient through there. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HurricaneJosh Posted September 10, 2012 Author Share Posted September 10, 2012 Wait til you see the rotors and mountain waves of the San Jacinto mtns! Spring time gets pretty winding too through the Banning pass b/c of the density difference caused by the moisture gradient and temp gradient through there. Ah, interesting. I'm usually not here in the springtime, as I come here for the summer/autumn heat, mostly. Cool to know, though. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HurricaneJosh Posted September 10, 2012 Author Share Posted September 10, 2012 By the way, it's totally calmed down again, but the City has a very weird odor-- sort of a heavy, briny, sulphury smell from the nearby Salton Sea. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Isopycnic Posted September 10, 2012 Share Posted September 10, 2012 By the way, it's totally calmed down again, but the City has a very weird odor-- sort of a heavy, briny, sulphury smell from the nearby Salton Sea. Did you hit the eyewall? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aslkahuna Posted September 10, 2012 Share Posted September 10, 2012 ULL over northern Baja pulled in some monsoon moisture from the Sea of Cortez (low level) and the GOM (mid level) giving you a taste of what PHX sees often in the Summer. High based boomers with copious dust and on occasion copious moistures. These storms can be severe and even weakly tornadic at times. Steve Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HurricaneJosh Posted September 10, 2012 Author Share Posted September 10, 2012 ULL over northern Baja pulled in some monsoon moisture from the Sea of Cortez (low level) and the GOM (mid level) giving you a taste of what PHX sees often in the Summer. High based boomers with copious dust and on occasion copious moistures. These storms can be severe and even weakly tornadic at times. Steve OK, that makes sense. The humidity here yesterday was crazy for the Desert-- I felt like I was in Florida. With temps over 100F, it was just nasty. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HurricaneJosh Posted September 10, 2012 Author Share Posted September 10, 2012 By the way, it's totally calmed down again, but the City has a very weird odor-- sort of a heavy, briny, sulphury smell from the nearby Salton Sea. Article Re: the odd odor last night: http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2012/09/foul-odor-prevades-southern-california-prompting-911-calls.html Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
das Posted September 10, 2012 Share Posted September 10, 2012 Oy, 32 kt gusting to 41 kt dust devil. What exactly is hot dry dirt blowing at that speed like? Anything similar to the above 35 N rainless tropical systems and sand? Some mindless blathering as we wait for 91L to coalesce: I went to school in Fresno and being born and largely raised on the east coast, was fascinated by the dust devils that would fire up in the late morning in the fields around town. I roll into work after classes one day and there is this monster dust devil in the tumbleweed filled “field” across from my building. I’d guess it was maybe 30’ across and the dust at this point had carried at least 500’ up. While the thing was around 30’ across, there was a clearly defined central vortex that seemed to be around 5’ in diameter. It was much easier to see up above 100’ or above the “deris ball” at the bottom. I’m in a white shirt and tie, ready for work and emerge from my un-air conditioned car excited and sweating from the Fresno summer heat. I did not know that my boss and 3 or 4 others were at the front door and saw me go running across the field toward the dust devil. I really don’t know what I was planning to do but when I got to it, I hesitated for a second then jumped right in. My jump got me into the “eyewall” so I was blasted with all manner of dust, sand, pebbles, grit, tumbleweed pieces, etc… I recalculated and moved 5 feet further in and stood in the relative calm of the “eye”. It was around 5’ in diameter and felt like a (variable) windy day. I could look up the tube of the center but could not see blue sky as the dust devil’s first bend was around 50’ up. It was also really hard to see up because all kinds of grit was raining down in the center. When I got my fill of that, I ran in and out of the thing like a lunatic until I disrupted its circulation and it collapsed. When it did so, all the heavier-than-dust particles it had picked up came raining down on me as I hightailed it out of there. I was lucky to keep my job. Once I stopped laughing like a moronic buffoon, I noticed my boss and co-workers standing in amazement looking at me as I walked towards the building. I was filthy from head to toe, think Pigpen from Charlie Brown, as was in no condition to work. My one saving grace is they knew I was a meteorology student up at the university and I was clearly not from Fresno. I was digging dust and dirt out from all sorts of places for the next 3 or 4 days. Yech. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ed Lizard Posted September 10, 2012 Share Posted September 10, 2012 I ate at a Denny's in FAT on US CA 99. I used to see dust devils driving betweem BFL and Taft. Also used to see lots of lightning storms over the Sierra to the East. It did rain, something like 0.14" that July, in 1992, first rain in July in BFL for decades. And experienced an earthquake hours after driving down the road from Lake Isabella in the Kern River deep cut/valley in the Sierra, and thinking an earthquake there would be bad. Warm ENSO FTL. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
das Posted September 10, 2012 Share Posted September 10, 2012 I ate at a Denny's in FAT on US 99. I rode in an F-16D at FAT. Detachment 035 at Cal St Univ Fresno got all kinds of perks, it is routinely one of the best detachments in the nation. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HurricaneJosh Posted September 10, 2012 Author Share Posted September 10, 2012 I ate a cheeseburger and fries in Prague once. Oh, mods, please move this thread to OT. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aslkahuna Posted September 10, 2012 Share Posted September 10, 2012 Dust devils can be dangerous however. AZ devils can be EF1 in damage with winds well above 60 mph. Also, the windborne debris can kill as was found out when a man in ME was killed by a devil a few years ago. Strongest devil at my house in Sierra Vista had 69 mph winds took off a roof panel from my patio cover and scattering the pieces of it nearly a mile away in a parking lot. The AZ storm chasing "experts" on stormtrack.org tend to put down the severe and especially tornadic potential of monsoon thunderstorms in SE AZ-shows a lack of understanding of AZ climatology. All of AZ's tornado fatalities have occurred in Tuccson and during the monsoon. Last damaging tornado in Tucson was an EF2 on July 28,1994 while two other tornadoes occurred in SE AZ that day. Last tornado in Tucson was on August 14, 1996 (I chased that one) with others having occurred around the city since. Cochise County gets 1-3 tornadoes every year during the monsoon-most but not all small ones. One hot spot is the area north of Sierra Vista from Tombstone to Sonoita in Santa Cruz County and from Huachuca City north to I-10. Steve Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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