We've Got Snow, Yes We do, We've Got Snow, How Bout You?

So yeah, we also have some snow here in the Twin Cities. Nothing unusual like those states on the East Coast are getting right now. We're prepared for this type of weather. We have plows that move the snow off of the roads. We have trucks that spread salt on the roads to melt what the plows couldn't remove. We don't usually shut the state down during 97% of our snow storms. Blizzard conditions, yes....three day snow storms without blizzard conditions, not a chance!

That right, this current snowstorm started falling Sunday afternoon. It continued through the night, all day Monday and it's now Tuesday and yes, it is still snowing. When I made it to work Monday morning, I noticed the snow was piling up on the roof entrance to the back building. The height of snow surprised me to say the least. Later in the afternoon, I that height had grow to the top of the roof. I tried to capture a photo as you can see below, but it was snowing so hard at the time, the snow, sky, falling snow all blended in. Trust me, the snow has reached the top of the roof.

Nothing But Net

Earlier in the year, a storm rolled through town with lots of lightning.

More Snow

Another capture from last weeks unusually early snow storm in October....

We Set A Record

My understanding is, the last measurable snowfall in the Twin Cities has set a record. Four inches of snow fell on Monday, this is the earliest record we've ever had that amount of snow falling in the Twin Cities. We're not alone, I'm sure you've noticed the cooler temperatures where ever you are reading this.

About 48 hours after the snowfall, all of my plants are dead, I've seen several trees where ALL of the leaves have fallen off the trees over night. Like that, winter has started.

Passing Storm

Wild Weather

The Twin Cities has seen some substantial thunderstorms roll through this area the past couple of nights. A combination of humid weather from the Gulf combined with a cool front from the north have made for a couple of interesting evenings. Friday evening, I had minor power outages, to the point where I powered my computer off line for the evening. Saturday night, I didn't see any rain around my part of town, but 20 miles north of me say a nasty storm pass through with reports of tornado touchdowns and 65+ miles per hour winds. Sunday we'll get the reports of any storm damage that occurred.

Rain Or Smoke

Driving home in late July, I noticed this very large flume of white smoke trailing up to the sky off in the distance. Now I knew it couldn't be smoke, it was too large of an area. Perhaps I caught a photo of the sky falling and those are clouds trickling down to earth. From where I took this photo it was mostly sunny, with the sun behind me, but across the Mississippi River and into Wisconsin, it was rainy weather. I figure the suns rays were at the right angle to brighten up the raindrops to give it the appearance of smoke or the clouds falling.

Keeping Dry

One thing I discovered while taking photos of lightning last Wednesday was be prepared for the rain. Thank goodness I was within 15 feet of my garage when the rain started falling from the sky or my camera would have gotten soaked. I'm making a mental note, if I'm out taking photos of lightning, have a plastic bag to throw over the camera handy to keep the rain drops out.

While I was watching the rain fall, I snapped a couple of photos between my vehicles parked in the driveway. I really like the effect the rain had on the street lights.

One More From The Lightning Storm

The forecast called for a second night of thunderstorms, but this event was a no-show. Or at least in my part of the woods. Today's photo is from Wednesday evening storm once again.

Lightning

We had a great thunderstorm roll through the Twin Cities last evening. I hadn't realized there was so much lightning that went along with this storm before the rain hit. I must have missed 20 minutes of photo taking before I started shooting. This one was the best of the crop with a couple of okay shots at the end of the text. Unfortunately, the shooting location was my driveway, but I wasn't sure how much time I had before the rain would start. So stayed where I was and made the best of it. After about 10-12 minutes, I had to retreat to my garage as the skies opened and I had to protect my camera.

 

Into The Great Unknown

Double Rainbow Reflection

Captured on Highway 61 in Cottage Grove shortly after a storm passed through. I was glad the road co-operated enough to get the reflection on the road. If you look close enough, you can see two rainbows with a slight reflection for the second. Or at least that's how I see it.

Capture Of The Moment

Got this one driving home yesterday from work. It was about an hour before sun set, a storm was passing through, I was waiting for the red arrow to turn green to make my way onto 35E. This was actually a bit of a challenge as my windshield wipers was in motion. I had to take the photo just after the blade passed my view. I can't see a drop of rain in the photo, but trust me, it was raining lightly when I snapped the shutter. I really like the reflection from the signal light, but what really stands out is the color of the road almost matches the sky perfectly.

Storm Reflection

My son took the first photo of the evening, his vision he saw after a thunderstorm had passed through the Twin Cities. I saw a puddle in the street and snapped a reflection photo of the enormous cloud.

Dad, Grab You Camera

My son walked into the house and started yelling for me, "Dad Dad" he said, "You should grab your camera because there is a cool looking cloud to take a photo of". Hearing him say that gave me a surprised and curious look to my face. I certainly had to take a look at what he was talking about. So I grabbed the camera and we headed out side. He walked over to the our drive way and sure enough, the view in today's photo was the photo opportunity he was talking about. He then said, "I bet if you put this photo on your web site it will get lots of comments". I handed him the camera so he could take the photo for today. I must admit, the way the passing thunderstorm cloud looked as the sun was setting and framed between the neighborhood trees, it was a great vision at only the age of 9.

My sons only question now is, how many comments will his photo bring?

After The Storm....Part Two

Continuing on from yesterday's storm photos....as I mentioned, I was taking photos while everyone was cleaning up the fallen branches. There was a very large sewer back up around one of our loading dock areas. It made for a very easy photo opportunity and is easily my favorite photo from this set. Once the bulk of branches was cleared, since we had no power and were waiting for Xcel energy to get us back on the power grid, we had no choice but to kill time by throwing the football in our parking lot. One of my co-workers, during his college days, played for the University Of Minnesota. He easily could throw the football the furthest from everyone who participated.

According to the local weather, a small tornado had touched down in the area somewhere, but did only minor damage. 65 mile per hour winds were achieved during the touchdown. Considering how much tree damage I saw, we were luck to only have debris in our parking lot and one tree knocked down. It certainly could have been much worse.

  

One Wicked Stormy Afternoon

I'm speaking with a customer on the phone this afternoon, we were trying to rush out an urgent order for him. All was going good as could be, everything was on schedule. Just as he finished thanking my crew for their hard work, flexibility on adjusting our work load, and doing something that the commercial companies could never do....we lost power in our building due to a very powerful storm. The high winds, branches flying, trees falling over, water coming down in buckets. It was an amazing storm to watch. Heck, since we were without power and our customers order that we had worked so hard to finish was going no where, we all watched in awe as the storm rolled through

After 15 to 20 minutes of downpour, the rains stopped, we made our way outside to get an up close view of the damage. Naturally I grabbed my camera and started shooting photos. What I found interesting, while I was taking photos, the group of my co-workers started picking up the lot of the leaves and branches. No one asked them to do so, they just did it on their own. Including one brave soul who waded into the loading dock to remove debris from the sewer drain. I thought all of their efforts was rather awesome to see.

I will post another batch of photos tomorrow on the storm, including my favorite shot from this photo set.

   

The Busiest Photo I've Ever Posted

There is so much going on in this photo, the object I was shooting, is hardly visible. Do you see it, the rainbow? Right there as it trails into the advertisement billboard. Not yet? Perhaps if you click on the photo, you'll see that there really is a rainbow in this photo. I really didn't like this photo at first, and I didn't capture the rainbow photo I wanted, but I'm posting it any ways because I really like the stormy direction I'm heading into, but with the side mirror view, you see the storm has passed, the weather is going to clear up any minute. I'm traveling east in my vehicle, stuck in traffic. The clear skys are to the west and soon to be where I am.

My 3 Daily Photo Favorites:
Radonvilliers, France
Melbourne, Australia
Ioannina, Greece

Another Day, Another Hill Top Photo

From the same street location as yesterday's photo. This one take a couple days later just as a passing rain shower had pass through. I took this one a bit further back on the newly paved section of the road as it gave a great reflective shot. You can see the same tree from yesterday's view at the end of the visible part of the road.

My 3 Daily Photo Favorites:
Rubaul, Papua New Guinea
New York, New York
Miami, Florida

Cotton Candy

This is a larger view of a storm cloud that rolled through here over the summer.

My 4 Daily Photo Favorites:
Selma, Alabama
Menton, France
Kansas City, Missouri
Chicago, Illinois

Powered Sunset

It's a strange occurrence when the sun sets into the power lines. The lights flicker, the power surges, but once it passes through the power lines, all returns to normal.

My 3 Daily Photo Favorites:
Ocean Township, New Jersey
Mexico City, Mexico
Jakarta, Indonesia

The Road To Nowhere

I've always being amazed when there is heavy fog. It doesn't happen too often around here. I've tried in the past to take photos of it, but I've never been happy with the results as it usually doesn't capture the depth and density of the fog. This photo however I believe captures it pretty decent. Perhaps the secret to a photo of the fog is to have objects close and far disappear. That is what we all like about the fog isn't it? You know what's ahead, but you're not able to see it in the fog.

Let me paint the picture for you: Up ahead is the entrance to connect with Highway 494 that crosses the river, it's rush hour traffic and there are hundreds of cars ahead. There are trees to the left that rise up a cliff, on the other side of 494 is another cliff with houses on top of them. There are very tall street lights that shoot up about 75 feet and cast their light during the dark hours. There is also road constructions on the east bound lanes of 494 where they are building a new bridge. Among the construction are mounds of dirt, trucks, a crane and lots of metal rebar. To the left and continues straight north is highway 61 with more cars on their way to work.

Now can you picture what is not seen?

My 3 Daily Photo Favorites:
Orlando, Florida
Ljubljana, Slovenia
Dubai, UAE

Where's Your Other Hand....Between Two Pillows?

There was this massive cloud bank to the east on Saturday. I had to take a photo of it. I also wasn't alone. Head over to St Paul Daily Photo by Carol for a different view of the very same cloud bank! It really was impressive as the east had the beautiful clouds in the photo, while the rest of the entire sky was completely cloudless and full of blue. I had to drive around for a bit to get rid of the house and trees to get a clear view of the sky.

My Top 3 Daily Photo Favorites
Chandler, Arizona
Buenos Aries, Argentina
San Diego, California