Abroad Lightning and Storm Photos

Whilst working on offshore oil rigs I had the opportunity to spend a bit of time in the Gulf of Mexico in the USA. During summer storms are a very common occurrence there, and a remarkably large proportion of them produce funnel clouds and water spouts. The storm below was no exception. I watched this storm as it produced a large rain free base, followed soon after by a small short lived funnel cloud.

Depending on your screen it may be hard to make out the slender water spout in the photos below. These are just two of a series of photos I took as a summer shower moved past the rig I was on in the Gulf of Mexico, producing this water spout which lasted about fifteen minutes. At it's peak intensity the condensation funnel reached close to halfway down the cloud base, and rotation on the water surface was clearly visible confirming it as a water spout and not a funnel cloud.

Below are photos of yet another water spout I observed whilst on a rig in the Gulf of Mexico. Unfortunately the cell that produced it was quite far away forcing me to zoom in a long way to capture the waterspout. The shocking haze that is a part of life in the Gulf states ensured the very average quality of these shots.