#2959 "July 7th Singleton Sunrise"

#2959 "July 7th Singleton Sunrise"  
14 x 18 by 7/8 depth cradled smooth panel (inches)
Started 11:00 am Monday, July 7th, 2025

The sunrise was at 5:27 am on Monday, July 7th, 2025. My friend John Verburg photographed this brilliant sunrise over the Singleton Sanctuary from a dock of the Singleton Lake Family Campground. Sunrises looking eastward only appear over the forest canopy for us. Some interesting meteorology was revealed by those clouds. That story deserved to be recorded in oils as well.

A warm front extended eastward across the Ottawa Valley from a low over Lake Simcoe. Water vapour imagery revealed the warm conveyor belt pattern over eastern Ontario. A series of upper vortices were rippling along with the jet stream flow. Southerly surface winds were directing abundant low-level moisture northward. The warm sector even enjoyed some strong July sunshine. The winds veered with height, especially in conjunction with the upper vortices. 

The warm airmass was loaded with moisture, heat and wind shear, which are all conducive to strong convection. The trigger in the form of the cold front could set everything into motion as it crossed eastern Ontario in the mid-afternoon. It was a dynamic weather situation with the added complication of lake breezes and local topography. 

Any convection that developed along the subtle intersections of these low-level convergence lines would encourage the development of a mesocyclone and possibly a tornado. The weather situation was worthy of special scrutiny. But I had a painting of a sunrise to work on in the Singleton Studio,  relatively immune from the heat and humidity outside. I would leave the forecast to my friends in the Ontario Storm Prediction Centre.

The "toothless" cradled panel worked well with the fleeting nature of the sunrise cloud shapes and colours. Sometimes you just need to charge the subject with bold and brash strokes. 

I alerted some family and friends after lunch, anticipating the weather developing in the early afternoon hours. The rogue cells that explode ahead of the cold front always warrant close scrutiny! I no longer "carry the can" for Environment Canada, but I still keep an eye on the weather. I was also still playing with the morning sunrise, so I could not devote much attention to either the satellite or radar imagery. 

Environment Canada went to "Tornado Warning" at 2025-07-07 19:18 UTC (3:18 pm), replacing Severe Thunderstorm Warning for: Merrickville-Wolford - Kemptville, Ont. (043610). Current details: At 3:18 p.m. EDT, Environment Canada meteorologists are tracking a severe thunderstorm that is possibly producing a tornado. Damaging winds, large hail and locally intense rainfall are also possible. 

There were some pictures of the Franktown mesocyclone and tree damage posted on Facebook. 

The hotspot of Canadian tornadoes has shifted from the Prairies to the eastern part of the continent. Severe convection must follow the moisture of the upper atmospheric trough. The science of my friend Dave Sills and The Northern Tornadoes Project (NTP) is making great progress at detecting more of the tornadoes and creating a more comprehensive climatology of severe weather events.  A research paper I did in the 1990s suggested that the Environment Canada observation network only detected 15 to 20 percent of the severe events that actually occurred. It is impossible to create a meaningful climatology with such a meagre detection rate. Weather IS important. 

The Northern Tornadoes Project may study this event in more detail. As for me, I am more than busy painting and looking after the forest. Several large trees were knocked down by the June derecho, and that will occupy my spare time into the autumn. 

I used two studio palettes to keep my colours clean. My brushes are always in a state of some neglect. Oh my...

For this and much more art, click on Pixels or go straight to the Collections. Here is the new Wet Paint 2024 Collection. 

Warmest regards and keep your paddle in the water,

Phil Chadwick