This is the classic definition of an isolated shower. One lone shower produced heavy rain as it tracked southeastward. The heavy rain barely touched the western shore of Singleton Lake. You could count the rain drops that reached our Singleton Sanctuary on the eastern bay of the lake. This is the kind of shower that frustrates farmers if they want to harvest their hay crops... or want some rain for their sprouting corn. Either way, an isolated heavy deluge like this has the potential to either rain on or make someone's plans.
The meteorology required to correctly predict the location of this isolated but very heavy rain shower is complex. It involves starting at the large scale of the water vapour imagery and drilling downward in time and space to the forces that influence the local scale. The water vapour imagery revealed several short-waves (use your Coriolis right hand to understand them). These pulses of energy were arranged in a double cyclonic vorticity (maximum) chain. The patterns are really quite beautiful. Daytime heating over the land and lake breezes get into the small scale, local processes. These forces nest together and presto, a heavy and very isolated rain shower is born. I was surprised to see it in the chilly northwesterly flow following the cold front of the previous sunset.
The towering cumulus still displayed some remarkable structure. The isolated cloud was rotating probably because of the wind shear along the lake breeze front. The convective cell produced heavy precipitation and strong winds as well. It was a remarkable cloud in an unexpected location behind the cold front. It deserved to be preserved in oils. I try to enjoy every sunset.
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