Thu, 18 Jul 2013 08:47:31 -0700
Day 6, July 16. Frustrating day all around/drive through Tucson Mts. | | A surge of mid level moisture was moving west from New Mexico which aided
in the early eruption of storms southeast of Tucson. I tried to photograph
lightning from the initial early afternoon convection in the Sonoita area,
but it soon became very messy with too many storms and rather low cloud
bases by Arizona standards... which is actually not all that ideal for
lightning photography. I finally gave up on that stuff and headed to Benson
to reset and figure out what to do next. I decided to head to Kitt Peak,
but when I got there, the road to Kitt Peak was closed at 4pm! That was
extremely frustrating and disappointing, because it would have yielded
great views of storms developing over the Tohono O'odham Nation. I did
drive southwest on the Ajo Highway toward Sells, but I turned around given
the fact that the terrain down there was rather thick with tall mesquite
brush and much in the way of overlooks. I turned around, but in retrospect
should have continued on as storms just south of Sells really organized
into profuse lightning machines close to sunset. Instead, I drove around
Gates Pass Road checking that out for the first time. Some showers and
some isolated lightning developed between Tucson and Casa Grande, but
nothing really came of this stuff.
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