Thunderstorms in San Jose, CA, During the First Potent Winter Storm of the Season (11-20-2010)

Watch in 480p (high quality). A cold low pressure system that formed in the Gulf of Alaska drifted down southward towards the Pacific Northwest and California, bringing in cold temps, snow and even heavy rain and a few thunderstorms. This was officially our first winter storm of the season.

So, in this video, it shows the main part of this winter storm slam the San Francisco Bay Area, including my area (San Jose, CA) on the Saturday of November 20, 2010.

In the first parts of the video, it shows the morning and afternoon of the incoming storm. We started off with mostly cloudy skies, then as soon as the afternoon came, showers began to sprinkle over the area with breezy conditions. Then as the day progresses, heavier showers proceeded. At 1:42 in the video, a good sized cumulonimbus was producing heavy rain showers. At about 2:22 in the video, you could just see a solid wall of water (or a heavy rain shaft) just coming from the southwest of us! As the rain arrived, we saw a nice sunset as well. But thunderheads lingered where the sun was setting so we knew that this wasn't the worst. There was a very faint rainbow as well. We had fun playing in the rain, especially the kids.

At around 5 p.m., we noticed suddenly that the rain showers had turned into heavy rain falling in larger droplets signalling that the thunderstorms were nearing. It appeared that at about 6:30 p.m., our area issued a flood advisory since there was a line of intense rain and thunderstorms headed our way. The storms were capable of producing drenching rain, about at a rate of over half an inch per hour!

[Sorry, I apologize for being so loud in the video during the lightning shots. I can't control my excitement especially when it comes to thunderstorms because I love them and since we don't get these often here.]

Then as the night starts, it was 7 p.m. and the thunderstorms have arrived. We witnessed heavy drenching rain, breezy conditions and even thunder and lightning!! The lightning was impressively happening at a decent rate, about one every 2 minutes on average. (The lightning/thunder footage starts at 5:14 in the video)

At 6:19 in the video, we were up at our church facility in Murillo, in San Jose, CA overlooking the Evergreen area. Boy, it was coming down at this point. The parking lot and even the area outside of our church building appeared to turn into a river! More lightning/thunder was experienced here.

At 7:50 in the video, that was the moment when the hardest, and strongest and heaviest rains fell. It was so loud! That sound you hear there was all that rain pounding the roof. It would've been very quiet in that lobby I was in. The roof couldn't hold all the rain that has been coming down and so it looked like a waterfall at 8:18 in the video! I've never experienced a rainstorm this severe in a while for our area.

With all this heavy rain and lightning and thunder made me feel like I was in the Midwest or Florida. This weather is really uncommon for the Bay Area. It was a phenomenal and great experience!

A total of 9 lightning flashes have been caught on film. A full version of this video, including the slow motions of most of the lightning is here: http://www.vimeo.com/17200510

What a great way to start the holiday season early.

Happy early Thanksgiving! Be safe out there :)

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• San Jose
• California
• weather
• storm
• storms
• skyscapes
• clouds
• cumulonimbus
• nimbostratus
• showers
• rain
• heavy rain
• rain storm
• thunderstorm
• lightning storm
• lightning
• winds
• atmosphere
• meteorology
• winter storm
• sunset
• flood advisory
• flooding
• winter
• downpour
• stormy weather
• rain shaft
• storm chasing

[TaroFan1231]

There A Very Strong Storm This Weekend That Could Produce Heavy Rain On Saturday and Monday

[54spiritedwill54]

@TaroFan1231 yea I heard that starting this Friday, it could be stormy all the way until next week possibly. 

[VideographyOfStorms]

Looks like you got a lot of rain from these nice storms! Great Video!

[54spiritedwill54]

@VideographyOfStorms yea, I've never seen such a rainstorm in a while. It was great to see a heavy downpour once again. Thanks for watching :)

[ChaseSevereWeather]

Living in Orange County, CA I wish I was there on saturday . I love any bad weather ! We grabbed a little rain from this system but not much .. We need more thunderstorms in CA, am I right lol ? Nice footage !

[54spiritedwill54]

@ChaseSevereWeather thanks! Yea I was amazed that we actually got a thunderstorm especially here in the Bay Area. I agree with you 110% that we need more thunderstorms in CA :) hehe.

[Trin3tyIII]

@rawbutto Or come here to Charleston, SC. We just randomly had a storm pop up just an hour ago. There was literally nothing on radar, and all of a sudden, there was. I was talking about how we haven't had rain in about a week, and all of a sudden there was a huge crash of thunder. But as is typical in the South, the heavy rain lasted 30 minutes, then moved on. And there was only that one lightning bolt out of the whole storm. But we get crazy storms from Mar-Nov. Only winter lacks thunderstorms.

[erikd217]

thor is upset

[SDThunderstorms]

@ChaseSevereWeather i no right? i live in san diego and the weather sucks as far as thunderstorms go but ill be moving soon so ya!!!

[rawbutto]

I'm from San Jose, but if you wanna enjoy a real thunderstorm....go to Oklahoma.

[flounder75x]

Outstanding weather video. Great camera control. Enjoyed. Thanks.

[WonderfulPostMusic]

We had more Thunderstorms today. There was a bunch of heavy rain.