A dash of November lightning

(please click to view on black // canon 5d mark iii, canon 135mm f/2 l, iso 125, f/8.0, 25 sec // buy print)

I’d been hearing about the chance of some rare November thunderstorms since Saturday, but you can never be too sure how that will pan out. To top it off, most of my family hasn’t been feeling well, including me, so when the storms did start popping up around Phoenix, I was almost too tired to even leave the house.

Later after failing near Avondale, I was downtown watching from a parking garage, debating whether or not I head home and get some sleep, because honestly, I wasn’t feeling awesome. Of course I saw a strike to the southeast of town where new cells were on radar, so I overrode whatever my body was telling me and headed towards the storms.

I set-up on the shoulder of Queen Creek just east of I-10, where I’ve been countless times. I grabbed the new Canon 135mm, aimed southeast to frame the Intel plant in the shot and started looking around at other storms off in the distance. I was looking back to the west when a big flashed happened somewhere behind me…but I didn’t know where. I usually pause the camera at that point so I can look back, but I decided to just keep going in case I missed the only strike of the night.

When I was packing up, I quickly scrolled through the images on the camera and BOOM I saw this strike…the only one worth keeping from the night. I had no idea…couldn’t believe I could get a strike like this in November. Amazing power.