Casebook 18 August 2003
CSU-CHILL Casebook: 18 August, 2003
A thunderstorm briefly became severe near the foothills west-southwest of Loveland Colorado during the afternoon of 18 August 2003. The CSU-CHILL radar made an RHI scan through the core of this storm at 2010:32 UTC. (See VCHILL example below.) The ZDR field contains a bright band in the low reflectivity elevated echo layer near the 20 km range point. In the high reflectivity thunderstorm core, the transition from positive to near 0 dB ZDR values near the surface at a range of 58 km indicates an increasing hail fraction in the precipitation. Finally, a three-body scattering signature (distinctly negative ZDR at low elevations changing to large positive values at higher elevation angles) can be seen at the far range end of the thunderstorm.
