Lightning chase in southwest Illinois: May 8, 2007
ABOVE: Lightning near Red Bud, Illinois.
RED BUD, IL - Tuesday, May 8 was more of a travel day than an storm chase day, covering the miles from Tulsa, Oklahoma back home to West Virginia. However, a small risk for thunderstorms was present from Oklahoma up through Missouri into Illinois and Indiana. Since I had planned to stop for the night in St. Louis, I decided I had time to try shooting whatever I came up on along the way.
I made it across the river right at sunset and stopped at a St. Louis Bread Company for dinner in O'Fallon, Illinois. Panera Bread/St. Louis Bread Company restaurants (both are one in the same) are nice places to eat during a chase, as they all have free high-speed wireless internet. I noticed a small cluster of storms about 50 miles due south of me, across the river in Missouri. The storms were not very strong, but they were producing lightning and moving due north toward me. I decided to head about 30 miles south near the town of Red Bud, and wait for the storms to move in after dark. This was my first time shooting lightning with my new Fuji S700 point-and-shoot digital camera, and I was looking forward to testing its capabilities. Needless to say, it did just fine. Here are a few shots on the manual 4-second exposure mode with a F3.6 aperture:
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