We've Been Oogling This Great Australian Shelf Cloud Attacking Sydney For Three Days Now

A lifeguard at Bondi Beach, Sydney Australia
enjoys the oncoming massive shelf cloud last week.  

Earlier in the week, a big thunderstorm loomed over Sydney, Australia and the nearby famed Bondi Beach.

The shelf cloud associated with this storm was just awesome, as you can tell by the photos in this post and the video at the bottom of this post.

Shelf clouds form along the gust front of an approaching strong or severe thunderstorm. The onrushing gust from the storm creates a snowplow like feature in the clouds. That's the shelf cloud.

Shelf clouds are often scary looking, and are a sign that a severe thunderstorm is approaching, so you want to take cover.

However, they aren't tornadoes. Sometimes shelf clouds hang low, as little as a couple hundred feet off the ground and scud clouds hanging below them resemble tornadoes. But shelf clouds aren't tornadic.

The Sydney Morning Herald said some of the storms produced damaging winds, golf ball sized hail and torrential rains.

But the big show was the shelf cloud, described by many media outlets as a "cloud tsunami."

Here's two time lapse view of this great storm, filmed by Will Reid and Hugo Vann:

Another Incredible Australian Storm. This Time, Sidney

Scary storm menaces rush hour traffic in Sydney, Australia
earlier this week. Photo by Mark Evans, or @evohood, via Twitter. 

It's the beginning of summer down in Australia, and it's prime time for severe weather, much like late spring and early summer is here in the United States.

It's been quite a year already for severe storms in Australia. I've already noted the incredible storm that hit Brisbane a couple weeks back.

Now it is Sydney's turn. 

They've been having a series of nasty storms this week, culminating in a super cell that moved over Sydney looking like an alien mother ship in a bad science fiction movie.

Here's a video of the photogenic but scary video approaching Sydney:

Excellent Time Lapse of Australian Severe Thunderstorm

Many of us in the United States are still shivering in winter weather, waiting for the spring and summer thunderstorm season.

To whet your appetite, here's some time lapse of a severe thunderstorm that rolled through Sydney, Australia earlier today. Awesome shelf cloud on the front side of that storm!

The videos came from the Canberra Times.