What the FAA doesn't teach about flying thunderstorms

I want to understand thunderstorms better. I stared learning about limitations of storm scopes which led me to more insights.

Before you attempt to fly close to, or through a front, learn about your front. Some fronts you can safely fly through, some you cannot.

Thunder cheat sheet

Preflight Tools

1. Radar - locate active fronts, size, and direction of movement
2. Sigmets - If your front is in a convective sigmet, you probably cannot fly through it. Airmets you generally can.
3. Lightning - Look at lightningmaps.org to see how much "in past hour" and 'current" lightning there is. If there are no strikes or few strikes, even if you see heavy or severe precip, it's just lots of water, not much turbulence, likely not a powerful storm.
4. Infrared Satellite - wunderground.com see how cold the reflection is. If temperature is -70, it's a very vertical storm, probably cannot fly through it.
5. NOAA soundings - http://rucsoundings.noaa.gov/ to learn in detail about atmospheric makeup

In flight Tools

1. Nexrad / ADSB weather - The "big picture" with 15 minute delay
2. Strike finder - determine exact direction lightning in real time
3. Strike Finder cell mode - Switch to cell detection mode when < 50nm from activity

Details about thunder storms

One problem is I used to rely heavily on nexrad radar alone. I assumed precip radar reflectivity directly correlates with storm intensity, but this is not true.  It's possible to have moderate or even severe precip that is just that - lots of water. Not much turbulence, no lightning. Lightning comes from vertical wind sheering, so when you have lightning, you KNOW there is bad turbulence. The more of it, the worse it is. Lots of water and no lightning? Probably fine to fly through or close to. So now I'm using radar reflectivity as just an initial cursory look and then watch the storm scope for activity. I also go to lightningmaps.org to see lightning activity before I fly, it tells me what my storm scope will see before I get up there. 

The more strikes and the more frequent the worse it is. Many of the discharges visible on storm scope aren't even visible lightning but still indicate turbulence

For example I"m watching a storm over NC right now. Top image is from lightningmaps.org bottom is aviationweather. Notice that the heavy precip over the water contains almost no lightning, yet, on radar, it looks like a severe thunder storm.

The lack of sigmet is a hint. And the top image shows "last hour of strikes". If I do current there is nothing over the water. The stuff over the mainland is really bad - stay away from there, give it 25nm, and fly the upwind side (east of the storm). The downwind side could still hammer you with huge balls of hail and cost you a $15000 paint job.

I'm also using soundings now. Super useful when flying to airports that don't report weather,also good to learn about layers and tops (since traditional reports only give you ceilings). And last but not least great to tell intensity of storm.

This is KILM now

I see a massive drop in dew point at 14000' and _multiple_ temperature inversions, very unusual. A real monster, stay far away from that, definitely fly the upwind side of it or good chance of a hail shower even 20nm away.

Read the thunderstorm section form Weather Flying (pdf).
-Velocity of thundrestorm cell is telltale. 20kts is strong. 30kts is severe. 60kts is killer. This is not same as groundspeed of whole front.
-Look at cloud tops for "spilling" out of the tops. The more of it, the more active.
Hail comes out of the wash-off anvil cloud on the downwind side. It's full of fail and washes downwind. Instead, go around fronts on upwind side, and use 1nm for each kt of wind (20kts cell = 20nm around).

http://www.ifr-magazine.com/issues/1_7/features/Cockpit-Weather-Choices_61-1.html

http://www.avweb.com/news/avionics/181954-1.html

http://www.nws.noaa.gov/os/aviation/front/14dec-front.pdf

http://www.aopa.org/Pilot-Resources/PIC-archive/ASF-Weather/Weather-Curiosity-Datalink-Roundup

(above) Author, photo taken after safely penetrating through a convective sigmet line at 17200', Zoom in on ipad to see the nexrad image and blue airplane icon.