After 10 minutes or so, the storm appeared to weaken and the wall cloud shrank. A new storm formed SE of the original one, leading me to think that a handoff of the main energy was occurring to the new, southeastern storm. We headed back to Santa Fe; I figured that with the storms moving NE at 20 mph, I could head back out later if they held together. Indeed the NW storm dissipated and was replaced by the new one to the SE.
I headed out again around 4 as the storm was now crossing the Cochiti Pueblo and moving toward the western fringes of the Santa Fe area. Shortly after 4 p.m. a SPS was issued for the possibility of half-inch hail and 50 mph wind, with the storm located over La Cienega, just WSW of Santa Fe. I got this picture around 4:15 just NE of the Santa Fe airport, looking WSW:
I watched the storm as it continued to move slowly to the NE. I knew I could not follow it past Santa Fe because of the mountains and the fact that the storm would cross 285 north of town before it moved into the mountains. Around 5 it formed a nice wall cloud, and seemed to be intensifying, as verified by a second SPS, this one indicating the possibility of penny-sized hail and 50 mph wind:
As the sun shined into lighter rain SE of the main cell, I got a nice rainbow pic:
With the storm nearing the mountains, my chance to stay with it was over, so I returned to Santa Fe to do some grocery shopping. When I came out from the grocery store, there was a nice view of the storm as it moved up into the moutnains:
Not bad considering all my storm photo ops were within either the Albuquerque or Santa Fe metro areas!