Josh Cool Stundon

Hello all. There are quite a few thunderstorm events for which there has been very little written about that I have been looking to try to do more research about. One of them was the August 31 2005 severe thunderstorm event over Ireland, particularly west central Ireland around the Limerick city/shannon region. It was one of the most violent thunderstorm events that I recall in Ireland, in terms of the very heavy rain and some of the loudest thunder I had ever heard. I have not been able to find much regarding this event, just the convective forecast that was issued by estofex that day in which a slight risk of severe thunderstorms was issued for Great Britain and eastern Ireland. Of interest to me was that it was a mainly afternoon and evening event, as opposed to a lot of the elevated nocturnal Spanish plume events. The estofex convective outlook mentioned that the focus of severe thunderstorms was more on eastern Ireland, but where I live just outside of Limerick city, and particularly the Shannon region was subject to violent thunderstorms for much of that afternoon, and I would be particularly interested to know why specifically that region got the bulk of those storms? Things really started to get going after about 1:30 pm and lasted through about 4 pm. There were a few other things that were mentioned in the estofex outlook. “Models show deepening low pressure system moving from northern bay of biscay to southeastern Ireland”. Perhaps that might have played a role? Unfortunately, I am fully blind so will not be able to see any weather charts that might be posted, so I will need them described to me. https://www.estofex.org/forecasts/outlook/html/200508311030cf.html

I have noticed that alright. The only write up I could find about August 31 2005 was a few sentences written in the British isles weather diary for 2005. I think a cold front moved across Ireland and western Scotland? Unfortunately, my screen reader doesn’t read charts or graphical information. But it is disappointing that there are no articles written about this particular event. It was really quite outstanding in the Limerick area and I had rarely experienced anything like it since.

@cambrian very interesting reply! What about the charts for August 31 2005? Limerick had some of the strongest thunderstorms I had experienced in a long time on that day in many years.

Hello, thanks for your reply. Unfortunately, I was not able to read much of the article because I am visually impaired and a lot of pdfs wont read with my screen reader. Are you able to copy and paste what the article says about plume setups?

Hello all. So I am aware that there are at least 3 spanish plume regimes that lead to severe thunderstorms in the UK, ireland and northwest Europe. The classical spanish plume, the modified spanish plume, and the european easterly plume. However, I am wondering if perhaps there could be a sub classification of the classic spanish plume? For instance, the classical spanish plume often leads to severe thunderstorms that are typically confined to southeast England, and not effecting Ireland, or the north and west of the UK. Yet it seems that in rare cases, the classic spanish plume has lead to severe thunderstorms much further north and west. June 28th 2012 is one such example. I also recall the severe thunderstorms of August 31 2005 as another example. Of spesific interest to me were a few things mentioned in the estofex convective outlook for that day. ““models show deepening low pressure system moving from northern bay of biscay to southeastern Ireland”. A surface cold front moved across Ireland on that day, and a wave formed along the front over westcentral Ireland around midday, which is probably what lead to the severe thunderstorms in the Limerick area which is where I live. A very similar situation took place on July 25-26 1985. This situation lead to one of irelands most violent thunderstorm events on record.