Storms and Convective discussion - April 2024

[Supacell]

Good morning and Happy Easter to all.

If we can say that the UK has a storm season then it likely runs from April 1st to September 30th, but the UK weather does not stick to any rules. This last week has seen thunderstorms with lightning displays, large hailstones and gusty winds along with some amazing mammatus displays. Thank you to all that shared your pictures. Let's hope this coming season offers up some of what we want to all of us.

So here we go, it's April 1st but I am not going to offer up any April fools jokes . 

Today actually offers its own risk of some thundery weather, albeit a small one. Numerous heavy showers are likely to break out today across the southern half of the UK. These should develop readily once the sun gets out across Central and Southern England before expanding northwards through the Midlands and possibly as far north as Manchester. Amongst these could be the odd thundery one but will unlikely be organised with very little wind shear on offer. 

Anyway, keep on chatting and remember to stay on topic and treat each other and the forum with respect. Heres to a good season of 2024.

Old thread here:

Storms and Convective discussion - November 2023 onwards

Chance of storms diminish tomorrow as the air turns much colder with a 50mph northeast wind bringing heavy snow from the east and up to 20-30cm expected across most of the UK.

Edited April 1 by Supacell
Only 30 days in September, not 31!

[Jamie M]

Showers galore later based on AROME 

[Thunderspotter]

Morning everyone. I got some brief footage last night which I trimmed down into a small compilation. I would usually edit it a lot better, but it's my first time using Davinci Resolve and I'm still learning the ropes! Switching from Adobe is pretty hard.
I also managed to pull a few frames with one or two bolts!

I apologise for the really large file size (especially for a 2min video) - it wouldn't let me change any compression settings lol and for some reason it changed from mp4 to move

Edit 2: Apologies for the neighbour's daughter in one part too!

 

 

Thunderstorms.mp4.mov

Edited April 1 by Thunderspotter

[Eagle Eye]

Convective Outlook️ 

800+ J/KG of SBCAPE will form on Monday afternoon with trough forced showers and storms widespread during the afternoon. Potentially frequent lightning may occur in a couple cells. At peak heating times, buoyancy could be fairly strong and force a few cell clusters and storms capable of frequent lightning and maybe flash flooding. This will occur across England and maybe more often in areas of deeper shear where cells can keep themselves up for longer instead of collapsing in on themselves quickly. Then in the channel throughout the day and the evening, there's likely showers that'll mostly be confined to western and central parts of the channel that may hit the coast and push further in on some unstable PV lobes that push north. Then throughout the day the channel showers push further east, lingering in the west till the evening but extending east mid to late afternoon perhaps turning into more stable rain in the SW as night falls but still strong further east. These also risk lightning strikes throughout the channel and the coast all throughout. The main risk has fairly good lapse rates and enough energy and weak enough low-level shear to have the potential of near severe hail in the midlands especially. However, flash flooding is the main severe risk. That's likely where the best combination of energy and potential for longer lived storms are as well.

[viking_smb]

 Thunderspotter downloaded and it wont run in windows media player

[Thunderspotter]

 viking_smb Huh, that's strange. I'll upload it to youtube and share the link then - gimme about half an hour and I'll post it here

Edited April 1 by Thunderspotter

[matty40s]

After a lazy start,  notices all the storm forecasts were coming in so set off.

No real convection going up yet, to the North it looks lovely.

South Cumulous Congestus..

 

North.

Edited April 1 by matty40s

[Azazel]

Showers getting going now. Just had a brief sprinkle in between some strong April sunshine 

[Thunderspotter]

 viking_smb Here's the link:

On my channel I also have a few other thunderstorm videos, and some other stuff I filmed when I was younger so be warned if you're looking at other vids too

[Eagle Eye]

Struggling to light up at the moment but the showers are there. 

[Eagle Eye]

 matty40s

3 to 4 pm looks to be where the showers are going to get more widespread and also push further north. I suspect that's when the main lightning potential is as well. 

[Azazel]

Nice to see an actual convective cloud base again 

[Azazel]

Definitely some shear/convergence going on. The scuddy lowering moving roughly north to south and everything to the right moving south to north 

[Eagle Eye]

 Azazel

Lightning just north of you apparently 

[viking_smb]

more now

[matty40s]

Big things starting to grow to the South now.

[Thunderspotter]

First boom of the day, and I'm 6 minutes late lol

[Sprites]

 matty40s  Oooer  

[TewksCells]

Storms are struggling to take off, and we’ve got a fair bit of cloud coverage atm 

[Eagle Eye]

Very much bust category here. Perhaps more saturated than expected and too much coverage of weaker showers didn't allow bigger ones to build. 

[Cain]

Seems pretty much a bust ?

[CoventryWeather]

Convection collapsing here, few heavier showers to the south, that's it. 

Edited April 1 by CoventryWeather

[ANYWEATHER]

After a fine day , some boring old rain showers……. 

[Snowshine]

Just a few nuisance showers here.

[matty40s]

Did someone mention convergence line...?