West Midlands - How Often Do Thunderstorms Occur?

[Eabie]

Hello! I'm new to the forum, originally from Manitoba in Canada, currently living in Southern Ontario, and I'll be moving to the UK shortly (marrying an Englishman). I was wondering what I can generally expect regarding thunderstorms in the Coventry area? I already know that the weather will be far more to my liking in general -- summers won't be so hot and humid, and winters won't be so cold -- though the relative lack of storms may be the one thing I have to sacrifice in exchange for such temperate weather. I don't really mind the rain. Anyway, I'd be especially interested in knowing what the most severe weather episode anyone in the area can remember, though really just any general comments would be appreciated.

[azores92]

well im not from coventry, but the climate here west of birmingham is fairly similar to that of coventry. thunderstorms occur here on rare occasions; every now and then, and usually when they do occur, they are quite tame in nature, with occasional hail, moderate gusts, and lightning. however, scattered showers are often the norm when it comes to convection, with light/moderate showers and good sunshine in between, which happens quite frequently. as you have already sussed, our climate is fairly benign and boring at the best of times, with slow moving, repetitive high pressure systems often hanging round for ages when they come along, mixed with changeable low pressure systems, though in summer, they tend to be more slack in nature. the most memorable extreme weather event here is probably the birmingham tornado of 2005, whereby a tornado of f2 intensity ripped through the kings heath and moseley areas, and although it was nothing like a canadian/american storm, it was pretty severe for here. that is very rare in the are though.

Edited July 31, 2010 by azores92

[azores92]

Hi Eabie and welcome to the forum.

I live on the northern side of Birmingham, which is around 25-30 miles NW of Coventry, and as azores92 says, the climate is pretty much similar across the Midlands. Extreme weather is rare across the west Midlands - as you say, temperatures never really get too high or too low in the warm and cold seasons. I would have to disagree with azores92, though, on the frequency and intensity of thunderstorms - a typical year will have a fair few thunderstorms across the west Midlands; they are usually weak to moderate, but also can occasionally be strong provided the right setup is there. Severe thunderstorms are unusual. Usual attributes of thunderstorms that occur across this region are, infrequent lightning, small-size hail and occasionally gusty winds.

i guess it's all about definition of thunderstorms weather09. if you include the definition that lightning must be present, then i can only think of one occasion this year that a true thunderstorm occurred, and for me, that seems fairly rare. when you are from the midwest through central/eastern canada though, what we would call a true thunderstorm would seem like a petty shower

Edited July 31, 2010 by azores92

[Thundery wintry showers]

TORRO has come up with an "average thunder frequency" map based on a number of observational sources:

http://www.torro.org.uk/site/tstorms_info.php

I don't think we'll get a truly definitive/detailed map until the Met Office acquires 30 years of ATD data, but for now, this map is probably the best approximation out there. Birmingham and Coventry both lie in the 10-14 days bracket, and thus are in one of the more thunder-prone areas of Britain but behind Lincolnshire, East Anglia and the eastern Home Counties.

[RichardR]

According the the Bablake weather website, you can expect an average of ten thunderstorm days per annum.

http://bws.users.netlink.co.uk/

From that site click on "statistics" on left and find "30 year averages", it will open as an Excel file. There is no direct link to it.

So, basically, hardly any thunderstorms.

Edited July 31, 2010 by RichardR

[azores92]

According the the Bablake weather website, you can expect an average of ten thunderstorm days per annum.

http://bws.users.netlink.co.uk/

From that site click on "statistics" on left and find "30 year averages".

So, basically, hardly any thunderstorms.

yep, proving my earlier point, and i stand by it. weather09 i still think thunderstorms are rare in the midlands, usually you get a few every year, mainly concentrated in the summer months, but the stats suggest one every 35 days roughly, and when you compare it to canadian or american standards, and ontario averages 30 days+ of t'storm activity per annum, it is comparatively infrequent.

Edited July 31, 2010 by azores92

[Guest]

Welcome, I would agree with the others about the climate of the Midlands, though I haven't lived there for quite a while.

We spend our time partly in the UK and partly Southern France (Languedoc) - there we can get some great storms - the clouds can be given an added impetus by the Pyrenees or the Massif Centrale depending on the direction of the wind.

Summers are probably more what you are used to with a max usually between 30 to 35C, though it can climb to low 40's C with the occasional thunderstorm with torrential rain and plenty of lightning to add interest. Unfortunately they can often cause loss of life as well through flash floods.

Snow very rare in the winter, except in the mountains but we did have a great snowstorm last March which stretched to south of Barcelona and beyond, so you can get a range of max temps between, say -1C and +18C in winter months.

What a difference 600 miles makes!

[Eugene]

Hi Eabie,

Welcome to the forum and soon welcome to Coventry and Warwickshire

I live near Coventry so think i can tell you best what the weather is like around here.

It depends if you are moving to the inner city parts of Coventry ( Coventry and Birmingham were Warwickshire's only cities but are now classifed as in the West Midlands county though alot of local people still think Coventry as in Warwickshire) or moving to one of the many lovely villages near Coventry.

Summers are comfortable in mid/north Warwickshire, temps very rarely above 28C, most likely 18C to 25C with nights down to 11C to 15C on most mid summer nights in built up areas but head out to rural areas of warwickshire and it gets surprisingly cool at night especially in low lying areas.

Winters aren't as cold as continental climates with SW'lys being the prevalent wind direction though the last two winters were cold for warwickshire standards with an unusual amount of night frosts(below 0C), temps very rarely dip below -7C in built areas of warwickshire but again head out to low lying rural areas and its much colder, fog is common in valley areas outside of summer when its usually misty instead.

Summers are mild, springs are cool/fresh with polal maritime airmasses prevalent, autumns rather mild though by November it get can cold and winters fairly cool(warwickshires inland position as far away from the sea as possible in england and very long mid winter nights helps alot) is my summary of what you should expect over here, don't expect anything that extreme as thunderstorms are becoming rare in our region, most likely is the occasional heavy burst of rain and grey overcast days even in the height of summer which is mid July to mid August in the midlands.

[cyclonic happiness]

Welcome to the forum!

I live in Bedworth just 4 miles to the north of Cov', IMO, we seem to do reasonably well from storms here, especially if the wind is due west to east as any storms benifit from the birmingham heat island effect and you tend to see them building explosively just to our west before they hit us.

In the past 4 years I've taken 3 shots of funnel clouds in the 'gap' between the two cites.

The posters here are right though, we have had a poor year here for storms with us only getting 4 so far.

[conor123]

I've not seen a decent thunderstorm for just over 2 years now, the last mini one was in the middle of April last year, there's been nothing since then other than the odd thundery shower, 2005-2008 were all decent years for thunderstorms though especially 2005 and 2007 which had vast quantities, in 2006 they often dodged us and went east though there was a spectacular lighting show around the 4th?5th? July which gave a 2 hour lightning show and i don't remember it raining at all.

The biggest storms i have in memory rainfall wise were ironically on the date, 19th July 2007 and 19th July 2008.

[Hairy Celt]

We lived in onionsty cov for about 10 years, 85 to 95 ish. Blunder and frightening were common in hot summers.

Up here, most summers are thunder free - just about the only thing i miss from the flatlands!

[Eabie]

Thanks everyone for the warm welcomes and helpful replies! I'm really looking forward to the lovely temperatures in England -- I hate the sticky heat and oppressive humidity of the summers here (I don't have air conditioning), and I'm not a huge fan of the freezing cold winters either. I will miss thunderstorms -- it's been a slow year for them here in Southern Ontario. I think we've had about 12 and none of them have really been severe, which (for the area) isn't much; I know I can expect far less than that in England, so I'm hoping for at least *one* more memorable severe weather event before I leave. There's still time!

Edited August 3, 2010 by Eabie

[Costa Del Fal]

I wouldnt say thunderstorms are especially rare but years like this are ones to forget! Weve had one very small storm. Last year had a good few thunder days scattered throughout the summer.

Most years we do quite well but 2010 has been beyond terrible!

Edited August 3, 2010 by Blizzards

[Eabie]

I wouldnt say thunderstorms are especially rare but years like this are ones to forget! Weve had one very small storm. Last year had a good few thunder days scattered throughout the summer.

Most years we do quite well but 2010 has been beyond terrible!

I wonder if El Nino has something to do with it? I know that it tends to have an adverse effect on the development of storms in Southern Ontario, whereas the Prairie provinces end up getting all the storms. Not sure how El Nino effects the UK though...

Edited August 3, 2010 by Eabie

[Nick F]

TORRO has come up with an "average thunder frequency" map based on a number of observational sources:

http://www.torro.org.uk/site/tstorms_info.php

I don't think we'll get a truly definitive/detailed map until the Met Office acquires 30 years of ATD data, but for now, this map is probably the best approximation out there. Birmingham and Coventry both lie in the 10-14 days bracket, and thus are in one of the more thunder-prone areas of Britain but behind Lincolnshire, East Anglia and the eastern Home Counties.

Well, we've got some serious catching up to do this year to get anywhere near even average for my location and probably for many locations in the UK. Recorded only 2 thunder days here this year, very poor.

[SteveElbows]

Welcome to the forum!

I live in Bedworth just 4 miles to the north of Cov', IMO, we seem to do reasonably well from storms here, especially if the wind is due west to east as any storms benifit from the birmingham heat island effect and you tend to see them building explosively just to our west before they hit us.

In the past 4 years I've taken 3 shots of funnel clouds in the 'gap' between the two cites.

The posters here are right though, we have had a poor year here for storms with us only getting 4 so far.

Despite the poor year for storms so far I have certainly seen the explosive building to our immediate west that you describe on the radar a fair few times this year.

I know that compared to many places in the world our temperatures do not get that high, but personally I think there is usually at least one time each summer that the heat & humidy get a bit much, and the air quality gets kinda bad.

Ive been here since 1975 except for a few years in the 1990s, and in terms of extreme memorable weather events there havent been too many really. The occasional drought, decent snowfall, thunderstorm that raged for most of the night, high winds that arent very catastrophic, these are things that I experienced a few times, with the decent snow & droughts more a feature of my childhood than the last few decades. We had a small tornado in my town almost 3 years ago but it didnt cause much damage at all, the Birmingham one gets more attention as real property damage occurred, albeit in a fairly small area. The only weather events that had impact on my life have been a couple of times where it snowed quite a lot and stayed around for a week or so, which was enough to cause disruption. Coupled with power-lines coming down due to winds or the wrong kind of snow, this lead to a feeling of being prisoner to weather conditions and if they hadnt got the power back on in time we would have started running out of tap water. The event is amplified in my mind by being fairly young at the time, I guess it was probably only 2-4 days serious disruption and it was roughly 20 years ago.

One thing you may notice with the UKs response to weather is that because our extreme weather is pretty rare and relatively tame, we dont put in place a lot of resources to cope on the rare occasions that temperatures, snow etc differ from the norm. So things grind to a halt quite easily, and the media like to talk of doom and stuff running out, so we certainly make the biggest meal we can out of the weather we are served with, no matter how small the portion.

[Phil UK]

Only one, which I would classify as a proper thunderstorm here in Solihull, which is somewhere in-between Coventry and Warwickshire this year and that was an unprecedented one on the evening of Saturday 1st May 2010.

3 months and two days later... Apart from one crack of thunder from a relatively distant CB some two weeks ago... Nothing to speak of at all.

In 2009, I counted nine, 2008, there were four, 2007 was completely insignificant apart from the copious amounts of rain that fell over much of the UK,

I hate to sound negative, but I do welcome you, Eabie and hope you enjoy your stay here with us on Net-Weather.

Still only early August, so maybe that will bring something. It's not too uncommon for late Summer storms in August and even into September. But the weather seems so stagnant at this moment in time and the WNW flow isn't doing any of us, N-S-E or West of us any real favours in storm development.

Phil.