South West/Central Southern Regional Discussion Discussion 16th July 2013 onwards

[lettice]

Didnt water my garden last night as according to the BBC there was going to be a deluge. Not a drop.

I thought about not watering, but glad I changed my mind and did. Always have to do the greenhouse and cloches anyway.

Glad I did we had nothing.

Beeb and Met both showed rain overnight for us and early morning, so they got it very wrong.

[Frosty_wsm]

I've got to hand it to the blitzortung lightning app for alerting me at 3am bang on that lightning was 10miles away. You can adjust the distance to which it alerts you and also if you want an alarm. A recommended app.

Just installed that app on my s3 ready for next time.

[Frosty_wsm]

Oh well, looks like ill be going to work after all, thats the last time i ever watch a bbc forecast

And why's that then, considering they did say that some places would miss the storms.

[dec10snow]

I'm gutted I missed the storms, as I'm out of the country at the moment!! Not that I can complain though

Seeing as where I live had what sounds like a good thunderstorm as well, I'm not happy I missed it, as we haven't had a good one for probably about 5/6 years now!!

Any reports/pics/videos of areas around me in Somerset?

[Frosty_wsm]

I thought about not watering, but glad I changed my mind and did. Always have to do the greenhouse and cloches anyway.Glad I did we had nothing.Beeb and Met both showed rain overnight for us and early morning, so they got it very wrong.

Er no, did you not bother to listen to the bbc forecasts, they clearly emphasised that the graphics shown did not represent 100% of where any storms/precipitation would be, which is not surprising when you can't predict exactly where thunderstorms will develop, so to say the bbc got the forecast wrong is incorrect!

[lettice]

Yes, South today yesterday evening did say 'possible' I think, but the graphics showed a lot of rain overnight and this morning throughout the region, which never materialised.

More the web for me that I was looking at till late last night, so not much listening Im afraid.

 

Still, blue skies and warm here now 21.4c and humidity down too.

Edited July 23, 2013 by lettice

[festivalking]

No rain my way so the garden continues to be parched. It did get very dark this morning here at work in Plymouth but alas nothing. The sun is now out and looks to be turning into a good day.

[Bumpkin]

I was awoken at 3.40am by my 18 year old son acting like an excited 5 year old on Christmas morning.  He wanted to show me a lightning show.  We stood on the landing looking north/ne and watched flashes every second and the occasional fork lightning.  I didn't realise that it was the first proper lightning that he had seen at night.

But that was it here. No rain or rumbles but just lightning miles away.  I checked the radar and we were about 5 miles east of that band that moved up through Somerset.  I was hoping for clearer air today but it is still hideously humid

Edited July 23, 2013 by Bumpkin

[Nights King]

Garden is bone dry and didn't even see a shower and I stayed up until 3am in morning to see didly squat! just a few distant flashes in distance as I lay in bed.  

 

Thunderstorms are worse than snow events!  the decade wait for a decent one continues. I cut the lawn in preparation for its refresher too now I shall have to wheel the sprinklers out.

Edited July 23, 2013 by mullender83

[Azazel]

Everyone can defend the BBC and Met Office to the hilt if they want but it makes no difference to me. I watched the forecast several times last night, even as late as some time around midnight and they didn't mention potential showers, they showed an ORGANISED band of rain moving up from the south which NEVER happened. If they had said potential, thundery showers then I wouldn't had a problem as I know how sporadic they can be and you can't really predict where one will pop up, but an organised band of rain the size of Hampshire you think they might have an idea.

Reminds me of the snow in 2010(yes again i appreciate how hard snow is to predict) when the forecast said we MIGHT see the ODD flurry in the wind for my area (the whole of hampshire) and it snowed solidly for 8 hours, trapping my friends and family who had ventured out into towns in their cars not expecting snowmaggedon.

I appreciate the weather is hard to predict and there is a lot of science and calculation and even guess work involved, but blimey they don't half get it wrong A LOT. People shouldnt get upset and so defensive when they get it wrong either, its their job. If i got as many things completely wrong in my job, I would probably be fired.

[Lynxus]

DagNabit.

 

Been going over the models and I cant find any evidence to suggest we in the SW could get anything decent anytime soon ( Maybe next monday )

Until then, Temps vary between 24 and 30c over the coming week with silly humidity.

 

Dont think I could cope with another hot night like last night.

 

Really need a storm and so far, They have skirted here just to leave us with more moisture

 

Anyone seen any thing I haven't?

[Nights King]

DagNabit.

 

Been going over the models and I cant find any evidence to suggest we in the SW could get anything decent anytime soon ( Maybe next monday )

Until then, Temps vary between 24 and 30c over the coming week with silly humidity.

 

Dont think I could cope with another hot night like last night.

 

Really need a storm and so far, They have skirted here just to leave us with more moisture

 

Anyone seen any thing I haven't?

 

No i'm a little confused as to the lack of ppn all together really the radar feature showed quite an organised area move through but many people reported nothing with just a few lucky ones. Maybe because it has been so dry over last few weeks they just had less moisture to fuel them so they didn't materialise as readily as they expected?

[festivalking]

DagNabit.

 

Been going over the models and I cant find any evidence to suggest we in the SW could get anything decent anytime soon ( Maybe next monday )

Until then, Temps vary between 24 and 30c over the coming week with silly humidity.

 

Dont think I could cope with another hot night like last night.

 

Really need a storm and so far, They have skirted here just to leave us with more moisture

 

Anyone seen any thing I haven't?

 

Well down in the far south west the temps are flat lining at 20 - 22c with no chance of storms a boring end to a decent spell of weather

Edited July 23, 2013 by festivalking

[Lynxus]

Well down in the far south west the temps are flat lining at 20 - 22c with no chance of storms a boring end to a decent spell of weather

 

 

No i'm a little confused as to the lack of ppn all together really the radar feature showed quite an organised area move through but many people reported nothing with just a few lucky ones. Maybe because it has been so dry over last few weeks they just had less moisture to fuel them so they didn't materialise as readily as they expected?

 

Yeah its a shame really.

 

I can seen some PPN picking up right in the SW but cant see it coming to much.

While the temps are obviously still nice ( even 22c is a nice day temp ) its just odd that the "plume" didnt do more. Esp with a cold front pushing against it.

 

Granted, I did see my first lightning of 2013 last night. Just a shame it wasn't closer.

 

Fingers crossed we get something unexpected.

 

As for people talking about the metoffice... I remember reading only a month or so ago that they are unsure as to why we have had poor summers. However they then went on to say that we will be stuck in cooler wetter summers for a while more and dont expect any kind of heat that we used to expect.

Suddenly.. Bang... We end up with a nice HP settled over us and a few weeks of really nice summer ( and to be honest , it looks like at least another week of fairly good "summer" weather )

 

Its quite evident that predicting "summer will be cool or hot" is just as bad as doing "winter will be snowy or not"  .. Yes you can base your ideas on patterns etc. But its quite clear that we still haven't got the full picture and something else is missing in our calculations,

[exeuser]

Well down in the far south west the temps are flat lining at 20 - 22c with no chance of storms a boring end to a decent spell of weather

 

My thoughts exactly, would have been nice to end our hot spell with a bit of a bang.

[Somerset Squall]

Had 17.0mm of rain last night. The rain was torrential at times during the storm. As I said earlier the thunder was not all that loud, but the lightning was averaging a strike every couple seconds. A lot of weather professional bashing here today by the looks of things. This setup was notoriously difficult to predict, so I think some of the comments are a little unfair. There was an organised belt of rain, it was just much narrower than predicted, and didn't travel as far east as expected. As I said a very difficult setup to forecast so I don't blame the Met Office at all, and before anyone says anything I WOULD be saying the same even if I didn't get the storm here last night.

[Karl83]

I know some of you are disappointed with last night but now I've had that one storm, I really want another! All I want are great lightning shots I guess.

[gottolovethisweather]

Yes, let's please move on from the lack of perceived accuracy from the professionals forecasters, who after all were only going on model output. We should be very grateful that we have a lot of informed analysis from the likes of fergieweather, AWD et al. in this regional and elsewhere within netweather. Even with the greatest minds in science, the weather will always fool us, it's nature's way. Also, it doesn't yet have the capability of bringing direct hits by thunderstorms, snow events or whatever to each and every one of our houses.

 

As for me, I witnessed a couple of close strikes, heard a lot of distant rumbles and saw countless distant flashes. I'm happy with that as for once, the English Channel became our friend.

Edited July 23, 2013 by gottolovethisweather

[Azazel]

I know my post is partially borne of frustration, but i just feel sometimes they could do better. Trust me, I really do appreciate how difficult the weather is to predict and how you need a multitude of ingredients to fall into place at the correct time. You have no idea how angry it makes me when i see someone consult their iPhone weather app and say "its meat to snow here at 4pm" acting like the weather is similar to trains or buses.

[AWD]

They weren't exactly that localised across the West Country last night. Going through reports from family & friends, from Ian Fergusson's twitter feed and from the Netweather ATD, there were lightning strikes in around;

- Bridgwater

- Bristol

- Chippenham

- Gloucester

- Stroud

- Cheltenham

- Weston Super Mare

- Westbury

- Bath

- Yeovil

- Ilminster

- Devizes

- Melksham

- Swindon

- Yatton

- Portishead

- Glastonbury

- Oxford

- Pewsey

- Newbury

But to name a few. As ever though, storms are notoriously difficult to forecast and are always hit & miss.

Some people scored last night and for some people it was a bust. Now, where is El Bristolio round 2.

[Guenhwyvar]

Yes, let's please move on from the lack of perceived accuracy from the professionals that be. We should be very grateful that we have a lot of informed analysis from the likes of fergieweather, AWD et al. in this regional and elsewhere. Even with the greatest minds in science, the weather will always fool us, it's nature's way. Also, it doesn't yet have the capability of bringing direct hits by thunderstorms, snow events or whatever over each and every one of our houses.

 

As for me, I witnessed a couple of close strikes, heard a lot of distant rumbles and saw countless distant flashes. I'm happy with that as for once, the English Channel became our friend.

The English channel It's not my friend.. in fact it's gone off in a big sulk.

[gottolovethisweather]

The English channel It's not my friend.. in fact it's gone off in a big sulk.

 

Right now it might not be, but we're all come to like it again.

Edited July 23, 2013 by gottolovethisweather

[dec10snow]

They weren't exactly that localised across the West Country last night. Going through reports from family & friends, from Ian Fergusson's twitter feed and from the Netweather ATD, there were lightning strikes in around;- Bridgwater- Bristol- Chippenham- Gloucester- Stroud- Cheltenham- Weston Super Mare- Westbury- Bath- Yeovil- Ilminster- Devizes- Melksham- Swindon- Yatton- Portishead- Glastonbury- Oxford- Pewsey- NewburyBut to name a few. As ever though, storms are notoriously difficult to forecast and are always hit & miss.Some people scored last night and for some people it was a bust. Now, where is El Bristolio round 2.

You can add Taunton to that not that I was there to experience it Edited July 23, 2013 by dec10snow

[JonGill]

You can add Taunton to that not that I was here to experience it

Indeed.

Although, I get the impression from the radar & the reports on here, that the Taunton area had a lot less thunder/lightning than some other areas of the region [such as Bristol] & other parts of the country.

<JG>

[sherrie]

And Axminster, i said it didnt feel stormy at all yesterday evening and yet i was wrong lightening and thunder, rumbles and bigger bangs from 1.30am until just after 3.20am. Thats a storm 2 nights running now :-)