Astronomy, Photography and Weather

The following verbatim account appeared on page 3 of the Portadown News (a weekly newspaper published in Portadown, Co. Armagh) of 15th August 2008:

Laurelvale man has the shock of his life

A LAURELVALE man had the shock of his life on Monday when not long after stopping to look at a tornado in a corn field, his jeep was struck by a bolt of lighting.

Property developer Rollo Gillespie was amazed to see the towering twister when he was driving through Laurelvale on Monday just before 6 pm.

He stopped to take a photograph on his mobile phone and marvel at the phenomenon which occurs when a column of strongly rising warm air is set spinning by high winds.

 "I couldn't believe what I was seeing." said Rollo. "And the most amazing thing was there was a man driving a tractor and cutting a hedge in the same field. He seemed unaware of the tornado behind him - it was a surreal scene really."

As if a real live tornado swirling around Laurelvale wasn't enough, Rollo was witness to another freak of nature when a few minutes later the side of his jeep was hit by lightning.

 "The skies had just opened when the lightning struck the vehicle", he said. It didn't leave a mark, although it cleaned off the wax on the side of the jeep where it landed.

 "As for the twister, it was small in diameter - around five to 10 free (sic") across and had seemed like a rain cloud at first.

"It had a light grey outer circle and an inside darker column which moved about and disappeared. Thankfully, it didn't suck anything up and leave a trail of devastation in its wake like in the movies."

Monday presumably refers to Monday 11th August, when there was a little thunder and lighting c. 6.15 pm and a downpour of rain (c. 37 mm up to 9 am on 12th) at Portadown, about 5 miles from Laurelvale. "Free" above presumably should be "feet".

There is also a small accompanying photo captioned "Rollo Gilliespie" showing Mr Gillespie holding up what seems to be a mobile phone in his left hand.

Copied from a thread on the UKweatherworld.

Hi Martin, Heard about that soon after it happened, totally forgot to tell you.. That was the same time I was taking the time lapse as that is the direction of lauravale, Mother-inlaw phoned to tell me about it. 

Did you hear anything else about it Steven?, any details which are not in the above article?. That's the first NI tornado this year.

Hi Martin, haven't heard much except what was in the paper, however found this link with a image that he took...

http://www.portadowntimes.co.uk/news/Laurelvale-man-has-the-shock.4392008.jp (http://www.portadowntimes.co.uk/news/Laurelvale-man-has-the-shock.4392008.jp)

Hope this helps...  ;D

Thanks for the link Steven, that's great. Pity there wasn't a bigger image. Looks like the funnel goes up high and bends into the base. Cool. Very trans funnel. At a first glance it looked like a rain shaft.