Astronomy, Photography and Weather

(http://i613.photobucket.com/albums/tt215/paulster78/Tues7.jpg)

As per earlier forecast with a sustained risk for stronger convective development from north central to northern regions UK.

GFS pushes upper trough east much faster now with a very dry mid level incursion from the south. Cloud tops will likely cool very rapidly adding upward velocity to any parcel making its LFC. With strong updrafts likely and strong bulk shear mid levels we can expect mid level mesocyclones to develop within the stronger storm cells. Restricted CAPE's will be compensated by strong sustained updrafts delivered by other forcing perameters. This together with a low freezing level could well develop some larger sized hail reports!

Certainly one to watch for!

Credit: Tony Gilbert

Looks an interesting day tomorrow!

that convergence zone is extremely interesting!!...chasing tomorrow  :)

Definitely looking good for a chase.. SW lough Neagh could be a nice target

(http://i53.tinypic.com/2cpdnkp.jpg)

Fantastic day's action, Declan and I caught this nice big funnel from a rotating thunderstorm near Maghera, it was close enough to the ground to be a suspect tornado, rotation was amazing with vortices twisting around one another inside the main funnel, while all this was going on there was booming thunder and blue c-g lightning which lasted for several hours, on occasion it was so close it almost struck the car, the thunder was unreal. Very intense hail too and flooded roads. The storm was also rotating like mad similar to the meso of a supercell...all caused by a convergence zone  :)

Oh your hunch was right Martin  ;)  That is an impressive picture  8)  I was looking at the radar all day today and could see the bright echoes in NI and thought something special was happening...  We had some hefty showers, but nothing special...

That’s mega Martin, it looks awesome how long was it visual for. I have travelled north today and saw plenty of dramatic cloud structure and heavy downpours but no lightning. 

Thanks Mark and Anton, it was visible for a few min's in different forms but the base of the storm was rotating for a good 30-40 min's right in front of us which was amazing.  Got plenty of images to sort through so will do a report on my site as soon as I can. Declan has fantastic video of this which will be online in the next day or two, cheers  :)

Wide angle video clip I took of the funnel...

http://youtu.be/b2XAy5SlOQ8

Great video great to see, love the sound effects from you both when lightning struck lol  ;D

Very Nice!  That funnel cloud is splendid and surreal at the same time  8) 8) 8)

You definitely had PROPER weather today  ;)

Thanks very much Mark  :)

BBC NI are covering it now...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-13691150

Congrats on the BBC article Martin and that amazing catch yesterday, stunning funnel man ;)

Thanks a million Paul!!  :)

Marvellous video,Martin. It almost made it to the ground too, a good day's chasing there and all on the BBC too- well done both.

Marvellous video,Martin. It almost made it to the ground too, a good day's chasing there and all on the BBC too- well done both.

Thanks very much John...and making money from the images too so that turned out to be a great day  :)