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Severe Squall Line Hits N. Ireland - Sat March 7th 09

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Author Topic: Severe Squall Line Hits N. Ireland - Sat March 7th 09  (Read 2540 times)
stuart2588
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« Reply #15 on: March 07, 2009, 10:44:36 pm »

here is the link for that weather station graph.  http://sproule.co.uk/weather/graphs.html

It jumps from 37kph to 92kph gust.

There also seems to be a drop in temp and pressure. Interesting
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Martin Mc Kenna
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« Reply #16 on: March 07, 2009, 11:00:20 pm »

Yikes!!!, phenomenal!
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John9929
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« Reply #17 on: March 07, 2009, 11:01:05 pm »

Thanks for the text warning Martin! Gosh it was rough here for about five minutes or so around 20:20UT. I saw two good flashes of lightning with the crack of thunder at the same time as the first one, it must have been overhead. My Brother saw a couple of flashes about five minutes before me with thunder as well, he's about five miles west of me. He was getting worried in case it was another tornado, in fact it was very similar to the one which produced the tornado that hit him a few years back. At one stage I was looking for the strongest place in the house, it was terrible.
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« Reply #18 on: March 07, 2009, 11:53:50 pm »

No problem John  Smiley

Here's a video of the squall impacting. Watch as the winds suddenly increase. It was much worse that it seems on the clip. Please excuse my excited chat. I was shouting at my family to get down when the house began to shake!. Some lightning flashes visible too.


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martinastro
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« Reply #19 on: March 08, 2009, 03:29:46 am »



Storm Forecast
Valid: Sun 08 Mar 2009 06:00 to Mon 09 Mar 2009 06:00 UTC
Issued: Sun 08 Mar 2009 02:06
Forecaster: SCHLENCZEK
SYNOPSIS / DISCUSSION

A large upper trough over the eastern Mediterranean is forecast to travel eastward while weakening. In the wake of the trough, some hundred J/kg of CAPE will be available, leading to showers and thunderstorms over the eastern Ionian / Aegean Sea. Both shear and forcing are very weak and severe weather is unlikely. Locally, LL lapse rates can reach values above 10 K/km and isolated waterspouts are not ruled out but overall threat should stay well below the level-1 threshold.

Further upstream, a large low pressure complex over the northern North Sea will lead to unsettled conditions over large portions of western / northwestern Europe. The upper jet streak over the British Isles will translate southeastward during the period. Some low-end instability is expected to be created in the wake of the trough where weak DLS is present. GFS shows some little CAPE along the cold front over France in the morning hours but it is uncertain whether appreciable convection will develop in that region or not. A narrow convective line may develop and isolated gusts exceeding 25 m/s are not ruled out.
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« Reply #20 on: March 08, 2009, 06:31:11 am »

wow thats a pretty sever downpour there Martin! 60mph winds are tough to stand in! lol. glad to see you guys got a good downpour and some lightning  Smiley

Did you happen to see a shelf cloud? I know it was at night, but maybe lightning lit it up? that video really shows the intensity of the storm Martin, good job. Its pretty tough getting a feel for a storms intensity at night, since everything is black, but you did a good job of it. The yelling helped too  Grin
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« Reply #21 on: March 08, 2009, 10:18:33 am »

Here's a video of the squall impacting. Watch as the winds suddenly increase. It was much worse that it seems on the clip. Please excuse my excited chat. I was shouting at my family to get down when the house began to shake!. Some lightning flashes visible too.
Did you observe comets on that night?  Wink Cheesy Grin

P.S. At least you have some stormy weather there. Here is no storms, and no clear skies, just boring...  Undecided
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Martin Mc Kenna
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« Reply #22 on: March 08, 2009, 01:30:53 pm »

LOl...thanks guys. Please excuse my yelling and cursing at the start. I really don't like the fact that those words are on the video, it's somewhat embarrasing because I don't normally curse like that. In my defense that was my real reaction to a severe event taking place. I should explain more, I was actually taking the video from inside my house through the open back door facing E. The squall came from the W behind me so I was in the sheltered side! lol. The video only shows half the story due to the darkness. The roar was unbelievable and so was the violence of the squall, when the camera shook that was when my entire house began to shake like crazy, I yelled to my family to get down because I honestly thought either the windows would get blown in or the roof would get ripped off because everything 'felt rite' for a tornado hit, even the sound. It was a severe and serious event which I will never forget, I actually felt a little scared to be honest. I'm still buzzing from it. The lightning was excellent but the wind and rain was too heavy to get exposures away from the estate. I didn't see the shelf Tyler because it approached from behind me in the darkness over the mountains, I stuck my head out to look for one but that was when the squall hit me...talk about timing. By looking at the high res radar it was almost certain this one packed a stunning shelf.

I didn't see any comets after this Roman, it was clear between hail and snow showers but there where icy orphan anvils around messing wiith the trans.

Here's a couple of rubbish stills from the video showing the horizontal rain/hail and lightning flashes.









Further lightning and snow showers in the country today.
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martinastro
Martin Mc Kenna
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« Reply #23 on: March 08, 2009, 03:52:36 pm »

More reports from the squall last night....

''Hello Martin, I'm Colleen and I am highly interested in weather, I go onto your website every day to look for the latest conditions. I am interested in thunderstorms etc. But Last night's unexpected squall line was unreal.. it did scare the s**t out of me at first, but I grew to like it. I watched and read your update of it and you seemed to get it worse in Maghera, as down here in Portglenone we did get strong winds, heavy rain and thunder and lightning, but it was more serve in Maghera''...Colleen, Portglenone.

''Hello Martin, I’m just dropping you a line about the unusual weather event tonight. In fact, I had intended to drop you a line before visiting the weather forum where I see the information is already starting to flow in I was in a friend’s house in Ballyronan when we heard what sounded like a massive explosion overhead. We immediately turned off the house lights in the hope of catching sight of some lightning. We weren’t to be disappointed. In total we saw two blue coloured flashes to the east. It’s not possible to say if the lightening occurred over Lough Neagh or over the County Antrim shoreline beyond. These flashes were accompanied by distant rumbles of thunder. The thunder was followed by intense rainfall – it was literally falling horizontally.  While there were gusts of wind it really didn’t seem all that noteworthy. It wasn’t until I made my way home in the direction of Toome that I realised the full extent of what had taken place. At various points the road was covered with debris blown from trees and hedges. It was obvious the area had been hit by violent gusts. Just outside Ballyronan the road was partially blocked with a fallen branch. When I returned home flower pots were strewn across the yard''...Connla Young.

''The squall came through my location at approx 8pm last night. Very strong winds for a time and several very bright and long flashes of overhead lightning with loud cracking thunder. Absolutely superb night time thunderstorm for early March. I can't remember the last time we had a night time storm so early in the year''...Greg Lloyd, Ballinderry''
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« Reply #24 on: March 08, 2009, 04:10:26 pm »

From UKWW (John, our wind estimate was a good one!)

Report of possible tornado at Ballyclare, Co Antrim, N. Ireland around 2000GMT on the 7th March 2009. Damage to trees on a farm near the town, but no damage to buildings. Location of farm w.r.t the town not known.

IMHO likely to have been SLW damage. There was a gust to 74kt (87mph) at Donaghadee Harbour between 2000 and 2100UTC, this given the weight of rain or hail with the wind would have been sufficient to damage trees.

Severe winds lasted for around 30 seconds with a noise like an express train.

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stuart2588
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« Reply #25 on: March 08, 2009, 05:04:00 pm »

Martin those images and video are great. I wish i had my camera on standby last night.

Ballyclare is just 5 mins from my house. I am going to take a drive up there to get some images now.
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« Reply #26 on: March 08, 2009, 08:15:04 pm »

Good man Stuart!. It was probably straight line winds but if you can evidence of rotation then that would do the trick!  Smiley

Anybody see anything today?. Just had a flash of lightning in the NE. I seen some stonker cells today but haven't got a decent image to save my life because of poor light our else in a car with trees blocking the view. I seen powerful looking cb line with mammatus over Maghera - from Ballyronan!!, that was a beast. It was white and solid looking, did anyone see that?.

Had some big decaying cells with small mamma from home at sunset, might have a good one of I'm lucky. Have to sort out images. Some good dark convection bubbling up my W against the dark twilight sky, looks interesting. Had some hail also.
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« Reply #27 on: March 08, 2009, 08:33:32 pm »

Quote
Anybody see anything today?
Dark now but thunder just heard at Portballintrae (1933 UT)
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stuart2588
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« Reply #28 on: March 08, 2009, 09:00:10 pm »

I had a wee look around the area and Ballyclare but couldnt really find anything too major.

Had alot of trees that appeared to be damaged but that was widespread everywhere really. In Ballyclare i found a field that appeared to have a large tree lyin in the middle of it but it was gettin dark so I couldnt see. I might return tomoro to have a look.

It was like findin a needle in a haystack tho as there are soooooo many farms in Ballyclare lol.

I didnt get many photos today but seen some nice cells forming but again no lightning for me this year lol.  My time will come.
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« Reply #29 on: March 08, 2009, 09:44:36 pm »

Thanks for the report Brian.  Never mind Stuart,  at least you tried!, I could imagine the country being a maze out there. Some of the damage may have already been cleaned up but there might be some evidence around yet. Good luck if you are heading out again.  Smiley

Some serious minor squalls of hail here. Seen some great anvils against the stars lit by the Moon. There's lightning activity to the N and W.
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