WEATHER Swarm of Small Tornados Today in Ireland

[Melodi]

We have been fine here (so far) only gentle rain and clouds but friends going out to work in their green house (they are small holders) looked up and the American wife said to the Italian husband, "Honey that looks like a funnel cloud" and he said "Oh my, it certainly is - get the camera!" They didn't mange any pictures of that one but there was a really dramatic photo posted on Irish Weather Today of one on the ground not too far from where we live (about 40 miles) but thankfully in an open field.

You can view that link here on facebook, I don't think I can post the photo but it is worth seeing.

People are not quite sure (including the local weather experts) if we are actually getting more tornadoes this year or if more people just have mobile phones so they can take instant photos and post them on line?

Thankfully most here are F1's or at the most F2's but that can still do some heavy damage if they hit your house or your farm buildings. And I don't even want to think what one even that size could do to a village center or actual down town area of a city.

I noticed that T-storms are being forecast for tomorrow followed by a low of 36 tomorrow night, so clashing fronts are us for the next 24 hours or so.

 

[Broken Arrow]

Yikes! Stay safe.

We had one touch down about two miles from our house and a half mile from my kids school a few weeks ago. Glad it went away from the school

 

[Marthanoir]

Scorching today, walking around in a Tshirt while working on the veggie garden, no sign of any funnels but then nothing surprises me when it comes to our weather

 

[Melodi]

That one was near Neighna (I think, I'm not sure) and our friends that saw one from their farm are closer to Port Leash...so mostly midlands - though we didn't see any and trust me if a room suddenly goes dark and/or the sky outside the window turns green I head for the downstairs - we've had those "alerts" about 20 times in 18 years but I've only seen a tornadic cloud looking like it was about to drop one once; and about 13 years ago we were doing an SCA demo at the Roscrea Gun and Dog Show when friends who were Irish but had lived in the US, pretty much tackled husband and I, to pulls us into their car (I later told them it might have been safer to hit the ground and get muddy) but they had seen the funnel and it did got right over head but by then it was pretty much "there" the sky turned green, then black with pelting lashing rain and the wind nearly tore the display down (did take part of it apart) but I never actually saw the "snake" and it stayed over our heads.

Again, it is likely that Ireland has had these smaller tornadoes for centuries (there are records of them) but the number has simply been underestimated because without mobile phones, digital cameras and the internet, they just were not reported if they didn't do any damage. Also, experts (like insurance companies) now know what to look for in terms of damage done by funnels, often inside of a raging thunder storm system; lately I've noticed several small articles that damage to "so and so's buildings" was thought to be from a small tornado but had been reported at first simply as storm and wind damage (of which we get a lot).

 

[Kook]

Aye, some wee tornadoes (tornadettes?) for the wee people! They're magically destructive! ;-)