Met Office Tornado warning: Thunderstorms hit UK following driest start to spring in 60 years

Following the driest start to spring in nearly 60 years, the Met Office has warned the thunderstorms currently sweeping the UK could provide “the right ingredients” to “produce a tornado”. The spell of hot dry weather has been brought to an end by rain and hail in parts of the country.

Without sustained rainfall, the Environment Agency has said there will be a risk of drought this summer, with millions of households told they may face restrictions on water use in the coming months. As of Friday (May 16), 80.6mm of rain had been recorded for the UK during spring so far, nearly 20mm less than the record low for the full season of 100.7mm set in 1852.

On Wednesday, Met Office meteorologist Dean Hall said single and multicell thunderstorms have broken out across parts of the West Midlands, South East England and central southern England. “When thunderstorms develop, depending on the nature of the storm, if you’ve got the right ingredients there to produce a tornado they will form – same with funnel clouds as well,” Mr Hall said.

“With the nature of these thunderstorms if a tornado was to be put down in a populated area then it would get recognised, obviously, because it may cause some damage. You can get some strong winds with tornadoes, quite damaging.”

But no tornadoes have been reported so far, and Mr Hall said if any were to develop it is rare they would occur in towns and cities and it is unlikely they would be big.

Areas around Brighton and Hove have seen the worst of the rain so far, with around 8mm of rainfall recorded in Plumpton, East Sussex. “We are seeing some heavy showers and thunderstorms breaking out across parts of the West Midlands, down towards South East England and central southern England,” Mr Hall continued.

“We are seeing a few lightning returns as well, lightning flashes in some of the data. Some of those showers have been producing some small hail as well and probably within the vicinity of those heavy showers, some gusty winds – gusting 30mph in one or two places.”

Northern parts of the UK have largely experienced sunny weather on Wednesday with the wet plaguing the south.

Met Office meteorologist Alex Burkill warned of a cold front bringing cloud and rain across eastern Scotland and then down the eastern side of England overnight, with frost possible across some parts of Scotland. Thursday is set to be a drier day, with a few showers possible across parts of the South West.

“But these won’t be as intense as the showery bursts that we’ll have seen through today,” Mr Burkill said. “There will again be a good amount of sunshine on offer.”

Friday is also expected to be “mostly fine” but the weekend may bring some wet and windy weather. “A real change from what we’ve become used to so far this spring,” Mr Burkill said.