A tornado warning has been issued for a large part of the United Kingdom as winds of up to 60mph set to batter the nation.
The Tornado and Storm Research Organisation (TORRO) has issued the warning until 4pm on Thursday, February 22. It says there could be “isolated” and “brief tornados”.
It comes as the Met Office has also issued a number of yellow weather warnings for southern England and parts of Wales. A rain warning covers most of south west England and Wales.
While another covers counties such as Oxfordshire, Buckinghamshire, Bath, Gloucester, Hertfordshire and the East Anglia region. A third warning, for wind, will cover large parts of the south east including Essex, London, and Hampshire.
The TORRO tornado alert meanwhile covers south Wales, East Anglia, southern England, parts of the Midlands and the Channel Islands. It says there could be hail and lightning as well as the winds and tornados.
A spokesman said: “A cold front will cross the area overnight and on Thursday, with one or more waves developing along it, in response to an upper short-wave trough.
“Several areas of precipitation should accompany this, with some embedded convection possible. This may organise into one or more lines, and perhaps some cellular activity too. The lines may include misocyclones, and a low-topped supercell or two is possible in any discrete convection.
“Overnight, parts of Wales will have one or two lines of showery rain, and then later tonight and on Thursday, another area of showery rain, with lines/possible cells, will cross parts of central and southern England.
“Both of these sets of showery rain may bring squally gusts, and the small chance of one or two brief tornadoes – the highest chance of gusts and isolated tornadoes appears to be over parts of Central Southern England, the SE Midlands, E Anglia, and SE England later on Thursday morning and into Thursday afternoon.”
The Met Office forecast adds: “A band of heavy, squally rain in expected to move eastwards across England on Thursday with gusts of around 50 mph in a few places very briefly, as well as some hail and thunder.
“However, there is a small chance of a broader swathe of very strong winds affecting southern and eastern England with gusts of 60 to 70 mph, mostly likely close to English Channel and southern North Sea coasts.”
