The Great British Deluge! Flooding Rains Today In Wake Of Record Wettest April-June Period On Record (Includes Video)

Written by on July 6, 2012 in United Kingdom & Ireland with 0 Comments

The well advertised heavy rains have materialised havinbg spread up from France overnight. These rains are and have caused all sorts of travel problems due to flooding across parts of the South, Midlands and Wales. The bulk of the rain canopy is now rotating away from the Midlands, after exiting the Southeast and East Anglia earlier.

According to current radar it appears Wales and eastern Ireland is currently under the gun of the heaviest, peristent and widespread rains and at times these rains are quite torrential thanks to enhanced convection and embedded thunderstorms. Expect 2-3 inches widely through the West Midlands and much of Wales as well as across the Irish Sea and into eastern and central Ireland. Thunderstorms are blowing up on the outer edges of this rain where there is enhanced instability as well as surface convergence.

I’m watching those storms pop over the Southwest of England which are working northeastwards into the heart of Southern England. As the bulk of the rains leave the Midlands, storms are also firing here too, so be aware of not only torrential downpours but dangerous lightning, hail, gusty, perhaps even damaging winds as well as an odd tornado. We have seen several funnel clouds today across several parts of England.

Here is a shot taken earlier by my friend Will Cooper of a funnel cloud seen near Fiddington Clays, Wiltshire.

Funnel cloud spotted near Fiddington Clays, in Market Lavington, Wiltshire. (Photo courtesy of Will Cooper)

Although the main area of rain may be over for now across the East Midlands and eventually West, thunderstorms are forming if they haven’t already done so and may dump a lot of rain within a short period of time.

This rain band is wrapping around the low pressure centre and so as it slides east and slightly north, the heavy rains will spread back up into Southwest England later tonight and progress across the South into early Saturday morning, so while we saw round one this morning, then it was followed by or or miss thunderstorms, round two arrives later this evening.

Northern England, Northern Ireland and Southern Scotland To Bare Brunt Of Heavy Rains Tonight And Saturday

During the overnight tonight the bulk of heaviest rains will spread north up through Lancashire, Cumbria, Northumberland into Southern Scotland where we may see 2-3 inches of rain over the next 18 hours across the Southern Uplands so we need to pay close attention here, especially over the hilly terrain where orographic influence could pose further flood risk.

Soggy Saturday At T-In-The-Park

Unfortunately the front and it’s rain band will sit over much of central and southern Scotland through a large part of Saturday. Although it’s unlikely to be an all day rain, we should see off and on showers, some heavy throughout the day with a period of heavy rains through tonight.

Further south, Saturday looks a lot better across much of England and Wales although we are going to see plenty of thunderstorms form beneath the low as the surface heats up to between 17-22C.

Severe flooding on A77 at the Bellfield Interchange due to water pouring off A76 above! (Photo courtesy of Daily Mail)

Severe flooding on A77 at the Bellfield Interchange due to water pouring off A76 above! (Photo courtesy of Daily Mail)

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