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A few panoramas of today's storm coming in over the Moelwyns & Rhinogydd mountains of Snowdonia with some interesting cloud formations.

Storm & Convective Forecast Issued 2017-07-22 06:50:16 Valid: 22/07/2017 06z to 23/07/2017 06z CONVECTIVE / STORM FORECAST - SATURDAY 22ND JULY 2017 Synopsis Upper vortex and collocated surface low will drift east across England and Wales on Saturday. Airmass will be unstable across England and Wales and perhaps southern Scotland, with surface heating, leading to heavy showers and scattered thunderstorms. DISCUSSION … Cool mid-level temperatures of cold pool / upper low crossing England and Wales (500mb temps AOB -20C) will create steep lapse rates with surface heating in sunny spells. Heavy showers and thunderstorms will likely be ongoing across southwestern/southern coastal areas in the morning driven by warm SSTs, then diurnal heating will build cumulonimbus clouds elsewhere across England & Wales, high enough for charge separation to bring scattered thunderstorms. Given steep lapse rates, hail will be generated in heavy showers and thunderstorms, isolated up to 1cm in diameter, with any locally strong buoyant updrafts. Vertical shear will weak, so showers/storms will be disorganised / pulse-type convection. However, frequency of showers/storms towards the south coast and convergence near slow-moving frontal boundary across Wales, N England and Scottish borders could focus convection and lead to a localised flooding risk. However, organised severe weather is not expected. Most storms should fade after dark, as diurnal heating dissipates and airmass becomes stable. However, there may be sufficiently steep lapse rates from departing upper low atop moist surface airmass across SE England to keep heavy showers and isolated thunderstorms going after dark here, with an isolated risk of surface flooding. Issued by: Nick Finnis

Towers forming over the Llyn ... ..and inland. It's now gone off with a bang!

Unfortunately as we enter the main holiday period there is no sign yet of anything other than brief settled interludes between the Atlantic systems. The UK fax for Tuesday shows one of those as a weak ridge moves across after the current slow moving low finally exits east. We can see though how we lack any influence from the Azores high as modeling continues to show those eastern Atlantic -ve 500 hPa height anomalies. A look at the ECM 500hPa mean anomaly charts underlines this,these are days 5 and 10 So it's a case of the odd fine day or 2 interspersed with more unsettled spells of rain and showers as the Atlantic jet continues to run across our latitude.Temperatures in this setup will naturally be somewhat disappointing.

Today and tomorrow look like giving me my favourite summer conditions: strong sunshine and heavy showers and thunderstorms...But not too hot!

This is an anvil cloud

I know it's July, but I took this photo about an hour ago... It could so easily be mistaken for September. The season of mists and mellow fruitfulness is underway.

GLAAM has stepped up a bit and looks to stay there, and good support for eastward MJO propagation from the Indian Ocean has emerged over the past few days. This should help mitigate the influence of the strong C Pac trades but by just how much is clearly very uncertain given recent model flailing. There is a discernable net trend toward more ridge influence from Europe which is encouraging, as is the fact that more complications to the Atlantic jet are more likely to help rather than hinder us next week (typically more complications emerge nearer the time), but these trends and tendencies are still fairly slight or tenuous so for now I'm remaining cautious with respect to getting my hopes up for later next week. A good shift toward more settled from ECM, which has the strongest C Pac trades and has - likely as a result - been most reluctant to settle things down, would be the best sign so far and start to raise the possibility toward a notable level. Fingers crossed!

There are likely to be widespread thundery showers today, although it appears the North Midlands and the southern-eastern part of Northern England could be in a drier slot. Having said that there is some very decent convection around here this morning. A chance again tomorrow, with perhaps a better chance for us in the East Midlands and Lincolnshire whereas less so further west. This time 4 years ago we were baking in temperatures approaching 30c (34c was reached around London) ahead of a very thundery evening and night for some. The storm I saw on this evening produced the most frequent lightning I had ever witnessed at that time. In actual fact it had some similarities to the storm last week with frequent flashes and IC lightning but very few bolts and strangely muffled thunder. This was followed by a bolt fest during the night, much like the initial round of storms over southern and eastern England on Tuesday night were followed by a bolt fest into the south coast early hours of Wednesday.

Morning @Justin123 and @Mokidugway Please forgive me, only I'm on two hours sleep, due to my Mum having to go into hospital, and also the loss of an animal (and I don't handle animal losses well)... So I went for an early morning walk to try and clear my head. There was an outline of an anvil(ish) cloud... Albeit very weak. Either way I apologise for posting up dud gen. And swerving swiftly back on topic... I've just seen some very strong convection, with towers going up to my south! Not the best photo in the world as it's off my phone... But if you look to the right of the tree.

Things are building up nicely here already. Lots of cumulus popping up including some towers, plus the top of an anvil off in the distance a little while ago.

As briefly discussed last night in relation to the EPS moving into the ext period there are signs that the models are looking at some amplification in eastern Europe, and thus the eastern Atlantic, with high pressure strengthening and ridging in the east. This stops eastward pattern movement and in our case the trough in the vicinity of the UK and weakens and diverts the upper flow. There is no apparent immediate advantage to this but it does open up opportunities in the near future that have already been mentioned. Ergo it can only be a good sign. This morning's gfs goes along with this Meanwhile back on the farm. The low pressure that is dominating the weather this weekend slowly moves east and by 18z Monday the UK is in a light northerly with showers quite infrequent and mainly confined to the coasts, We are then briefly more or less in a col on Tuesday before the next upper trough appears south east of Greenland by 00z Wednesday with associated surface fronts orientated just to the west of Ireland The front(s) traverse the country clearing by 12z on Thursday as a ridge builds in from the south west, And this is where we came in. The next Atlantic depression is diverted NE as the upper flow backs and the whole pattern loses inertia over the weekend. Absolutely no point in looking at detail at this stage but I think, for the moment, I would accept this as although still changeable next week it could be a lot worse and a chink of light may well be showing although no point in getting carried away at this stage particularly as only the gfs has been looked at this morning. And talking of where we came in the GEFS anomaly this morning.

Saw these on the way home:

Saw this scary satellite map on Midlands Storms Chasers Facebook page, If you look closely, you see a skull which looks like it's blowing wind, and it's nose is placed directly on top of the Midlands. Sorry it's a bit off topic.

Earlier this eve. No thunder but pretty

There are some dramatic cloudscapes to my west, particularly given that it's overcast here so there's no direct sunlight to accentute the darker cloud bases. What is strange is that,due to where the Low is centred and how far from the centre the outermost showers are positioned, it's styed dry here while much of the rest of East Anglia has been wet.

After a lovely morning in Banbury it started to cloud over at lunchtime and we have now had 2 hours of quite heavy persistent rain and the temperature has dropped to a dreadful 15C. Looks like another couple of hours of rain to come, going by the radar. Thought it was meant to be showery today, not a hideous deluge?? Well, I hope that those of you that moaned about the heat are happy, this is soooo much better

OMG you got the red arrows to do that

Just a had a rumble of thunder from heavy shower passing over in SE25

18z going along with stalling the low next week too, eventually allowing a (at this stage) short lived HP area to form over the UK. A new signal maybe? Fingers crossed for holidaymakers!

For anyone still pining after Tuesday's storms I've put together a compilation of footage from the event to make "the perfect storm" - with the lightning building at the start and fading away - with the original sounds to add atmosphere. Hope you like it!

Hmmm ... ECM sticking to its general plan of getting the low in its favourite position between Iceland and Scotland, and then sticking it there. GFS is similar so that would have to be the preferred solution for now. Which means, for next weekend, incrementally better weather the further south and east one goes. - as usual. Could turn out rather good in the SE. With a bit of luck, some decent spells further north too but unlikely to avoid some sort of frontal activity. But, as mentioned earlier, still options for more settled throughout and less settled for all. We, the UK, ride the dividing line between summer and non-summer

Few flashes of lightning here, First thunderstorm I witness here this year.

The idea that the models can't be trusted is often overdone imo, but this really is one of the rare times where I'd say enjoy the sun and warmth on Monday and Tuesday, and then who knows where we go from there. The difference between the GFS, UKMO and GEM are so stark tonight not just for the middle of the week, but for the whole subsequent evolution. The GEM is even pushing the Atlantic trough backwards by Thursday, suggesting that a ridge may emerge over the UK to split the west and east troughs. In contrast the UKMO conjures up a low for Wednesday that I haven't seen modelled thus far. I think it's what you get in summer when there's a lot of slack pressure around, little forcing and small disturbances milling around aimlessly. I think @damianslaw 's post above has a couple of ideas that have a chance, but I think there are even more than he mentions. FI is T96 for me right now, and long term trends hard to see.

Massive Thunderstorm here, torrential rain and hail, lane I live in completely flooded. Pete

A nice tower going up to my SE

Tomorrow will be going off with a bang into the night if this is anything to go by.. Bring on the downgrade to nothing

A heavy shower near Loughborough is closing in on Belper. Could the fact they are moving in a rare NNW direction help something get to Belper as all other directions tend to see them shredded.

Looks the part moving to the NE of Brum......but meh being shredded as i type

Yes i hope the summer conditions tomorrow, are better than the autumn conditions today. Although today was only forecast to produce a couple of rumbles..... There was a Waterspout off the Kent coast earlier.

That lot is over Chester and Flintshire way towards Queensferry

WOO HOO!! Now that was a good clap of thunder.

High summer and here it is currently dark, raining and only 13.4c and falling! More like an October day.

Steric detected near Eastbourne, and here is the view...

Intense rain here near Croydon and one close CG seen with instant load thunder while looking out the window at our overflowing gutter. Need to clean that out ...

That's correct. A storm developed around Oxfordshire during the evening and pushed north across the East Midlands. I met it not far from the M1 Junction 26 and it was flashing once every couple of seconds with hail and torrential rain. The storm was elevated and so the thunder was not particularly loud. I chased it as far as Mansfield before leaving it to trundle off into Yorkshire. This was the precursor to an evening of widespread and strong thunderstorms. @LightningLover I assume Dan is going add in some text to the forecast. Maybe he selected to post before he had finished it

if this is an insight it could bring us yet more distant rumbles joking, overhead storms haven't been that uncommon this year, im pretty we're approaching 6-7 days with thunder overhead already

Yep, that would've been the one I was directly under on that remarkable night. Constant non stop thunder and strobe lighting with plenty of hail and extreme rain thrown in too, with minor flash flooding in parts. Went on for a total of 7 hours! That was also the first real night storm for about 7 years, which made it seem even better! Edit: actually, I do remember the evening one you are on about that developed around Leicester and pushed due north over EMA, Nottingham and up into South Yorkshire. That had some of the biggest cloud tops I've ever witnessed personally, so no surprise that there was copious amounts of lightning in that thing! Despite being over Leics/Notts, it looked like it was only over somewhere like Melton Mowbray or Corby, so that just shows how high those tops were!

Yes that is an anvil type cloud,i have done editing to show the black lines show that is where the anvil is and the red arrow shows where the inflow is,hope the helps.

The chicks have hatched at one nest, with another two broods on the point of hatching. https://www.birdguides.com/news/bee-eaters-hatch-young-in-nottinghamshire/

yeah very tentetive signs, the noaa 6-10 dayer now suggests the mean upper trough centred west of north instead of the previous east of north, so the rain will be warmer. but it might allow for a transitory ridge to deliver a 24-36 hour hot blast between systems ?

@Dangerous55019 Your pictures are stunning. Come October it's all about being cosy, never was a salad person. Hearty stews all the way.

SE corner doesn't look vile

Again, this is still not an anvil lol

Up and about early, and I'm pleasantly surprised to once more see the gentle mists just hanging across the fields. So today I can confirm that I have just felt, smelt and seen autumn appearing for the first time this year! Hello autumn 2017.

Up and about early, and nice to see the back end of an anvil heading off towards the Pennines.

Honestly, is there any need for such an over the top emotive post? How on earth did you come up with mid September? It's almost 2 whole months away!

Where are you getting this from? Or comparing to what? From what I can see.... temps of around 20-23 in the south, to 17-22 in the north have been propagated for a few days now for next week. and that hasn't tended to change, much. As per metoffice, yr.no, weatherbell.

A bit breezy this afternoon, with a top gust of 19 mph. But overall a lovely day with plenty of sunshine and a max of 22C. And to end the day much of the Region under blue skies.