Harry

Not particularly humid feeling around London, just pleasantly warm.

Seems to be based on where the model anticipates showers/storms to develop. UKMO precip forecast has been all over the place the past 12 hours, recently showing a great swathe of the SE quarter under widespread thunderstorms. Now Kent/Sussex is a favoured focal point. As ever, has to be taken with a pinch of salt but the extent/coverage/location of where it anticipates precipitation to occur is extremely erratic.

I'm desperate to get the gym tonight having not been over the weekend - however, should storms appear in my neck of the woods, that'll be practically impossible I'm afraid to say

After weakening in electrical activity the channel cell is ramping back up again, flashing quite nicely now. Nice whitish/orange flashes. Swear I saw sprites/jets a short while ago - would be the right distance away if so.

Awesome, I can see the cell in the Channel from here - some form of an orange glowing tower on the horizon which is flashing away nicely!!

Nice to see more widespread thunderstorm activity today!! Looking good tomorrow, particularly on the notoriously erratic MetO precip forecasts, which go nuts for much more widespread convective activity (hence prompting the MetO yellow warning earlier today)...here's hoping

Ac and AcCas becoming a little more extensive from the East now (from my vantage point anyway)

Absolutely stunning day here...decent signs of instability developing albeit not for our eventual enjoyment here in the SE. This is what is bubbling up over my house - some cloud porn for @William Grimsley

This poxy cloud just isn't shifting. Grrrrr

Out of interest @William Grimsley, I trust that when you're older you'll be relocating somewhere between Dungeness (Kent) and Lincolnshire?

Warmth and humidity really starting to ratchet up now, despite no meaningful budge in the cloud cover yet. Makes a nice change from the autumnal chill of this week. Could be another couple of hours yet before this awful grey scourge buggers off out of it!

I have been out this morning and the warm and humid air has certainly arrived - just have to patiently await the clearance of the horrid cloud and murk now!!

Day 1 Convective Outlook VALID 06:00 UTC Sat 04 Jun 2016 - 05:59 UTC Sun 05 Jun 2016 ISSUED 04:21 UTC Sat 04 Jun 2016 ISSUED BY: Dan High WBPT airmass will continue to advect westwards from the nearby Continent through Saturday, with hints perhaps of elements of elevated convection possible first thing across C to SE England (low probability). Profiles initially exhibit a notable warm nose inversion around 850-900mb, acting as a cap to any surface-based convection until sufficient diurnal heating combined with low-level convergence / orographic forcing enables air parcels to rise to form deep convection - particularly so mid/late afternoon and through the evening hours, assuming adequate clearance of existing stratus and fog trapped beneath inversion. Given initial cap and CAPE values of 700-1,000 Jkg-1, convective development could be fairly rapid. However, relatively dry profiles and a lack of any notable shear will probably result in isolated to well-scattered marginally-organised showers and thunderstorms, particularly focussed over areas where low-level forcing is most prominent (sea breeze through Thames Estuary environs, orographic forcing over Wales / W Midlands / NW England / C + W Scotland etc). Instability is greatest towards the SE, and so here cells may be quite electrically active. Have highlighted areas at greatest risk with SLGTs, but it is plausible isolated cells may develop elsewhere within the LOW. Overall evolution sees instability axis shifting slowly southwestward through the evening hours, and hence the zone with thunderstorm potential will be shifting SW-ward towards southern and western parts of Britain - some uncertainty as to how long through the evening hours convection can be sustained given nocturnal cooling of the boundary layer, but it certainly seems possible that some (isolated) thunderstorms could perhaps survive until 00z. There may also be elements of elevated convection approaching SE England later in the night. Although some hail is possible in the strongest cells, main risk will be local flash flooding given slow storm motion in an environment characterised by PWAT values of 27-30mm - potential for 16-18mm to fall in just 1 hour.

Hence my earlier exclamation of surprise...

Cheers mate.

@Mapantz what does you super storm tool say for 15z-16z tomorrow?? Im curious as to how different models are projecting the evolution of this E-W trough through tomorrow

Seriously??

This only shows precipitation remember - NMM MUCAPE projections are uninspiring so would not be too confident of much steric activity.

I think this is a classic case of seeing pretty colours and equating it with stormageddon. El Brumo was a classic example in 2012, where many will recall some areas experienced widespread severe thunderstorms, while others (such as my corner of the world) baked and sweated in 33C heat, high dew points, crystal clear skies and watched over 3000/-10 CAPE/LI pfffft into nothing. It should be noted that despite widespread instability next week, the continent appears to remain under fairly High pressure which will suppress the risk of imported thunderstorms. Our opportunities at this stage appear to be from occasional trough features, CZs and good old fashioned surface heating - the problem with this is storms could well be isolated and even less predictable than with classic plume breakdowns. Furthermore and has already been mentioned, fronts associated with the low in the Atlantic could throw a lot of cloud up, particularly across more SW/W portions which could further limit storm risk. I'm excited for next week as it is always nice to have some heat, humidity and a risk of a storm popping up at any time - but it is equally likely to be one of those periods where for the majority, instability will remain unrealised and a failure to manage excitement/expectations resulting in disappointment.

Same here too, although the skies remarkably clear now (grrr!!). Been trying to glimpse a flash in the distant but still too far away

Storms are reinvigorating over the North Sea, activity seemingly picking back up

Agreed, not just me then! Even weirder is the fact that it's a northerly wind! The storms on the continent are so intense Blitzortung can't keep up!!

There is absolutely no difference between the Channel and the North Sea, except for that the North Sea is larger and colder. In any event, if any instability is elevated then neither would have much effect. Any thunder risk overnight/tomorrow AM will be elevated and therefore the crucial element is whether the airmass that moves in is unstable...at the moment it is touch and go with any lightning likely to be confined to the areas identified on ukcw

Awesome...that's settled, I'm learning Dutch and moving to the Netherlands

Those cells are moving north in roughly my direction, with CAPE across this part of the world due to rocket this morning before retreating westwards through the afternoon. If we are to benefit from any storms it needs to be before 2-3pm I would suggest