A waterspout was spotted forming in the Bristol Channel estuary on Sunday (August 16th) as summer storms continued to affect the region.
Russ Turner’s son, Will, took these photographs of the twister forming over the sea during the afternoon.
“Exciting stuff, we caught the Funnel Cloud over the estuary between Clevedon and Portishead this afternoon at 4:25pm,” he said.
“This was a big one – a smaller one formed a bit later as the thunderstorm moved away.”
The sighting was confirmed later by the BBC and other people along the coastline. These are further photos below of Sunday’s waterspout via BBC Weather Watchers.
A waterspout is a whirling column of air and mist that can form over oceans, seas or lakes. There are two types of waterspouts – a fair weather waterspout and a tornadic waterspout.
Tornadic waterspouts develop downward during a thunderstorm and can be accompanied by high winds and lightning, whereas a fair weather waterspout develops on the surface of the water and works its way upward.
