Homes in Nottinghamshire and Staffordshire have been damaged and trees have been downed after a pair of ‘mini tornadoes’ tore through the county earlier today.
The Met Office had issued a yellow warning for strong winds – which is still in place until 10pm tonight – across almost the entire UK, but parts of West Bridgford and Clifton, just south of Nottingham, bore the brunt of the “horrendous” hyper-localised freak weather event.
Residents detailed their experiences with the twister, which has wreaked power and traffic havoc by toppling a number of trees.
Speaking to NottinghamshireLive, Bob Stanley, from West Bridgford, said: “We have chimney damage. It’s down on the lawn. We were having breakfast when it happened. It sounded like: ‘Bang’.
The Met Office had issued a yellow warning for strong winds across almost the entire UK until 10pm tonight
Met Office
“It was the equivalent of a tornado, a small one at least. It was very localised and a lot of the houses are alright. It didn’t last long. A couple of seconds – it was a shock.”
Paul Johnson, who also lives in the town, had his garage destroyed when the tornado sent his chimney crashing down onto it.
He told the paper: “The wind was horrendous. Absolutely horrendous. It was only for about ten minutes though but it did a lot of damage.
“The chimney has destroyed the garage – I’m fine though. There’s nothing you can do about it. It is what it is, innit!”
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Elsewhere, a suspected tornado flipped a caravan and damaged a string of homes and vehicles at 6.30am in Knutton, Staffordshire.
Steven Hemming, a resident, told the BBC: “It’s destroyed a lot of cars, as in write-offs, and people’s living room windows have gone through. The caravan just completely tipped over with the intense burst – it was instantaneous.”
Dramatic footage of the storm in Knutton was posted on social media – in a clip seen by GB News, wind and rain is shown smashing into homes and gardens, almost obscuring the camera’s field of view entirely.
Hemming’s father’s caravan topples over within seconds, crashing into another vehicle outside his home – while the CCTV camera recording the chaos unfold is blown askew.
Emergency services were on hand earlier today to help clean up the debris; in the wake of the tornado, wheelie bins were left strewn and emptied across the street.
Jim Dale, a senior meteorologist, told the BBC the blast of wind could have been a squall – a vortex “one down” from a tornado, but damaging nonetheless.
He said the twister came about as a result of a cold front sweeping through the area, but explained that they were reasonably common in April.
Heather Foster, another resident, described the event in similar terms to those in West Bridgford, saying: “I heard the rain on the window about 6 o’clock, then I heard this mighty whoosh and then bang, bang, bang.”
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