Phil grabs his camera to snatch this extraordinary twister photo on Cambs/Suffolk border
IT looks like an image taken from a film, but this is the moment a twister was photographed on the Cambridgeshire/Suffolk border.
And meteorologists, who yesterday said unsettled weather had created an above average number of tornados and funnel clouds in Suffolk, Essex and Anglia in general said more freak storms could be seen until next week.
Phil Kelly, a scientist at Quotient Bioresearch, grabbed his camera as he saw the distinctive funnel-shape descend from black rain clouds in Fordham near Soham at about 6pm yesterday.
“I was at work and a couple of people rushed outside and I wondered what was going on. Out the back, over some woodland there was a really dark rain cloud and it had started to rotate. A funnel came down from the base in the middle. We all knew what it was.”
It is not known if the twister touched down, which would transform it from a funnel cloud to a tornado.
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The 27-year-old, who described himself as being interested in weather, took more photographs as he drove from the Suffolk border into Thetford.
A spokesman for Weatherquest, a private weather forecasting and weather analysis company based in East Anglia, said they had heard reports of a funnel cloud or tornado in the area.
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“They are much more likely at the moment because we have been in a patch of very unstable weather. But having said that the risk of them is decreasing next week as the weather settles down. But generally you are very lucky to see one.”
He added that over a 30 year average, there had probably been an increase in number of clouds/tornados in the region in 2012.
“They are not well documented, people tend to take photos and then forget about them, unless they are disruptive.”
According to forecasters the weather is expected to get hotter and drier next week.
