"Norman" wrote in
:

--------------------
"That rain will be accompanied by strong southerly winds with gusts
to gale or severe gale force over southern and southeastern England."
--------------------

I was going to comment on that too, Norman!!

I'm not keen on the idea of sustained winds. A "gale" in the sustained wind
sense can produce a wide range of gusts based upon the underlying surface
roughness. Also other meteorological complications like unstable conditions
that can really boost the sustained-to-gust windspeed ratio - i.e. a
sustained "gale" could give anything from gale force gusts to storm force
gusts depending the predicament (and who knows how these sort of sustained-
to-gust ratios change when we have "the unknown" like sting jets).

I would rather forecasters emphasise the gust speeds. It's the short
staccato bursts that are most strongly linked to property damage and avoid
the gale/severe gale terminology.

IMHO, of course.

Richard