JPG wrote:

On a short break in Cornwall, about 1100, just leaving Newquay on our
way to Padstow last Saturday (13th).

We were only a couple of miles from St Mawgan, did they report
anything or do they even have human observers there these days?

After about 55 years of observing, both official and unofficial, and
having spent some time in the American Midwest, and having experienced
some spectacular storms, this is the first funnel cloud I have seen.

It was tiny and extended only a small way from the cloud base but it
was definitely a funnel cloud.


Saw my first when I was in my early teens I think it was, perhaps younger,
in the 1950s. Although I couldn't see the base of it I'm sure it was a full-
blown tornado. It was black, wide at the base of the cloud and hanging
vertically, then trailing backwards and narrowing before becoming vertical
again as it neared the ground. It continued moving slowly NE for a long time
with no change of shape. I checked the papers that week but there was no
mention of it. It would have been tracking across open fields in North Beds.
near Rushden.

In August 1964 (or possibly '63) I saw five funnel clouds simultaneously at
RAE Thurleigh, Beds.

If you want to see funnel clouds in UK, I think North Beds. is the place to
be!

--
Graham P Davis, Bracknell, Berks., UK. E-mail: newsman not newsboy
"I wear the cheese. It does not wear me."