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Europe Weather and Climate Topics

Witnessing A Classic Shelf Cloud over Luxembourg, Germany (credit: Meteo Europe)

8/15/2017

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Picture
DISCUSSION: Within the last 24 hours, there has been a fairly impressive increase in the coverage of deeper convection across parts of western and northwestern Europe.  During the last 24 hours, a weak (but slightly invigorated) piece of mid-level energy was propagating across western Europe.  As it did so, the surface low pressure helped to shift the larger-scale regional wind field direction from a northeasterly to more of a southeasterly orientation.  Hence, this wind direction change helped to increase the influx (i.e., the amount of incoming air from a given region) of warmer air from the greater Mediterranean Sea.  As this warm air coming north increased with time, this helped to bolster the overall amount of convective instability as a result of the warmer air closer to the surface being coupled with much cooler air aloft.  

This increasing unstable lower-to-upper atmospheric combination led to a regional atmospheric environment which was much more conducive for deep convective development.  As shown in the footage above, one such convective storm developed into a severe thunderstorm which exhibited a classic shelf cloud.  Shelf clouds often form in convective situations wherein there was effective low-level lift which helped to create the layered cloud deck which was observed as a shelf cloud out ahead of the aforementioned severe thunderstorm.

To learn more about other high-impact weather events occurring across Europe, be sure to click here!


©2017 Meteorologist Jordan Rabinowitz
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  • Home
  • About
    • GWCC Is
    • Where in the World is GWCC?
    • Contact Us
  • Global Regions
    • Africa
    • Atlantic Ocean and Caribbean Sea
    • Central and Eastern Pacific Ocean
    • Central and South America
    • Europe
    • North America
    • Indian Ocean and Asia
    • Polar Regions
    • South Pacific Ocean and Australia
    • Western Pacific Ocean
  • Weather
    • Applied Meteorology >
      • Air Quality
      • Aviation
      • Droughts
      • Fire Weather
      • Flooding
      • Geosciences
      • Global Environmental Topics
      • Weather Observations
    • Weather Education
    • Weather History
    • Weather Research
    • Weather Safety and Preparedness
    • Severe Weather
    • Social Sciences
    • Space Weather
    • Tropical Cyclones
    • Weather and Health
    • Winter Weather
  • Climate
  • GWCC Global Imagery Archive
  • GWCC Window to the World
    • GOES-16 Live Satellite Imagery Portal
    • GOES-16 ABI Channel Description and Examples
    • GOES-16 ABI Satellite Products
    • GOES-17 Live Satellite Imagery Portal
    • Himawari-8 Live Satellite Imagery Portal
    • Meteosat-11 Live Satellite Imagery Portal
  • Kids Corner
    • Kindergarten to 5th Grade
    • 6th to 12th grade
    • Fun Facts & Weather Trivia
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