Thunderstorms associated with severe gusty winds and lightening cause loss of life and property even though they last for an hour or so. Forecasting of these severe weather events is highly essential due to their impact on socioeconomic conditions of affected regions. Kharagpur (22°30′ N, 87°20′ E) is in the region of Gangetic West Bengal (GWB) affected by high frequency of occurrence of thunde...

The thermodynamic structure on top of a numerically simulated severe storm is examined to explain the satellite observed plume formation above thunderstorm anvils. The same mechanism also explains the formation of jumping cirrus observed by Fujita on board of a research aircraft. A three-dimensional, non-hydrostatic cloud model is used to perform numerical simulation of a supercell that occurre...

Comprehensive lightning statistics are presented for a large, contiguous domain covering several European countries such as France, Germany, Austria, and Switzerland. Spatiotemporal variability of convective activity is investigated based on a 14-year time series (2001–2014) of lightning data. Based on the binary variable thunderstorm day, the mean spatial patterns of lightning activity and reg...

The preconvective environment on days with ordinary, widespread, and severe thunderstorms in Southwest Germany was investigated. Various thermodynamic and kinetic parameters calculated from radiosoundings at 12:00 UTC were verified against subsequent thunderstorm observations derived from SYNOP station data, radar data, and damage reports of a building insurance company. The skill of the convec...

Previous analyses of very high frequency (VHF) LightningMappingArray (LMA) observations relative to the location of deep convective updrafts have noted a systematic pattern in flash characteristics. In and near strong updrafts, flashes tend to be smaller and more frequent, while flashes far from strong vertical drafts exhibit the opposite tendency. This study quantitatively tests these past ane...