Search the Community

Our project is converting a barn, the location is at the top of a Suffolk hill, i.e. not very high or steep. HID is wondering if, as the barn is on it's own and is higher than all the other dwellings nearby, and has a metal roof do we need a lightening conductor. The electricity wires are on poles and there is a major pole with a small distribution unit at the top, this is about 40' away from the barn and approx 20' higher, so I guess that would get it first, but as we have a big metal roof (25m x 16m) we are wondering about us. There is another house about 1/4 mile away that is higher. TIA

Some will remember my little tussle with the weather . And while the weather was not to blame, I had simply assumed that July did not bring turbulent easterly gales. Once the mess had been cleared up, I started to think about the lessons learned. One conclusion was that I should keep a closer eye on the weather forecast. After ferreting around for a good while I have been using two Apps (applications, or programs) The Met Office Weather App and Windy.com And while they are both excellent in different ways, neither allows me to define my own alerts. The Met Office App produces excellent warnings, windy.com provides a huge amount of detail - really interesting to view. But in the way of things, I get my head down in whatever I'm doing and often forget to look at the forecast. And when I do, I look for easterly gales freezing overnight strong north westerly gales Is there an app which allows you to set your own parameters for an alert? What I really mean is a free app of course.....

Time for a calm analysis of what happened here. If you haven't read the original post, please do so now: it explains a good deal of what I say below. The weather. That night, it was foul. 30mph+ steady wind and gusting up to 50. I know that at low level it was gusting at 40 + because our plastic guttering rattles at that speed or thereabout. In addition, there's a hiss in the phone wires which (I have tinnitus) is very very close to the pitch I hear in my head all the time. So, background noise instead of cancelling out (or distracting from) my tinnitus was accentuated for the odd second or two in the heavier gusts. The key determinant in the collapse was direction. Here's the view due east (from the top of the scaffold looking eastward) Those hills are the Pennines. Looking to the skyline on the right thats 100 meters away from Forton Services on the M6. The gap in the hills is the Trough of Bowland. The Hills on the left are Clougha and Ward Stone. The wind was from the east that night. Just out of sight between the pond and the hedge is a steep slope. Perfect to create a pressure wave suitable for a slope-soaring glider. By contrast look at our view West The view from the site westward. Four fields away is Morecambe Bay. Look at those wonderful energy absorption systems. Trees. I make this post because of what happened last night. Sailors, hill walkers, glider pilots, GA pilots will understand this all too well. A vicious thunderstorm went through at 21.30 last night. Preceded by a gust front from the west that would have done justice to a small jet engine. It hit the house with a sickening thud, instantly rattled the guttering, and I shot out of bed. Still half asleep I stumbled out into the rain hail and thunder with Debbie's calm words ringing in my ears.. "What do you think you can do about it?" Rushed into the container, dug out my laser plumb line and set it up to see if the blocks were moving. By the time I had fiddled, cursed fallen over, smacked my cheek on the door, trodden on the cat (bless him) woken the dogs and got the laser setup, the wind was abating, but it was hissing down hard. I could see the back edge of the front clearly delineated out to the west in the last of the failing sunlight. Standing out in the open in front of Salamander Cottage hardly a breath of air on the ground, the tops of the trees' west side were still rattling loudly. 10 minutes later, not a breath of wind anywhere. Wind direction matters. Wind strength matters. Local topography matters. Especially when a builder doesn't see the wider picture.

This is a bit worrying. http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/climate-change-emergency-jet-stream-shift-warning-global-warning-extreme-weather-a7111661.html Worth watching the video. May account for our awful spring and early summer.