An amateur photographer out for a walk with his partner captured images of what looked like a tornado in the Parkgate area of south Wirral.
It happened at around 6.30pm yesterday, when Aaron Green was walking at a Heswall beauty spot. He said: "I spotted a storm cloud which started spinning and turning into a tornado. It looked like it was forming over Parkgate.
"The cloud attracted my attention because it looked quite strange. It was a small funnel cloud which kept on changing shape. I've never seen one personally before, and it looked like it was raining around it.
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"It kept changing shape and forming into a bigger one as it moved towards the land."
The images were captured on a camera phone by 23-year-old Aaron. The Met Office says that around 30 tornadoes a year are reported in the UK. These are typically small and short-lived, but can cause structural damage if they pass over built-up areas.
A tornado is a rapidly rotating column of air that reaches between the base of a storm cloud and the Earth's surface. They form in very unsettled weather conditions as part of severe thunderstorms. Many conditions need to be present for a tornado to form but, when these conditions are met, a violently whirling mass of air, known as a vortex, forms beneath the storm cloud.
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