This is the moment a 'mini tornado' dust devil hit a work yard in Southport.
Jamie Church, who works as a nurseryman in Southport, was on shift between 3pm and 5pm on Thursday, June, 16, when he saw a mini tornado start to form in the work yard. At the time Jamie was on a break with colleagues as the dust in the Churchtown yard stared to spin.
The 37-year-old managed to catch the spiralling dust devil on his phone, which he has shared with the ECHO. The footage shows dust spinning in the yard, which was the height of around six lorry trailers.
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You can hear the sound of wind in the video before the dust devil hits the HGV trailer and disappears into thin air.
Jamie told The ECHO he sees dust devil regularly and was happy to share the footage with people who may have never seen one before.
He said: "Where we work we get lots of dust devils. It just came out of nowhere, it just started spiralling like that and then hit the side of the wagon and disappeared.
"It lasted about 20 seconds and is the biggest one I have ever seen. We were on our break and next thing we saw it. I sent it to my wife and she sent it everywhere."
The Met Office says dust devils are a vortex of air that may vary in height from a few feet to over 1,000. They are usually several metres in diameter at the base, then narrowing for a short distance before expanding again.
They mainly occur in desert and semi-arid areas, where the ground is dry and high surface temperatures produce strong updrafts.
The Met Office website said: "Unlike tornadoes, dust devils grow upwards from the ground, rather than down from clouds. Although they may resemble 'mini-tornadoes', dust devils are nowhere near as powerful or destructive.
"They travel across the ground and, besides dust, they may also carry other loose debris such as hay; as seen in the clip below."
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