FORECAST IS... A VERY CLOUDY SCOTLAND!
SENSITIVE souls might see it as a sinister sign of the turbulent times currently testing our nation.
In truth, this enormous silhouetted cloud in the shape of the UK portends nothing more ominous for Scots than rain – lots and lots of rain.
A dismal August is set to end as it came in, with torrential downpours drenching the country yet again.
Scotland has lost the protection of the jetstream, which briefly acted as a barrier to wild weather coming from the Atlantic. As a result, stormy conditions will drop up to four inches of rain over a 27-hour period starting today.
The Met Office says that even before today, Scotland has endured 144 per cent of the rainfall it would expect in a normal August. About 6.6 inches fell from the first to the 27th of the month.
Forecast totals for today and tomorrow suggest the country could end up with 50 per cent more rain this month than ‘average’. As August comes to a close, the Met Office has a yellow flood warning in place for large swathes of the country.
The warning period begins at midday today and lasts until 3pm on Saturday.
Oli Claydon of the Met Office said: ‘For the western side of Scotland, it’s going to be a wet and windy start to the weekend. There will be spells of drier weather for the East and North-East but the West is expected to see significant downpours.’
Images of the UK-shaped cloud were captured by business owner Jason Ellis, 34, above his house at 4.40pm on Tuesday.
Father-of-two Mr Ellis, from Thaxted, Essex, said: ‘It was a perfect moment.’