Yarmouth tops likely sites for raining fish

YARMOUTH - The fishermen of Great Yarmouth still talk about the day four years ago when, instead of having to brave the North Sea, the catch came to them.

Silvery sprats - all of them dead, but still fresh - carpeted the gardens of a neat row of terraces after falling from the heavens near the seafront.

The Norfolk town may well find itself with more, if a new commercial weather report is anything to go by.

British Weather Services lists such improbable places as Great Yarmouth, Ipswich, Southampton, east Manchester and Yorkshire's Pennines among locations most likely to see strange objects falling from the sky as a result of atmospheric instability.

The report examines which places tend to experience most thunder, lightning and extreme meteorological events such as mini-tornadoes, before reaching its conclusions about the places most likely to find fish, frogs and coal raining down on them. Great Yarmouth's 2002 event has helped it to the top of the list, though its position on England's east coast, where cold North Sea air collides with a warmer land mass, also helped it there.

"You need converging air, warm land mass, instances of lightning and thunderstorms and chances of tornadoes," said the services' Jim Dale.

Global warming - with its attendant meteorological unpredictability - also increases the likelihood of the famous sprat storm being repeated.

"Chaotic atmosphere brings chaotic events. The more extreme, the more unpredictable it will be."

Any object caught up in the weather system can be carried anything from a few metres to a few km.

Great Yarmouth is by no means the only place to have experienced falling objects. Live fish were reported falling from the sky in Aberdare, Glamorgan, as long ago as 1841 and in one memorable storm in England in 1844, people held out hats to catch falling frogs.

There have also been at least four Scottish fish-falls recorded in the past 20 years. Falling frogs were also reported in Llanddewi, Wales, in 1996 and Croydon, south London, in 1998.

The main theory to explain this is that the objects are drawn up into a waterspout, a vortex of spiralling, rising air which builds up under thunderclouds before being deposited elsewhere. Fish are common when the waterspout has formed over the sea.

The Meteorological Office says these occurrences are not as uncommon as they may sound. Other than rain itself, frogs, toads, tomatoes, periwinkles, straw and even lumps of coal have been known to fall from the sky.

Great Yarmouth remained sceptical about its position at the top of the new table. Bert Collins, chairman of the town's tourism authority, said he found it "remarkable".

John Hemsworth, head of environmental health, said Great Yarmouth was "always open" to unusual experiences. "But as it's a natural phenomenon there's not a lot we can do to plan for it - save to remind people to bring an umbrella," he said.

WHAT FELL WHERE

5cm sprats fell in Great Yarmouth in 2002. Live fish fell from the sky in Glamorgan in 1841. Falling frogs reported in Llanddewi, Wales, in 1996 and Croydon in 1998.

THE THEORY

Objects are drawn up in a "waterspout", a vortex of air which builds up under thunderclouds. Those forming over the sea suck up fish and dump them elsewhere.

OTHER MISSILES

Tomatoes, lumps of coal and straw have been known to fall when waterspouts form.

- INDEPENDENT