It seems that I should do more updates, as it appears to bring on more interesting weather. After my post last week, Cape Town got some rare weather conditions. While most of us were expecting a fairly typical weak cold front bringing some light rain and tossing the ocean up a bit, what we really got was some exciting thunderstorm action. For those not living in the Cape it may be hard to understand the excitement us Capetonian weather fanatics feel with a simple thunderstorm, after all - they occur almost daily up there.

Thunderstorms occur likely around 6-10 times a year in Cape Town and when they do, it's kind of a big deal, even if they are merely thundershowers with a bit of lightening and some rain. This weekend was an even rarer event though, the thundershowers were by no means severe or even strong but the temperatures were probably around 18-21'C and these thunderstorms were dropping hail in both the northern and southern suburbs of Cape Town. I heard reports of hail from both Newlands and Durbanville.

As we head into summer we head into the period where thunderstorms become more likely for the entire country with Cape Town included. And looking at the latest model runs it seems that there is a chance for thundershowers again this weekend for the Cape. The situation isn't completely clear yet and with these troughs, the smallest change in their shape and movement can have a large effect on the weather experienced here. The idea given by the latest runs are that the trough will form over Namibia and deep down towards the Northern Cape and possibly down to the Western Cape - it will then move ESE across South Africa, likely bringing some rain and thundershowers to other areas of the country as the days progress and as the system continues moving east. The trough will likely create some good thunderstorms probabilities over the highveld into next week.

Temperatures in the Cape have also started to climb a bit, though it won't last too long with some cooling expected on Monday the 21st, but Saturday temperatures are expected to climb into the 30s around the Cape. Gauteng has already been experiencing the furnace with temperatures in the low to mid 30s over the past few days.

You can follow the discussion of this event in the forum: West Coast Trough and Cold Front