Storm
A heavy thunderstorm zone passed over Flanders during the night from Monday to Tuesday. This was accompanied by heavy showers and gusts of wind. In Zwevegem a house was damaged by a tornado, in Koekelare thousands of residents were without power due to a lightning strike.
South-West Flanders in particular had a hard time. In Zwevegem, twelve residents had to be evacuated from their apartment after the side wall collapsed during a tornado. “We were sitting in the living room and suddenly it started to rain heavily and blow,” resident Patricia Declercq testified. The wall cracked and part of the facade fell down. “It looked like there was smoke and I couldn’t find my daughter. I started shouting. Suddenly she said, I’m mom here. She came from behind the seat,” said Patricia.
No injuries were reported, but the damage is significant. The fire brigade arrived on site for emergency repairs. The residents were received on Monday evening in a tavern nearby. They couldn’t spend the night in their apartment. Eleven were able to stay with family, one slept in a hotel.
No current due to lightning
In Koekelare, lightning struck a 36 kilovolt medium-voltage line, which is part of the high-voltage network. Up to 8,000 residents were briefly without power. Almost all of Koekelare and part of Ichtegem were shrouded in darkness, except for the numerous flashes of lightning.
“Fortunately, it was possible to intervene quickly by switching over and the largest power outage only lasted about seven minutes,” said Bart Wouters of Fluvius. Several residents reported that they ended up being without electricity or network for up to twenty minutes. Fluvius is now assessing whether repairs are needed to the grid.
Lightning without thunder
But fierce thunderstorms also passed over East Flanders on Monday evening. With a striking phenomenon, as many readers noticed: there is a lot of lightning, but you don’t hear the thunder. How so?
“That is possible if you are far from the center of a thunderstorm,” says weatherman David Dehenauw. “You may see the flashes of lightning in the distance, but you may not hear the thunder. Because it’s still too far away. A thunderstorm hanging over your municipality where you see flashes of lightning but hear no thunder, I have never experienced that before and it also seems unlikely to me.”
So it is possible that you don’t hear thunder, he says, but only when you see the thunder in the distance. In the dark you can see those lightning flashes far away.
During the evening and night, the storm moved further inland towards Flemish Brabant and Brussels. “Luckily it only lasts a short time. Short but sweet,” Dehenauw predicted. The damage was very limited.
