Deadly, Weird Storm Unleashes 90 MPH Winds In Parts of Europe

Damage from weird Storm Poly this week
in the Netherlands. 

 During the winter, large storms come roaring off the North Atlantic and lash large parts of western Europe with gales, floods and high tides.  

These storms are obviously dangerous, and are arguably the biggest weather hazard Europe can have in the winter. 

This type of winter storm goes away in the spring, and Europeans can go through their summer without having to worry about these tempests.

Until this summer.

Storm Poly swept through the Netherlands and Germany this week with 90 mph and at least two people died. (Europe names each winter storm, or at least a storm of this type, even when it doesn't happen in the winter.)

A woman died in Haarlem, The Netherlands when a tree fell on her car.  Another person died in Rhede, Germany when a tree fell on her.

Reuters reported that this was the strongest storm on record to hit the Netherlands during the summer, and the strongest storm for any season since 2018.  It was the first summer storm like this since 2015. The storm in 2015 was the first time a storm of this type hit in more than a century.

In both 2015 and this week, and El Nino global weather pattern was underway, so I wonder if that contributed to it. Climate change might also have helped make the storm stronger than it otherwise would have been. 

The strong winds were also caused by a strong difference in air pressure between the storm and a high pressure system over Russia. Also, most of these storms happen in the winter, when trees are leafless. In the summer, the leaves on the trees act like little sails, pulling the trees with the wind much more than you'd see in the winter. 

Video showed trees and debris strewn around the streets of Amsterdam, The Hague and Haarlem. 

Trees fell on numerous cars in Amsterdam, and on houseboats moored in the city's canals. 

Luckily, the storm weakened after it passed by the Netherlands and northwestern Germany.

Videos:

News report out of the Netherlands with scenes of the storm. Click on this link to view or click on image below if you see it. 

Dash cam video gives you a sense of the wind's strength, and the extensive tree damage the storm caused in the Netherlands. Again, click on this link or, if you see image below, click on that.