A video of a 'tornado' forming over Ramla l-Ħamra bay in Gozo earlier today has been uploaded onto YouTube as a partly cloudy Tuesday makes way for a surprisingly fresh night. The clip was uploaded by Mike Fox Photography.

It turns out that the formation in question, which can be seen increasing in height over the short, 23-second clip, is actually a waterspout. A relatively common occurrence especially over Northern Malta, waterspouts are non-supercell tornados which form over water.

Waterspouts can be formed by severe thunderstorms, but are even more commonly associated with developing storm systems. The clouds from which they descend are rarely fast-moving, and that makes waterspouts very easy to spot and film since they are often static.


Coincidentally, tonight is set to get particularly cold when compared to both yesterday and tomorrow nights.

While this week has seen temperatures going down to around 12°C, tonight should see that go down all the way to a significantly fresher 7°C. Southwesterly Force 4 winds will be switching to Northwesterly Force 5, no doubt making those cool single digit temperatures feel even colder.

In fact, tonight will be more the double as cold as Thursday night, which is when temperatures are set to start going back up (with highs of 19°C and lows of 16°C).