Severe weather events are weather conditions that can be dangerous to people and their belongings.
Severe weather can happen in many different situations, but three things are usually needed: a line where temperature or moisture changes, the presence of moisture, and (for severe weather that involves rain) unstable air in the sky.
Examples
- Fog Haar (fog) Ice fog
- Thunderstorm Derecho Multicellular thunderstorm Pulse storm Squall line Storm cell (single-cell) Supercells, rotating thunderstorms Lightning
- Wildfire or bushfire (ignition of wildfires is sometimes by lightning strike, especially in "dry thunderstorms") Firestorm Fire whirl, also called firenado and fire tornado
- Floods Flash flood Coastal flooding Tidal flooding Storm surge
- Harmful algal bloom Blue green algae Red tide
- High seas
- Sneaker wave
- High tides
- King tide
- Ice shove
- Rogue wave
- Seiche
- Swell (ocean)
- Tidal surge
- Storm surge
- Rip currents
- Undertow (water waves)
- Whirlpools
- Avalanche
- Blizzard
- Lake effect snow
- Snownado Snow devil Polar vortex
- Black ice
- Glaze ice
- Hailstorm
- Ice shove
- Ice storm
- Megacryometeor
- Acid rain
- Blood rain
- Cold drop (Spanish: gota fría; archaic as a meteorological term), colloquially, any high impact rainfall event along the Mediterranean coast of Spain
- Drought, a prolonged water supply shortage, often caused by persistent lack of, or much reduced, rainfall
- Floods Flash flood
- Rainstorm
- Red rain in Kerala (for related phenomena, see Blood rain)
- Monsoon
- Avalanche
- Mass wasting and landslips
- Earthquake Landslide Debris flows Mudslide Rockfall Coastal erosion Sinkhole
- Cold wave
- Heat wave
- Heat burst
- Polar vortex
- Volcanic eruption
- Volcanic lightning
- Volcanic ash
- Cyclones Extratropical cyclone European windstorms Australian east coast low "Medicane," Mediterranean tropical-like cyclones Polar cyclone Tropical cyclone, also called a hurricane, typhoon, or just "cyclone" Subtropical cyclone Australian east coast low
- Explosive cyclogenesis or weather bomb
- Dust storm Haboob Dust devil Sandstorm
- Hurricane
- Katabatic winds Bohemian wind Bora Piteraq Gregale Anabatic wind Valley exit jet Santa Ana winds Williwaws Chinook
- Gale
- Monsoon
- Nor’easter
- Nor'westers
- Steam devil
- Squall Straight-line winds Derecho
- Tornado (also colloquially referred to as a "whirlwind" or "twister") Landspout Gustnado, a "gust front tornado" Waterspout
- Winter storms
- Wind gust
- Windstorm
- Gust front
- Heat lightning
- Zud, widespread livestock death, mainly by starvation, caused by climatic conditions
- Hayfever
Phenomena caused by severe thunderstorms
- Derecho (a long, straight-line windstorm)
- Extreme wind (70 mph or greater)
- Heavy rain
- Sudden, intense rainfall
- Flooding, flash flooding, and coastal flooding
- Hail (ice pellets falling from the sky)
- Strong winds (93 km/h or 58 mph or higher)
- Lightning (lightning that occurs high in the atmosphere)
- Thundersnow (snowfall accompanied by thunder and lightning) and snowsquall (a sudden, heavy snowstorm)
- Tornado (a rotating column of wind that touches the ground)
- Windstorm (caused by sudden changes in air pressure)
- Severe thunderstorm (includes hailstorms and downbursts, which are sudden, powerful wind events)