Great model performance that day, already foreshadowing a major storm event over Eastern Austria. Several villages alongside Danube river have been hit on Thursday afternoon, with local flooding, numberous windfall and snapped trees and also saving people’s lives on several occasions. Here’s a video footage on a federal road between Regelsbrunn and Maria Ellend, with a car trapped in the microburst event. In Schwadorf, few kilometres south of Schwechat, even a power pylon has been bended. Some tree damage looks tornadic, e.g. this newspaper photo. But none of the eyewitnesses in the villages did say something about a tornado or landspout („Windhose“).

Media reports have been inconsistent as usual, suggesting different thunderstorms being responsible for severe wind damage. But Kittsee in easternmost Austria has been hit by the same storm event (more photos here). Altogether torn trees and crushed power pylons appear to be the heaviest damage, pointing to an F2/T4 storm event. Private weather stations (published by wunderground) measured peaking wind gusts around 150-180 km/h in Maria Ellend and Kittsee. Position 34 on the Schwechat airport runway registered 71kts. The storm headed for Bratislava, causing serious damage there with intense rain, large hail and violent winds (video) – the footage could indicate a short-lived gustnado, too (04:26 to 04:30).

Preliminary data clearly suggests a straight-line wind event, with some hints at radar images.

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