People are sharing amazing videos of a ‘tornado’ that swept through Darlington

A funnel cloud was spotted hovering above the skies of Darlington on Friday, with Twitter users rushing to the social media platform to share their footage of the supposed ‘twister’.

In clips and images posted online, a sharp downwards cone can be seen coming from a dark grey storm cloud, but it does not touch the Earth’s surface – the one thing which would officially make it a tornado.

Instead, it is actually a funnel cloud, with the Met Office saying on its website that “at the point [a funnel cloud] reaches land it becomes a tornado, or if it reaches a body of water it becomes a waterspout.

In a typical year, the UK sees around 30-35 tornadoes each year, though it is very rare that they are strong enough to cause any significant damage.

The cloud came as northern England faced showers on Friday morning, with the Met Office saying that one of these caused the funnel cloud to spawn in Darlington - which briefliny trended on Twitter

The scenes have prompted mixed reactions from people online, who either described the funnel cloud as “amazing” or “worrying”:

While one individual definitely did see a twister:

Just maybe not that kind of twister…