If you were driving into Downtown Pittsburgh Wednesday morning, you may have witnessed what appeared to be an alarming site.
Get Marty’s Patrick O’Connor captured video of what appeared to be a funnel cloud spinning on top of the U.S. Steel Tower.
Luckily, the funnel didn’t appear to anything and didn’t cause any damage.
So, what was it?
KDKA-TV’s meteorologist Ray Petelin tells Marty Griffin that it was a “cold air funnel.”
Petelin says that with the cooler air, it was the perfect day for that type of funnel.
“Typically, when you have the cold air funnels, that cold air is weaker, the winds are out of the northwest, you have that cold air aloft and you can just get those little spin-ups that try to drop a funnel,” said Petelin.
He adds the difference between a funnel and a tornado is, it becomes a tornado when it hits the ground.
Petelin says that if the funnel did touch the building, it could have caused some damage.
He says the funnel cloud usually has a spin around 50 to 60 mph.
Petelin says he had several videos get sent to him on Wednesday of funnels and a scud cloud.
Scud clouds, or scattered cloud under deck, get confused for funnels and tornados.
“They’re a lot more ragged looking when they hang down . . . and they don’t rotate,” said Petelin.
Petelin says it was an “unusual” day with the National Weather Service issuing a statement about the possibilities of funnels and that they were monitoring them, if the winds would’ve picked up.