SUFFOLK escaped tornadoes which hit southern and central parts of the country.The Met Office said a violent storm hit Luton at 7.30am, ripping through gardens and tearing tiles off roofs.

SUFFOLK escaped tornadoes which hit southern and central parts of the country.

The Met Office said a violent storm hit Luton at 7.30am, ripping through gardens and tearing tiles off roofs.

Twenty homes were hit by a tornado in Farnborough, Hampshire, at around 8am, pulling a roof off a garage and uprooting trees, the fire service said.

Tornadoes were also reported in Nuneaton, Warwickshire, and in Northampton.

A spokesman for the Met Office said weather conditions conducive to tornadoes were travelling across the country and had spread east from a weather system which originated over Exeter at around 4am today before heading out over the North Sea.

A Hampshire Police spokeswoman said that up to ten houses were damaged, including some with severe structural damage when the tornado struck in Farnborough but there were no injuries.

She also said that a tree crashed into a bus shelter and a telegraph pole fell down in the same area.

At just before 7am a tornado hit Northampton uprooting several trees and causing rush hour chaos, one tree hit an empty school bus, ripping off part of its roof.

Terrence Meaden, deputy head of tornado research group Torro, said Luton was hit at 6.45am and added he had spoken with a witness who saw a tornado funnel at ground level going through her garden.

A Met Office spokeswoman said she had heard reports of tornadoes in Northampton and Nuneaton.

She said: "The weather conditions at the time were conducive to tornados.

"The weather system that we are going through at the moment - very windy with heavy rain - is travelling across the country.

"Although the tornado itself wouldn't be travelling across, the conditions that give rise to the tornado are.''