The Royal Meteorological Society (RMS) has announced the 2022 winners of its annual Weather Photographer of the Year competition, and the winning photographs are truly magnificent. Nearly 5,500 people cast their ballots for the 22 finalists in the overall competition.
Prize money for this year’s RMS competition ranged from £500 ($580) for first place, £250 ($290) for second place, and £100 ($115) for third. The contestants also received a complimentary free membership to the Royal Meteorological Society for one year and a Canon SELPHY CP1300 printer with a media pack.
Here are the winners of the competition.
A dramatic shot by British photographer Christopher Ison titled “Storm Eunice” won first place. Taken in 2021 during the first-ever red storm warning at Newhaven on the south coast of England, the picture shows roaring seas at high tide against the stoic structure of a lighthouse.
In a statement to the press, Ison, 50, stated, “I knew I had to find a spot to record it; this was going to be big! I got there reasonably early to find many photographers already drenched in rain and seawater, standing very close to the harbor wall. I decided to head to high ground and slightly further away, with my back to the weather.”
Ison’s decision paid off, and the ensuing photo series featured his winning shot in a novel and dramatic context. The judges unanimously deemed Ison’s photo entry to represent “the power of nature.”
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The 55-year-old Canadian photographer Zhenhuan Zhou from Toronto took second place with his photograph “Frozen,” a surreal scene of icicles covering Niagara Falls in Ontario. He managed to capture the perfect shot of the frozen waterfall.
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For his depiction of the massive optical phenomenon that occurs when an observer’s shadow is cast downward upon morning fog from the cliff at Tavertet, Barcelona, 68-year-old Emili Vilamala Benito of Barcelona, Spain, came in third.
Benito explained, “In this geographical area, you can see these phenomena due to morning fog, and when it fades, it is possible to see this spectacular optical phenomenon.”
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Submittals were also accepted for the “Young Photographer,” “Mobile Phone,” and “Public Favorite” categories of the competition. U.S. citizen and Pennsylvania-based photographer Eris Pil won the Young Weather Photographer of the Year award for 2022. Eris, a 17-year-old student, used a Google Pixel 3 smartphone to record the rare and challenging-to-catch occurrence known as a “Mammatus Sunset,” in which bulbous, backlit clouds gently illuminate the sky. It was Pil’s first time seeing Mammatus clouds. He was excited and eager to show other people what they looked like and hoped he’d see them again.
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Aung Chan Thar of Myanmar won the prize for Best Mobile Phone Photo with his picture “Sunset,” which captures a fleeting moment of ethereal beauty as the sun dips below the horizon and casts a golden glow on a nearby pagoda.
“That evening, the clouds were overcast, and it was raining, so I could not see the sun. Fortunately, just before sunset, the sun rose through the clouds and mist, creating a beautiful evening. Due to the sun, the pagoda became brighter, and I captured this moment,” Aung recalled.
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Storm-chaser Jamie Russell of the Isle of Wight, United Kingdom, captured the public’s attention with his photograph “Departing Storm Over Bembridge Lifeboat Station.” It featured a double rainbow against a gloomy sky and, less obviously, the color reversal in the lighter, pastel “shadow” rainbow.
Jamie came close to missing out on the winning photo. He explained that he had traveled west to east across the island, following storms hoping to photograph incredible rainbows. He said, “I reached Bembridge as the final shower departed, and in a panic, waded into waist-deep water, fully dressed, just to compose this scene!”
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Shreya Nair’s “Tyndall Effect,” shot near Trivandrum, India, was the runner-up entry in the Young Weather Photographer of the Year category. Shreya saw the sunlight filtering down through the trees as she strolled across her Indian backyard.
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The “Scotch Mist” by Vince Campbell from Penrith was the runner-up in the Mobile phone category. Campbell woke up to this mystical scene after spending the night at Tarbet, Loch Lomond, Scotland, and hiking up Cruach Tairbeirt with his dogs, Oscar and Ollie.
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Brendan Conway captures a gorgeous, quiet evening with a fantastic fake mirage sunset over the Thames Estuary. He took this shot as people stroll down Kent’s famous shingle ‘street’ in Tankerton, which is exposed at low tide.
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Luo Xing managed to capture this photo of lightning strikes over Chongqing, China, in the wee hours of the night. This phenomenon is called cloud-to-ground lightning, which occurs when a channel of negative charge descends in a zigzag ‘forked pattern.’
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It looks like the sun is finally making an appearance after a long, gloomy, and icy winter’s night. Krzysztof Tollas photographed a beautiful and chilly daybreak above Poland’s Gwda River as the sun rises over the frozen landscape.
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Photographed by Sara Jazbar, a temperature inversion occurs twice or thrice yearly in the Slovenian town of Crni Kal, causing the fog to form under the highway bridge. The thick fog engulfs the entire area leaving only a part of the bridge visible, which makes it seem like the route goes straight into a void.
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