Plane Passenger Captures Thunderstorm Exploding Over Missouri

If you've lived in Missouri for any length of time, you've no doubt seen a thunderstorm or two (or 1,000). But, I can almost guarantee that you've never seen a thunderstorm in Missouri that a plane passenger witnessed as they were aboard a plane ABOVE a storm.

According to the video description, Angie LeVan was on a flight from St. Louis, Missouri heading toward Salt Lake City, Utah when she saw a thunderstorm outside of her plane window. This is quite a sight. Many were having difficulty seeing the embedded video so you can WATCH IT HERE.

Here's another video from an undisclosed location also showing an intense thunderstorm below. Crazy energy below.

Sometimes there is not a lot of context for YouTube short videos, but I'm fairly certain the first video link above was captured by Angie LeVan in September of 2021.

I had to check with the experts at NOAA to figure out exactly what's happening at the top of this Missouri thunderstorm. The top of the cloud that almost looks like a fluffy cauliflower is formed "when the updraft (warm air rising) has reached a point where the surrounding air is about the same temperature or even warmer" according to the NOAA weather nerds.

The only time I've witnessed a thunderstorm from a plane was on a flight from St. Paul, Minnesota heading toward Montana after we had flown from St. Louis to St. Paul. The thunderstorm view through the plane windows was amazing. The plane turbulence when we flew through it was not.