As predicted, this weekend was a wet one in Dubai. Here’s our weather report from Friday morning…

Dubai woke up to thundery skies today: with rain, lightning and rumbles taking over the skies from late Thursday night until Friday morning.

Some residents even spied dramatic fork lightning late last night (click to play):

A post shared by Ksu (@dxb_meeting) on

Will things be cancelled this weekend?

Probably, yes, especially those planned for today. Basically, if you were planning to go to an outdoor event this weekend – call ahead, as it’s very likely to be cancelled.

One thing we know is definitely cancelled is the Desert Warrior Challenge in Ajman. We’ll keep you updated when we hear of more events cancelled.

Also, both Skydive Dubai drop zones are closed Friday morning, and Deliveroo was not taking orders at 10am on Friday due to safety concerns for their drives.

What about the Dubai World Cup? Well, tomorrow is another day, and some weather sites are predicting dry weather in Dubai for tomorrow, so that could definitely still be a sunny event.

So will it rain all weekend?

First things first, here’s how today is looking. This satellite image from 9am Friday morning shows just how much rain is hovering over the UAE. Red means heavy rain, orange and yellow moderate rain and blue light rain: 

This forecast map from the UAE’s official National Weather Service (NCMS) shows how the rain is widespread, with no town in the country free from wet weather today: 

But yes, the NCMS is predicting rain and possible thunder all weekend. Their weather report for Saturday and Sunday reads almost identically to the report for today.

They’re predicting Dubai temperatures to range from 18 degrees Celsius to 28 degrees Celsius today, and say that the thunder has set in for the weekend.

That said, Weather.com is saying that the rain will only last until around 1pm today, and then we’ll just have cloudy weather for the weekend.

So basically, as always, we’ll just have to wait and see…

Also, important to remember is that many Dubai roads get waterlogged in the rain – so drive carefully. In fact, why not strap on a rain jacket and catch the metro?!