Yet more additions of high pressure to the outlook, England winning on Penalties in the World Cup and now Richard producing an entirely positive post?

Somebody pinch me! 

 

Serious hat back on (never for long these days...) - Tue-Thu next week has taken on a less hot look with low-mid 20s more common. Very pleasant and easier to work within but it could hurt this month's challenge for a record high CET... you can't have it all .

I sense we have a good chance of some high-end heat later in the month though, which could bring the CET back into contention even if it does turn out relatively fresh for a few days next week.

 

When this is the extent if weather concerns, it really is a great time to be alive here.

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The farmers round here (Worcestershire) have started harvesting the wheat - something they normally do at the beginning of August, so a month early.

Quality of the crop does not look too bad though - I guess the spring rain was sufficient and the corn has just ripened very rapidly in the continuous sunshine.

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What’s the betting for above average rainfall for the Autumn/Winter period.

 

If it falls in frozen, crystalline form, then we won't be complaining.

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Sunshine of 100.1 hours in the last 7 days making it the second sunniest week in my records after 20-26 May 2012

July has managed an incredible 62.0 hours already which must make it one of the sunniest ever starts to a month. That takes the total since 1st May up to 551 hours. Such an unbelievable turnaround from the dross of the past decade. The last four May to July periods were so dire that none managed even 500 hours for the entire three months. Must be a good chance of joining 1911 as the only other year to manage 700 hours. 

Also surpassed 1000 hours sun for the year today which is the earliest date that has been recorded in my 11 year records. Previous earliest was 9th July in 2015 with 28th August in 2012 being the latest.

 OK!  Who are you and what have you done with Richard?  

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Sunshine of 100.1 hours in the last 7 days making it the second sunniest week in my records after 20-26 May 2012

July has managed an incredible 62.0 hours already which must make it one of the sunniest ever starts to a month. That takes the total since 1st May up to 551 hours. Such an unbelievable turnaround from the dross of the past decade. The last four May to July periods were so dire that none managed even 500 hours for the entire three months. Must be a good chance of joining 1911 as the only other year to manage 700 hours. 

Also surpassed 1000 hours sun for the year today which is the earliest date that has been recorded in my 11 year records. Previous earliest was 9th July in 2015 with 28th August in 2012 being the latest.

 OK!  Who are you and what have you done with Richard?  

 

Or hell really is about to freeze over....

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Best first half to summer I have experienced in this country. Didn't experience 1976. May and June have been truely remarkable here and this has now continued into the first week of July. 

Manchester Summer Indices

1976 301
1995 298
1983 278
1955 277
1911 274
1984 271
1959 269
1975 268
1949 267
1989 262

2018 260 (up to 4th July)

2013 260 
1947 255
1933 251

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Today reminds me a lot of July 2013, where many days started off sunny but the convective cloud built, hit a cap then spread out and covered the entire sky. Now it's rather grey.

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The amount of sun we have had over the past 2 months is unreal for these parts. So much so that when it does cloud over a bit like it did from 5 onwards yesterday, it was a surprise and the house seemed quite dark! I do hope we can keep it a little bit longer than mid July but I feel greedy in wishing that. Realistically I hope at the worst it will break and start with a new glorious few weeks of weather which seems to have been the theme since May. Rinse and repeat.

The current 25C days will do me fine. Warm without being uncomfortable.

The amount of sun we have had over the past 2 months is unreal for these parts. So much so that when it does cloud over a bit like it did from 5 onwards yesterday, it was a surprise and the house seemed quite dark! I do hope we can keep it a little bit longer than mid July but I feel greedy in wishing that. Realistically I hope at the worst it will break and start with a new glorious few weeks of weather which seems to have been the theme since May. Rinse and repeat.

The current 25C days will do me fine. Warm without being uncomfortable.

 

You could be echoing my own thoughts! It seemed a genuine surprise yesterday evening when I saw clouds overhead.

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Ahhh we have clouds!  Yes a rarety this year!  It looked like they might deliver too but they’re breaking up now. There is a horribly hot, sticky and oppressive feel now and even despite the cloud, it’s still 28.2c.  We really could do with a good night time thunder storm!  

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It's funny that yesterday was supposed to be the cloudy day, but it ended up sunny, yet today will have been largely cloudy, and completely cloudy since 1pm-ish.

This convective infill can be another bane of summer, since it has a habit of forming along the spine of the country and not moving at all. It's completely pointless too.

Hopefully the next few days are a bit sunnier.

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Best first half to summer I have experienced in this country. Didn't experience 1976. May and June have been truely remarkable here and this has now continued into the first week of July. 

Manchester Summer Indices

1976 301
1995 298
1983 278
1955 277
1911 274
1984 271
1959 269
1975 268
1949 267
1989 262

2018 260 (up to 4th July)

2013 260 
1947 255
1933 251

 

suprised 1990 isnt there as august 3rd saw a temprature record tumble and I recall it being a pretty decent summer. 

  http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/august/3/newsid_2527000/2527311.stm

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suprised 1990 isnt there as august 3rd saw a temprature record tumble and I recall it being a pretty decent summer. 

  http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/august/3/newsid_2527000/2527311.stm

Overrated that summer, IMO. 

June was poor and August wasn't good all the time. There was one day mid August that was a shocker here

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After a very brief cooler day yesterday Max 23c the coolest day here for over 2 weeks! the heat has reloded and set to get hot from tomorrow onwards 30c widlely forecast for much of the south for the weekend. Iam confident this July will be a record breaking month if and its a big if a breakdown does not occur when the schools break up.

Well, I think I've had enough of this hot weather now.  I'm probably starting to think like Darren.  Just too much of feeling hot and sticky absolutely all the time.  Rain please!

Angus

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suprised 1990 isnt there as august 3rd saw a temprature record tumble and I recall it being a pretty decent summer. 

  http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/august/3/newsid_2527000/2527311.stm

Ok I just recall July being decent and the heat at the start of August, well down south anyways. 

 

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Ok I just recall July being decent and the heat at the start of August, well down south anyways. 

 

I think this is where some disagreement comes from. Some in the South have generally had better summers than the North but this year the heat and sunshine is further North and the Southerners can’t understand what the fuss is about!  

Here in the middle, in North Notts, during the past two months we’ve only had one day of measurable rain at the end of May, 6 spots of rain on about four occasions and one day when I heard distant thunder.  It’s been over 20c almost every day, mostly between 23 and 26c, with just a few days topping that, although it’s been cooler at night and on three occasions in May, we came close to a frost.  Most notable is the amount of sunshine we’re getting.  We’ve had many mornings like today that start (for me about 4.30am) with thin cloud but it’s burnt away just after sunrise.

For me, the weather is just perfect!  Long may it last. 

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I don't know about anyone else, but I'm getting to the stage now where it wouldn't bother me too much if we were to soon go into a major deterioration in the weather pattern, as long as that was only on a temporary basis. Even really decent summers after all, have at least one spell within them where the weather isn't so great (just in the same way that even our most cold and severe winters will still have at least one brief mild spell within them).

That doesn't mean that I actually want the weather to deteriorate, far from it. Nevertheless, we have been experiencing virtually constant good weather since before this summer even started and the UK as a whole, is just now renowned for getting good weather all the time on such a constant basis as is what is happening just now. With that in mind, it is important to have a sens of realism here because if the weather was to go downhill for a while, I still don't think that we can have any complaints about that, given how good our weather has been until now.

Furthermore, the farmers and growers would be getting at least some of their badly needed rainfall if that happened, so this would be a win-win scenario for everyone if that ended up happening. Then if there was a quick return to high pressure after that, this would still end up going down as a decent summer anyway, where most people would probably have forgetten over time, that we even had that temporary breakdown in the meantime.

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suprised 1990 isnt there as august 3rd saw a temprature record tumble and I recall it being a pretty decent summer. 

  http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/august/3/newsid_2527000/2527311.stm

The record was broken on August 2nd in Worcester that year, I remember because I was in Worcester that day. The next day it was broken again by Gloucester. That record stayed until August 2003, I think.

1990 was a good summer, but if my memory is correct it was one good week followed by one ordinary week, repeatedly. This may explain why it doesn't appear in Kev's best summer list.

 The record was broken on August 2nd in Worcester that year, I remember because I was in Worcester that day. The next day it was broken again by Gloucester. That record stayed until August 2003, I think.

1990 was a good summer, but if my memory is correct it was one good week followed by one ordinary week, repeatedly. This may explain why it doesn't appear in Kev's best summer list.

Possibly because the indices take into account overall temperature and sunshine for the three summer months in total. And possibly because the weather isn’t consistently widespread from North to South and Kev’s list is for Manchester. 

As per my previous post, we naturally tend to think IMBY and forget that the weather can be very different in different areas.  Two people can argue one year was better than the other and they’d both be right if they lived miles apart. 

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