Latest from Manston for August thus far... 18.0 mean, (+0.2) average max 22.3, 46mm of rain, sunshine disappointing at 127 hours.

So far then,  slightly warmer and drier than average but a dearth of sunshine, though the next 10 days may alter that stat in particular.

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Our Local station reporting about 90mm of rain and 100 hours of sunshine so far, I really don't see how the CET justifies itself at least for our area,, because of late below than average temps.

I have next week booked off, so wonder how long this settled spell will last..........

A level 2 heatwave alert is in place for East of England and South East England - London is not part of the warning where they remain on level 1

Current watch level: Level 2 - Alert and Readiness

Issued at: 09:26 on Wed 21 Aug 2019

There is a 70 % probability of heat health criteria being met between 1800 on Saturday and 0900 on Tuesday in parts of England.

High pressure will start to build over the south of England, allowing temperatures to gradually rise into the weekend, with the warmest temperatures in the south and east of England. Maximum temperatures on Saturday are likely to be near the threshold, but then a warm night is expected on Saturday night, with temperatures reaching thresholds from Saturday evening and onwards into the Bank Holiday weekend.

An update will be issued when the alert level changes in any region. Alerts are issued once a day by 0900 if required and are not subject to amendment in between standard issue times. Note that the details of the forecast weather are valid at the time of issue but may change over the period that an alert remains in force. These details will not be updated here unless the alert level also changes, the latest forecast details can be obtained at the following link: http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/public/weather/forecast/#?tab=map 

https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/public/weather/heat-health/#?tab=heatHealth

Wettest summer for the region, provisionally, since 2012.

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Updated heatwave warning

Level 3

• East of England

Level 2

• South East England


• East Midlands


• Yorkshire and the Humber

Level 1 - No heatwave warning

• London


• Southwest England


• West Midlands


• Northwest England


• Northeast England

Current watch level: Level 3 - Heatwave Action

Issued at: 08:55 on Fri 23 Aug 2019

There is a 90 % probability of heat health criteria being met between 0900 on Saturday and 0900 on Monday in parts of England.

High pressure will build across England, bringing very warm or hot conditions to many parts of the country during Saturday and Sunday. Highest temperatures look to be across the eastern England, with western parts turning less hot Sunday. Into Monday, fresher air is now expected to gradually move eastwards across the country, although it will remain very warm for some eastern parts.

An update will be issued when the alert level changes in any region. Alerts are issued once a day by 0900 if required and are not subject to amendment in between standard issue times. Note that the details of the forecast weather are valid at the time of issue but may change over the period that an alert remains in force. These details will not be updated here unless the alert level also changes, the latest forecast details can be obtained at the following link: http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/public/weather/forecast/#?tab=map 

https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/public/weather/heat-health/#?tab=heatHealth

BBC forecasting sun tomorrow. This is at odds with the model output which shows a disgusting and unacceptable amount of cloud.

Given the utter garbage that's just spewed in this evening I know which scenario my money is on 

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... and surprise, surprise the BBC get it spectacularly wrong again. Cloud is not restricted to the NW of the Great Glen as forecast. It is a vile grey mess out there as yet again pretty much all of Scotland has to suffer awful Highland summer weather 

I can't say just hacked off I am to be suffering this garbage at the weekend yet again after enduring the last two thoroughly unpleasant days stuck in a stifling office. It's just relentless weekend after weekend of utter pigswill as decent weather is constantly restricted to working hours.

2019 is the worst ever year for the 'Weekend Curse'. Every month since April, apart from June. It's just soul destroying 

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Strange summer in London, particularly temperature wise as we have seen a huge gap between a big cluster of maxes between 22 and 26C (decent, usable) and secondary clusters at the very hot end with a fair few very cool days too. But almost nothing until this weekend in the very warm / quite hot zone that dominated last year. Here’s the frequency of maxes (rounded) since start of June at Heathrow:

13: 1

14: 1

15: 0

16: 1

17: 3

18: 1

19: 8

20: 7

21: 2

22: 7

23: 11

24: 17

25: 6

26: 7

27: 5

28: 2

29: 0

30: 0

31: 0

32: 0

33: 2

34: 1

35: 0

36: 0

37: 1

 

Or put another way:

Under 20C (cool): 15

20-23C (meh): 27

24-27C (warm): 35

28-31C (very warm-hot): 2

32+ (heatwave): 4

 

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A poor summer overall here to date; the only times we have has anything remotely summery were the mini-heatwaves of late June and late July. Otherwise, on a par with the likes of 2015, 2016 and 2017 for a general lack of sustained good weather, although 2016 did have a decent start and a not bad end to the season.

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I don't think that nature (and especially, the weather) is actually aware of what us humans, refer to as "the weekend" and so, will always do what it is going to do anyway regardless of the actual day of the week which we are. That is done in the same way in which our weather isn't going to conform to what we refer to as the meteorological or astronomical seasons for the same reason.

This means that if there is any such thing as a weekend curse, that is probably nothing more than a sheer coincidence. Having said that our weather is never going to conform to what we define as our seasons though, there does come a time when I am always glad to see the back of one season, and am ready to just get on with the next one and in my case, that always coincides with the meteorological seasons.

This means that whilst it is great to finally have a decent spell of weather in August (albeit just a short-lived one in this case), I don't have the same enthusiasm for that this time as I would for other such spells of weather which have occurred during this summer. We are after all, at the end of the summer. A week tomorrow, we will then be going into September and the start of the meteorological summer so when that time comes, I would then much rather be getting on with autumn, rather than getting more in the way of summery weather which we could have done with seeing during this actual summer itself (although, I also know that the weather isn't exactly going to work like that just because we are about to enter into meteorological autumn).

Finally, I hope that there aren't any temperature records broken for this upcoming English Bank Holiday. For obvious reasons, I don't want to go into the subject of climate change here. However, it just seems that we can't ever go for more than a few months or sometimes even a few weeks these days, without some sort of high temperature record being broken here in the UK. It wasn't all that long ago after all, that the UK had its hottest day on record on that very same day which was locally for here, also the hottest day on record here in Edinburgh.

I am just sick to the back teeth of these high temperature records constantly being broken all the time, I would really very much welcome a much needed break from all of that happening.

Why is it after all, that we can't to the same extent, ever get any cold temperature records broken in any given year when it comes to our winter (or any time of the year for that matter)?

 

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Shaping up to be one of the better summers in S England. Even in Central England (parameterised I admit from the CET). If we get a 17.3 final figure (after the downjustment) we'd be on 16.3 for the summer. That would beat 2013, 1994 and 1990 and would be close to 1984, which was a good 'un. It would also put us in the top 10 after 1976. 10th out of 43 would also put it comfortably in the top quartile since then.

Locally, it's better than 1984 and close to 1989.

 

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It looks like turning into a pleasant, warm and bright afternoon with some sunshine even if it is still largely cloudy. No complaints as it is very nice for working outside.

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Not technically during the winter I know, but I think there was a new record created somewhere in the UK in early March 2018, during the Beast from the East event, for the coldest March day on record in this country. If I am wrong about this then someone please correct me.

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Yes, the lowest U.K. March maximum on record was at Tredegar on the 1st of March 2018 (at -4.7°C). England also set its record on the same day.

December 19th 2010 broke th lowest December max in England.

In Wales the lowest maxima for October, November and December were set in 2008, 2010 and again 2010 respectively. The November 2010 lowest minimum for Wales was also broken in 2010.

N Ireland set its all time recorded minimum on December 24th 2010 with the December record max set the day before. Its October lowest daily max was set two years earlier.

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My issue here though isn't so much that there are never any cold temperatures (yes, I am aware that the odd one has cropped up now and again), as it is about the fact that there are always very little in the way of cold temperature records these days in comparison with the vast number of high temperature records that there always seems to be these days.

If we really did live in a stable climate after all, you would have thought that these high and low temperature records would over time, balance and cancel each over out and yet that doesn't appear to be the case.

 

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This is just a consequence of living in a warming world.

Extremes of temperature both high and low are generally expressed in terms of the number of "Standard Deviations from the mean" and these equate directly to return periods.

As the planet warms, the mean temperature increases and hence the Standard Deviation from the mean to get to the same record temperature (or exceed it) goes down and thus the return period gets shorter (more frequent)

The opposite is true for low temperatures where the mean is moving further away from the extreme low value and the return period gets longer (less frequent)

The upshot is we will always beat a lot more warm records than cold ones whilst global temperatures are on the rise

 

 

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The period during which many of these warm records have been created in this country (hottest days on record, hottest month on record etc) only covers the last 20 years or so, or almost 30 years if one goes all the way back to 1990 when the then hottest day on record was recorded in the UK which then stood until 10th August 2003. Yes, the number of records is notable, but 20-30 years is not really a great deal of time in climatological terms.

If you want my opinion, the type of sustained hot spell that happened in the summer of 1976 when temperatures of 32C and above were seemingly recorded somewhere in the UK for around a fortnight is just as exceptional as individual record hot days such as 25th July 2019, 10th August 2003, 1st July 2015 etc. Not even the best summers this country has had since 1976 such as 1995, 2003, 2006 and 2018 have managed to equal or surpass that spell. I wasn't around in 1976 to experience that great summer so I am going by the accounts of those people who were around then and can remember it.

What was interesting about the hottest day on record this year on 25th July and the then hottest July day on record on 1st July 2015 was that both occurred during relatively short but intense hot spells during otherwise mediocre summers and not during long-lasting settled weather like we saw for most of summer 2018. The old hottest day record from August 2003 came during a sustained settled spell (same things happened in August 1990) as almost that entire month was dry and settled and was overall one of the warmest Augusts on record in the UK. When I think about summer 2018 and then compare it to this summer, I would have thought that hot temperature records would have been more likely to have been broken during last year's summer as it was dominated by hot & settled weather, until late July/early August at least. Whereas this year, settled spells had been transient at best with long unsettled periods just as Brian mentioned on the website homepage this morning.

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We’re getting more of these short lived intense hot spells because the source region for intense heatwaves (North Africa, the Western Med) is warming much more quickly than the Atlantic sheltered U.K. It’s the airmass that is doing it, not the in situ heating.

Last year did reach 35C though, which used to be pretty unusual.

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IIRC, that happened just before the breakdown, such as it was, in late July to the cooler and somewhat more unsettled pattern that we saw during last August.

I could be wrong here but I think 35C was recorded during the summer of 1995 too. That summer gave us what is still the hottest August on record and what at the time was the second hottest month on record behind the then record holder of July 1983, before they were pushed into second and third place by July 2006 (that month also saw the then hottest July day on record until it was toppled by 1/7/2015).

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Manchester Summer Indices 

1954 143
1907 147
1956 155
1912 156
1924 158
2012 164
2008 168
1987 169
1946 170
1909 171
1931 173
1978 173
1980 173
1920 174
1923 174
2007 174
1927 175
1948 176
1938 177
1922 178
2011 179
1985 180
1958 184
1972 185
1916 188
1986 189
1965 189
2016 189
1910 190
1936 190
1988 191
2010 191
1966 192
1998 192
2017 192
1953 193
1963 194
1993 194
2009 194
1902 195
1915 196
1981 196
1928 197
1962 197
1964 197
2004 197
2019 197 (up to 25th August)
1952 198
2000 198
1930 199
1974 199
1979 199 

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Glorious day with cricket and weather

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Foggy and cool at the moment 16c, I wonder if this crap will clear? looks like that's the end of the nice weather, got the rest of the week booked off and looking like rain rest of this week was hoping to get some painting done outside

I see Kevin’s summer index has us up with 2004. Sounds about right in a few ways - no real set pattern, alternating hot and cool, a lot of rain particularly in August.

Has been better than 2004 down South though.

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After two utterly awful, useless for doing anything outsifde* days, let's see if today's MetO forecast is as cruddy as the last few.

IMBY, it says:

Today
25° 19°
Sunny.

That's actually warmer than at this time on Saturday and Sunday, both of which ended up being revised, during the day, to 29C. I'd bet the same happens today.

All I can say is thank God today's the last day of this insufferable heatwave... it took my little portable aircon all night to get the temperature down to 23C, such is the amount of heat stored up in this house. I can't even have the windows open this morning as I'll be at work... it's going to be an absolute inferno in here tonight!

* - unless you do it at 7 AM, as I did, but there's only so much chopping and pruning you can do without making a racket. Even the wolf centre had to abort their wolf walk on Sunday as the wolves refused to go any further!

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I was on Sheppey yesterday.  Arrived midday at Warden Bay.  Pleasant walk assisted by a breeze to the fossil beach, where many fossils including a fossil shark's tooth was found.  After that, to the arcades at Leysdown (very busy), we headed to Shellness (not the nudist bit!) and then kayaked around the corners towards the Isle of Harty and back.  This was the first time Ive ever not felt I needed at least a t shirt on top, so lovely and warm it was on the Swale!

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