Its funny how the very recent heat records have been broken during the less than brilliant summers and not during the two good summers of this decade, 2013 and 2018.
Indeed Kevin, and just as happened in July 2015, this record that has just been confirmed occured during what was at best a transient heatwave lasting only a few days at the most. The 2003 record which has just been surpassed happened during a fortnight-long heatwave IIRC, although temperatures did drop a bit after the record was set on 10th August. Interesting too that the highest temperature recorded last year happened just before the long settled spell came to an end.
The pressure set-up we had last week was literally a carbon copy of early July 2015; a deep low which was slow-moving to the west of Ireland and an anticyclone over the continent, both of which combined to send up some exceptionally hot air over the UK for a few days. Once the July 2015 heatwave broke down, we were then stuck in an unsettled and rather cooler pattern for the rest of that month. The only two summers which were notably good overall which created any records were 2003 (then hottest day on record) and 2006 (then hottest July day on record). It is interesting that these records have now both been surpassed during what were only transient as opposed to sustained heatwaves.
Looking at the current model output though, I think it could be a while before we see temperatures anywhere near the values that we had last week again this summer, if we do at all.
Edited by user
29 July 2019 16:28:21
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Reason: Not specified
Lenzie, Glasgow
"Let us not take ourselves too seriously. None of us has a monopoly on wisdom, and we must always be ready to listen and respect other points of view."- Queen Elizabeth II 1926-2022