The latest weather buzz

Weather updates from site founder Brian Gaze that keep you in the know.

High summer

Posted Wed 10th July 13:00

We're now into high summer and although the weather has improved in recent weeks it has been quite mixed. The south is currently enjoying quite settled and warm days but it is wetter in the north. Will that pattern continue as we head through July?

Textbook outlook

After the drama of June it seems as though July is set to be a much quieter month. During the first half of last month high pressure to the north and west caused areas of low pressure to become slow moving close to the UK. They deposited a lot of rain which led to extensive flooding in parts of the UK.

The pattern was an example of a negative North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO). Since then things have steadily changed with the Azores high pressure strengthening and pressure falling in the Iceland and Greenland region. At the moment it looks like a positive NAO will continue for much of July. It suggests the possibility of textbook British summer weather with wet spells most likely in the north and north west as disturbances from the Atlantic brush by. In the south rain is possible too but the Azores high pressure ridging towards the UK should keep it drier.

The London GEFS plot below illustrates. On the upper half of the plot 850hPa temperatures are close to the 30 year mean early on before tending to rise later. By late July a few hot plume runs appear but the focus is definitely on warm rather than hot spells. Goldilocks weather for many I should think.

The lower graph shows forecast rain. It's not a completely dry picture and through the last third of July the chance of wetter spells increases a little. Nonetheless it suggests plenty of dry weather.

Note that for more northerly locations a wetter outlook is shown.

TL;DR

If you like typical British summer weather the next couple of weeks look quite promising. Warm and dry days with variable amounts of cloud are the form horse in the south at the moment. The outlook in the north remains mixed and generally wetter, but despite that some decent dry periods are possible too. 

Latest charts

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