summer 2022

[Chris henshall]

I dont know about anyone about anyone else but summer 2022 was the best, sun coming through the window, long daylight, shorts and tshirt, im hoping 2025 will be the same

[Harry's House]

Yes, but without anywhere near a 40 degree C heat.

[Chris henshall]

 Harry's House That was extreme but nice to see after cold miserable weather 

[Metwatch]

Personally for me it wasn't a particularly memorable summer for heat or dryness, but most likely that was down to me being abroad in the first 10 days of July, then again in the first half of August. Still experienced the record breaking heat spike in mid July, an incredible event.

 

It was drier than summer 2018 though here.

Summer 2018: 99.2mm

Summer 2022: 74.0mm (only 1913 and 1995 drier)

 

Central England temperature: 17.30C, 6th warmest in the series.

Edited December 5, 2024 by Metwatch

[Thundery wintry showers]

I remember that summer mainly for the record breaking heatwave on 19 July. It wasn't pleasant, but at the same time I found it exciting that 40C was breached here in Lincolnshire, rather than just in the south-east, and I was pleased to have experienced it. I wouldn't want it to become a regular occurrence though, it was exciting purely because of the novelty factor. Probably the most enjoyable spell was that very sunny anticyclonic spell in the second week of August. For much of England it was the sunniest August since 1995, but at my nearest site at RAF Waddington, allowing for the difference between Kipp-Zonen and Campbell-Stokes sunshine sensors, it might well have been the sunniest on record (back to 1948).

I regard it as a good summer overall, but unfortunately also as a reminder that it's getting harder to get spells of hot and sunny weather in summer without the heat getting excessive. Often the main problem is the overnight minima, rather than the maxima. For instance the minima in the 2nd week of August 2022 were generally a couple of degrees higher than those from a very similar setup in the third week of August 1995, and over a week's heatwave that can make quite a significant difference to the ability to cool our houses down.

Edited December 5, 2024 by Thundery wintry showers

[Summer8906]

I missed most of it but it looks like it differed from, say, 1995 or 1989, or June/July 2006, in the sense that there were not long spells of warm sunny weather lasting for weeks with little interruption.

Looks like the really sunny weather was concentrated between around July 4-19 and again between August 5-14 with a lot of warm, dry but relatively cloudy weather at other times due to a pronounced westerly albeit with fairly high pressure in the south.

Even still, against the rather low standard of most recent summers, it was very good. I think I would still prefer 2006, 1995, 1989 or 1983 though.

Edited December 6, 2024 by Summer8906

[LetItSnow]

June 2022 didn't feel like a particularly warm month to me despite having a C.E.T. of 15.0C. I remember very clearly a very cool start. The 4th was chilly and cloudy with a nagging breeze and the 5th was cold with torrential rain. It brightened up by the 8th for a reasonably sunny and warm spell. Genuinely a blank until the 17th when there was the brief hot spell, but the rest of the month felt decidely average, even cool at times.

July 2022 was genuinely great down here. The 1st was rather cool but high pressure quickly built in. I had a holiday down at Lyme Regis with my partner from the 4th to the 8th and it coincided with perfect weather. Cloudy on the 4th but the remaining days were all warm and sunny with gradually increasing temperatures. I think I forget there was a heatwave before the big one around the 11th ish before it cooled down yet remained fine and sunny, then the BIG heat. After that the month remained very warm and sticky feeling with temperatures often in the upper 20s.

August 2022 felt to me the most like a classic month of them though. Generally often very sunny and hot. The park behind me dried to a crisp with barely any rain all summer. The drought ended in spectacular fashion with a storm on the 15th then a cracker unleashing buckets of rain on the 17th. There was further rain at times and that period into September was quite wet. The grass turned green very quickly after a very dry summer.

Didn't hold a candle to 2018 though. 2018 was genuinely dry and fine for weeks on end and is the closest new summer we have to one of the all time classics. I didn't see a drop of rain from May 29th until alte July. The difference between the two is that 2018 was steady instead of spikes and also petered out in the second half of August, but it made up for that by having a very sunny September and October.

[Summer8906]

 LetItSnow I did experience the first 17 days of June 2022 directly and basically "changeable" sums it up. The Jubilee weekend was mixed with a sunny but cool Thursday, a humid, warm and bright Friday, a cloudy, warm and humid Saturday and a very dull and sometimes wet Sunday. Then the Mon-Fri following was basically dull, changeable and often wet SW-lies.

The weekend of the 11th/12th still had a changeable W-ly type but was mostly bright here (unexpectedly bright in the fashion of the post-Bert Monday), before the 13th-17th featured sunny weather with increasing heat.

Missed the rest of the month but looks like: 18th-19th , much cooler with rain; 20th-22nd, fine and sunny again; 23rd-24th, some thunderstorms then cooler and wetter; 25th-30th, changeable with showers. So perhaps "average" sums up June.

Hearing varying things about the second half of August 2022: were there any further consecutive runs of sunny days past mid-month at your location?

Sounds like August 2022 was perhaps rather like August 1975 which also had strong heat in the first half, notable thunderstorm mid month, then cloudier but still reasonably summery second half.

Being slightly controversial I will offer the opinion that I didn't think 2018 was as good as 2006 (or 1995, 1990, 1989 or 1983). The first 20 days of June were bone-dry but mostly cloudy, significant sunshine only arrived on the 21st and continued to the 30th. Nonetheless these 10 days with occasional earlier sunny days meant sunshine was just about above average.

The first 26 days or so of July were very dry and generally hot but many days had significant cloud buildup compared to some of the earlier fine summers, so the sunshine stats in this area were good but not outstanding. Following a short dull and sometimes damp interruption 27th-30th there was then a further week of fine hot weather from the 31st to August 7th. Then the rest of August was cloudy and changeable with occasional spells of rain, especially the 8th-12th and the Bank Holiday weekend.

The sunniest spell of 2018 here was likely the first three weeks or so of May, with May arguably being the best month of the extended summer.

Edited December 7, 2024 by Summer8906

[LetItSnow]

1 hour ago, Summer8906 said:

Hearing varying things about the second half of August 2022: were there any further consecutive runs of sunny days past mid-month at your location?

Sounds like August 2022 was perhaps rather like August 1975 which also had strong heat in the first half, notable thunderstorm mid month, then cloudier but still reasonably summery second half.

Being slightly controversial I will offer the opinion that I didn't think 2018 was as good as 2006 (or 1995, 1990, 1989 or 1983). The first 20 days of June were bone-dry but mostly cloudy, significant sunshine only arrived on the 21st and continued to the 30th. Nonetheless these 10 days with occasional earlier sunny days meant sunshine was just about above average.

The first 26 days or so of July were very dry and generally hot but many days had significant cloud buildup compared to some of the earlier fine summers, so the sunshine stats in this area were good but not outstanding. Following a short dull and sometimes damp interruption 27th-30th there was then a further week of fine hot weather from the 31st to August 7th. Then the rest of August was cloudy and changeable with occasional spells of rain, especially the 8th-12th and the Bank Holiday weekend.

The sunniest spell of 2018 here was likely the first three weeks or so of May, with May arguably being the best month of the extended summer.

On the second half of August 2022, it wasn’t a major step down to that much unsettled weather. IIRC there were a spell of easterlies. There were quite a lot of days of warm sunshine with cloud bubbling up and I think there may have been some more storms but I can’t quite remember. It definitely was still fine for the most part so it gave the month a true classic feel. 

Adding to the cloudy remarks of some of June 2018, I do remember the slack thundery easterlies at the end of May did bring an endless gloom for a while. I can’t remember when it cleared but I do remember the closing days of May and the 1st of June were very cloudy but very humid feeling and I think there was even some mist around. Sort of like a post thunderstorm haze. However my memories of June 2018 where I was living was very sunny overall so I don’t think that spell lasted much longer after the 5th.

I’d be interested to compare August 2006 and August 2018. The latter featured more intense heat early on and I’ve spoken about the locally incredibly thundery spell from the 7th-12th where I saw multiple storms roll over each day. One of the thunderiest periods of my life. I seem to remember it gradually turned cooler but not necessarily overly poor (the 16th I think was fine) but then turned very cool and quite cloudy at the end of August. 

August 2006 failed to break 30C and I’m unsure of its sunshine stats off the top of my head. I do remember it was an extremely wet month across East Anglia and was quite a northerly month, but the uppers generally weren’t that cold and there was a lot of residual warmth. Had the same synoptics occurred a year earlier or later perhaps it would have been quite a cold August. I don’t think the wet weather extended everywhere. It strikes me as perhaps a rather meh August which would have felt much worse coming after June/July 2006.

Had August and September 2006 switched around then the summer of 2006 would have surpassed 1976 for heat. 

[Summer8906]

 LetItSnow Yes, I think "meh" sums up Aug 2006. I'd put it in about the same ballpark as Aug 2018 - but I'd rate June/July 2006 higher than the equivalents in 2018, hence 2006 is a better summer overall.

I do remember a forecast lasting rebuild of July's conditions in the 2nd week was scuppered by an odd synoptic pattern of a trough moving westwards in a northerly producing a hazy and rather showery weekend 12th/13th before a more general breakdown to westerlies occurred for the rest of the month. It wasn't horrendously wet - just very meh. Slightly cooler than normal if I remember right, cloudier than normal and with showery rain on some days but to be fair still a lot of dry usable weather too.

Edited December 7, 2024 by Summer8906

[Summer8906]

7 hours ago, LetItSnow said:

Adding to the cloudy remarks of some of June 2018, I do remember the slack thundery easterlies at the end of May did bring an endless gloom for a while. I can’t remember when it cleared but I do remember the closing days of May and the 1st of June were very cloudy but very humid feeling and I think there was even some mist around. Sort of like a post thunderstorm haze. However my memories of June 2018 where I was living was very sunny overall so I don’t think that spell lasted much longer after the 5th.

Where I am I do remember the first week of June 2018 (2nd/3rd) being sunny but the general theme of the first 20 days was cloudy. I think it was fairly anticyclonic but rather weakly so and presumably weak fronts within the high pressure were a factor in the cloudiness.

[danm]

Amazing Summer. 

[cheese]

August 2022 was an excellent month - just as hot & dry as 1995 locally.

[Harry233]

Amazing summer. Would love to have one similar to 2025. It wasn’t quite as good as the best ones but was still brilliant.

A very pleasantly warm, dry and sunny June, a brilliant two week hot spell in July and an excellent August with some amazing thunderstorms.

It was quite a similar summer to 2021 in terms of temperature but it was slightly wetter but sunnier. It did have more cooler, wetter spells than 2021 but then equally did have a lot more warmer days and extreme heat.
 

[Harry233]

 Summer8906 I was abroad from the 6th-16th. I remember the 4th being an absolutely cracking day and before that it was pleasant but nothing to write home about. I think the weather was quite bad here during that spell. I remember going to Glasgow airport and the rain was absolutely lethal, come back from 10 days in Mexico and it was wall to wall sunshine and very warm. One of the very few times I’ve landed in Scotland and the weather has actually been very decent, didn’t expect it to last pretty much the whole summer.

Edited December 8, 2024 by Harry233

[SunChaserWales]

A great summer, in my memory not quite on a level with 2018 but I'm sure it would be if I wasn't abroad from 7th-24th August (the peak of the summer really). From what I've heard the August heatwave was an absolute cracker and so were the storms after. 

The weather before July 5th was meh though, June was up and down, remember mid month was really nice with a hot Friday 17th, then a horrible cold weekend before the heat came back for about 4 days. Then the last week of the month was pretty bad, cool and pretty wet, the coolness carried on into the first weekend of July.

However I can say the period from 5th July - 6th August was incredible, the heat just never seemed to stop rolling in and it all coincided with the summer between my two years of sixth form which was amazing. After I came back the final week of August was warm, pleasant and summery, not too memorable but nice. The weather of the past year and a half really making me miss the kind of weather we got in 2022. Repeat in 2025 anyone?

 

Edited December 9, 2024 by SunChaserWales

[Harry233]

 SunChaserWales that’s exactly how I’d describe it, a very good summer but just fell short of the very best. Only bad spells of the summer I would say here would be the second week in June, the first week and final few days in July and a brief spell at the start of August. That August heatwave was something else and we had a belter of a thunderstorm on the 15th which brought some flooding but the heat came back and the rest of the month was superb.

[SunChaserWales]

 Harry233 Late July into early Aug was perfectly fine here weirdly, every day recorded 22c or above and a reasonable amount of sunshine, mostly dry too. Even the 2nd week of June was okay here, pretty standard June weather with some nicer days (6th, 10th, 11th) mixed in with some worse (7th-9th). The only real bad part of the summer where I was was June 24th - July 4th which failed to top 20c even once and wouldn't have been out of place in a June like 2012 or 2019, but even in that period it was obvious in the models a heatwave was on its way so it didn't really take the wind out of the summer's momentum.

Agreed that Aug 2022 looked perfect from start to finish. Hottest August of the past 20 years by an insane margin of 2 degrees!