Fed Up With Overcast, Rain And Cold?

[Cloudwatcher]

The last two days the forecast was for poor weather and it turned out fine. Again the forecast for today was grim but being the weekend it was of course spot on.

Pure and utter filth all day long. Windy, wet and only 12C. Light levels typical of mid-winter. On and on this dismal summer marches. Just a joke that no-one finds funny. Heating turned up at full blast again with nothing to look forward to as all that lies ahead is one of the coldest ever July weeks in which temperatures will struggle to even reach 15C

Time to write this year off I think. In the same boat here mate. Any rare sun that we experience here is soon taken over by haze and then cloud.Very odd systems in place at the moment. And for us the prevailing wind is from the NE, which is really unusual and having the undesirable effect of blowing all the petro-chemical pollution directly over the town, where it is getting trapped by the drizzle. It smells disgusting here at the moment!

[Snowy Easterly]

what a disgusting, miserable turgid mid summer's evening, it is my birthday tomorrow, me and my family went out for dinner earlier and we got soaking wet walking to a restaurant, it felt like the end of october, tomorrow looks dreadful too with more cloud and showers and a high of a pathetic 16c

no words can describe this vileness, i bet next weeks 3 day pleasant snap gets downgraded too

Edited July 10, 2012 by Snowy Easterly

[Upgrade]

I am watching the models in astonishment and fascination - i don't think i can remember such an unremittingly bad summer period like this with daily rain like this for many, many years, if ever . I'm wondering whether this will end up even worse than 2007 . It's perhaps not quite as cool as 2007, although that summer did follow 2006 which was very warm so perhaps skewed my memory. i can remember some wet summers, but maybe we had 2 , 3 weeks of bad weather in a row - and sometimes quite showery periods. not 7 or 8 weeks with frequent deluges and rain events lasting days.

I know the north suffered even worse than the south east in 2007. And 2009/10, when it was a little better in the south, it was appalling the north. I think this year the south is also getting it bad once more.

Apart from the 8 or 9 days of settled warm weather in May, it has rained virtually every day since the beginning of April in London. i'm not sure we've had 2 dry days together. It seems to be groundhog day every single day. When will it end?

Edited July 10, 2012 by Upgrade

[sunny scunny]

After 5 inches of rain in the first 10 days of July, it would be nice to have some dry days for a change

[reef]

I am watching the models in astonishment and fascination - i don't think i can remember such an unremittingly bad summer period like this with daily rain like this for many, many years, if ever . I'm wondering whether this will end up even worse than 2007 . It's perhaps not quite as cool as 2007, although that summer did follow 2006 which was very warm so perhaps skewed my memory. i can remember some wet summers, but maybe we had 2 , 3 weeks of bad weather in a row - and sometimes quite showery periods. not 7 or 8 weeks with frequent deluges and rain events lasting days.

I know the north suffered even worse than the south east in 2007. And 2009/10, when it was a little better in the south, it was appalling the north. I think this year the south is also getting it bad once more.

Apart from the 8 or 9 days of settled warm weather in May, it has rained virtually every day since the beginning of April in London. i'm not sure we've had 2 dry days together. It seems to be groundhog day every single day. When will it end?

This summer is perhaps a bit of a reality check for those who thought the Summers 2007-2011 were truely dreadful. I can only speak for my area (other areas will differ) but overall they were all pretty average in the sunshine, temperature and rainfall stakes (apart from 2007 on the rainfall front). This year though so far is something else and makes you realise how poor summers can actually be in this country, something that has perhaps been forgotten after the run of regular warm, dry and sunny summers in the 1990s and early 2000s.

It is after all pretty logical to assume that if we can get a July like 2006 with 300+ hours of sunshine and the average is 200hrs then at some point you will get one with only 100 hours to balance it out.

[AderynCoch]

It is after all pretty logical to assume that if we can get a July like 2006 with 300+ hours of sunshine and the average is 200hrs then at some point you will get one with only 100 hours to balance it out.

Many of us got that in 2010. A terrible July in this neck of the woods.

Although this summer is definitely worse than the last few (I would even rank it below 2007 so far), taken as a whole it really has been a very poor run of summers here:

2007 needs no introduction

2008 was dull and wet with an exceptionally dull August

2009 wasn't bad to start off with but July was awfully wet again and August was ruined by an annoying and persistent NW-SE split

2010 started off pretty well but deteriorated in late June, and July was horrific - exceptionally wet yet again, and record-breakingly dull with the worst NW-SE split ever. Yet another lacklustre August

2011 was cool in all three months and lacking in warm days. The NW-SE curse also remained, though not on the scale of July 2010.

I can accept bad summer months in isolation, but we've had far too many of them in such a relatively small span of years.

[Aaron]

2009 wasn't too bad here, July and August were below average but not cold, June was pretty warm, avg max 21c.. 2008 was okay, August very dull but July was rather warm, but very wet, with lots of convection.

As ever, it's all from an IMBY perspective.

2010 and 2011 were the only very cold summers IMO here.

Edited July 11, 2012 by Aaron

[ScottBlue]

This summer has been very similar to 2002 thus far. In western scotland it rained throughout June and July that year with the only settled period coming at the start of August for a week or so. Some forecasts are predicting that's when any warm dry period will take effect this year. 2002 was followed by a great summer the folowing year but it's hard to imagine another british summer that isn't dull and wet after 6 on the bounce.

[Milhouse]

Its amazing what differences there are depending on where you live. Over here on the east coast July 2010 was one of the warmest months ever due to the persistence of southwesterlies with stations right on the coast seeing 10+ days over 24c. Wainfleet on the Linconshire coast saw less than 20mm of rain all month. Up until the end of July i was liking Summer 2010. But then the cooler and wetter August ruinied it somewhat.

Sure is a nice suprise to see blue skies outside today, at least it compensates for the poor temperatures. We should be hitting 21c frequently in July.

[Village]

Poor temperatures and poor sunshine down here in the south. Temps are down now for a good few months .... its dreadful....we are looking at September weather here.

[Stargazer]

I'd describe it as being like a typical September but with three times the rainfall

Just been looking over the MetO anomaly maps for this area to see if the last few summers have really been statistically as awful as they seemed...

2012: cool, very wet, very dull

2011: cool, very wet, dull

2010: warm, normal rainfall, dull [very much a summer of two halves, August was dreadful]

2009: warm, drier than average, dull [August was very dry]

2008: near normal temperatures, very wet, dull

2007: near normal temperatures, very wet, near normal sunshine.

So essentially, yes - the only real exceptions being June-early July 2010 and to a lesser extent August 2009. And every summer since 2008 has had below average sunshine.

[Richard2901]

The lack of summer sunshine in this part of the country since August 2006 has been unreal. Only Summer 2009 has achieved anything like close to average sunshine but it was also a very wet summer.

This is the dross we've had to endure over the past 6 years:

August 2006 - The dullest August since 1979. So bad it pretty much wiped out the sunshine surplus from July so we were one of the few parts of the country to see only average sunshine levels for the summer.

http://www.metoffice...y_1971-2000.gif

Summer 2007 - Execrable: very cool, very dull and very wet. The worst summer on my index since 1948 and the dullest since 1944 with only 352 hours sun - around 150 below average

http://www.metoffice...y_1971-2000.gif

Summer 2008 - June was one of the better summer months in recent years. Still wet but managed average sunshine and temperatures. July had a bad first half and decent second half (while I was out of the country). August was diabolical with sunshine the lowest since 1963 although there was one reasonable week (23rd -29th) which made it a better month than June 2007 or summer 2012 to date.

Summer 2009 - June rather cool with average sunshine and rainfall. July quite warm and the only summer month in 6 years to manage above average sunshine. Was very wet though. August slightly above average temperatures and average rainfall but 10% below average sunshine. Still that easily made it the best August out of the last 6.

Summer 2010 - June dire for the first three weeks, final third was much better but still ended up as the 2nd dullest since 1991 despite being very dry. Nearly the whole country had a good June but we still end up with rubbish here: http://www.metoffice...y_1971-2000.gif

July was decent for the first half with the period 22nd June to 13th July constituting the only summer settled spell in the past 6 years (though all the worst weather during that 3 weeks coincided with the weekends as usual). Second half of July was very wet although, unlike this year, there were at least sunny days in between. August was mainly cool, cloudy and wet except for a decent spell from 12th to 22nd.

Summer 2011 - Barely any better than 2007. It was unrelentingly cool, dull and wet after a brief heatwave at the start of June.

Overall the last 5 summers racked up an incredible 350 hours sunshine deficit between them and so far summer 2012, which is easily the worst, can add another 115 hours to that

Even the sunshine figures don't do justice to how bad it's been because of the amount of featureless stratus gloom. It's just about the only type of cloud we ever see in summer now. Certainly good cloud types such as lenticulars are almost never seen any more because the wind never comes from the west or south west.

Really can't see July ending up as anything other than the 3rd month out of 4 to see record or near record low sunshine. So far there has not been a single day when I have woken up to anything other than featureless overcast gloom and there has not been one day with any sunshine after 6pm.

We've had less than half an hour of sunshine since last Friday. Just the same monotonous grey featureless tripe day in day out and all the satellite shows is endless cloud heading our way. It's too depressing for words. It's a struggle to get out of bed in the mornings knowing you'll be faced with the same old monotone garbage when you look out the window. It's as bad as getting up in the dark in winter but at least then it gets lighter whereas this rot just hangs about the whole day never clearing

What really gets to me more than anything is that every single summer sees the worst conditions reserved for the weekend. The last 5 sundays here have produced an aggregate of 2.9 hours sun usually with drizzly rain on and off that doesn't add up to much but makes the day a write-off.

Only the last 6 weeks of 2002 are in any way comparable to the unrelenting misery of the past 6 weeks. Only difference being at that time of the year extended sunless spells aren't exactly unusual or at least didn't used to be before they got moved to summer instead

[Summer Sun]

According to BBC look NE and cumbria the famous summer of 76 had the jet stream well south of the UK like this year only in 76 it was much further south and that sent all the rain to Spain and Portugal whilst the UK got all the high pressure, If only it was further south this year

[Thundery wintry showers]

I doubt this, although there might have been a small southern "arm" to the jet. During June and July 1976, depressions generally tracked slightly further south than usual over the Atlantic but then turned sharply northwards as they approached the British Isles, which gave us a suppressed Azores high and an Atlantic trough/Euro high pattern, with the Atlantic trough generally too far west to prevent the high from being the more dominant of the two features. During August 1976 the setup shifted north-westwards which allowed more interconnection between "our" high and the one over the Azores, which gave us an exceptional dry spell. July/August 1995 also had a remarkably similar progression.

This theme of depressions taking a sharp left as they approach the UK, allowing high pressure to develop over western and central Europe, is a recurring theme in a large majority of warm/hot sunny months (whether dry, or interspersed with thunderstorms- the thundery ones tend to have a more prominent Atlantic trough than the dry ones). It also features a lot during shorter dry sunny spells in otherwise mixed summer months (e.g. each of the summer months of 1996 had this pattern contribute to a mid-month anticyclonic spell).

There is a popular view that the Azores High is the most important player for "summery" weather, but the above evidence suggests otherwise, and I think many people will be disappointed by the results of the emerging Azores High in the upcoming week or two unless the jet, as in the above examples, starts heading northwards on its approach to the British Isles.

[AWD]

The first time in an age I have awoken to near clear blue skies, shame the temp is on the cool side though. Wih the frontal rain not due to arrive until later this afternoon, this could be one of my better days.

[Radiating Dendrite]

Cold this morning!

I even contemplated turning the heating on! I resisted temptation though!

[95 Degrees]

Really getting tough now, this summer so far so been awful, I have recorded just 5 20C+ days in summer so far and 4 of those from 20-28th June, so only one day of 20C or more (not including late June) since late-may not including, which isn't even summer according to most people, and now that the humidity has gone and most days can't get above 16C, it really is very poor, last summer was similar apart from some warmth at the start of June, safe to say I'm long past done with caring about summers here as they are predictable now and they are a disgrace to the word summer.

[Eskimo]

I can't stand it being overcast, but I do love a lot of rain.

[Richard2901]

Today was yet another day of conditions too dismal, boring and depressing for words.

12 days in a row now of waking up to this:

6 days in a row of it never clearing at all through the entire day

A whole week with no sunshine in Edinburgh, one of the most popular destinations for overseas visitors. It's an embarrassment for this country.

For years I have had to watch as the weather here slips further and further down the toilet but this month is the absolute limit. Less than 10 hours sun in 12 days and less than 50% of the average sunshine for summer to date. Just how can a summer be this grim?

The rain and cold temperatures are bad enough but being constantly plagued by featureless overcast is by far the worst aspect of this awful summer.

As far as I’m concerned what we have experienced this month is the worst weather anywhere on the planet. Dire even by Faeroe Islands standards. The only places this sunless are uninhabited islands in the Southern Ocean (Campbell, Macquarie) and the reason they're uninhabited is that weather like this is just not conducive to supporting human life

[AderynCoch]

So Edinburgh remains stuck on 1.6 hours for the month! It's beyond me to describe just how incredible that is. I wonder how long it will take to reach double figures? One very sunny day will do it, but that doesn't look like occurring any time soon (unless I've missed something in the forecast).

Even in deepest, darkest winter there can't have been that many 12-days periods as dull as this..

[Jon Somerset]

I hear Mary Shelley is writing Frankenstein II.

[Thundery wintry showers]

I posted quite an extensive analysis of my reading of the model outputs today, and while it's looking promising regarding Edinburgh creeping above its current total of 1.6 hours by next Wednesday, it may nonetheless still be short of the 10-hour mark by then. Most of any brighter weather will be reserved for a slice of northern England tomorrow, hit-and-miss areas on Saturday (mostly away from eastern Scotland), most of England & Wales on Sunday and possibly parts of eastern and southern England on Tuesday/Wednesday. None of those areas particularly include Edinburgh...

The lack of sunshine in eastern Scotland in general has been absolutely incredible.

[Snowy Easterly]

the rain has really been coming down for hours, my poor crops at the allotment are dying, some have already died, im sick to the back teeth of this rain now, i don't even want any thunderstorms or convective showers etc, just some nice warm sunshine, that might happen next week but surprise surprise it only lasts for a couple of days then its back to this cool, wet crap again.

if we had a week of wall to wall sunshine, which is very rare anyway, some people would get bored of the lack of variety, well i don't care what they think, a week is nothing compared to months of cool, cloudy and wet rubbish that we have had this spring and summer so far

Edited July 12, 2012 by Snowy Easterly

[Cloudwatcher]

Today was yet another day of conditions too dismal, boring and depressing for words.

12 days in a row now of waking up to this:

6 days in a row of it never clearing at all through the entire day

A whole week with no sunshine in Edinburgh, one of the most popular destinations for overseas visitors. It's an embarrassment for this country.

For years I have had to watch as the weather here slips further and further down the toilet but this month is the absolute limit. Less than 10 hours sun in 12 days and less than 50% of the average sunshine for summer to date. Just how can a summer be this grim?

The rain and cold temperatures are bad enough but being constantly plagued by featureless overcast is by far the worst aspect of this awful summer.

As far as I’m concerned what we have experienced this month is the worst weather anywhere on the planet. Dire even by Faeroe Islands standards. The only places this sunless are uninhabited islands in the Southern Ocean (Campbell, Macquarie) and the reason they're uninhabited is that weather like this is just not conducive to supporting human life

Can't add anything to this.Bizarrely we are pretty much stuck with the same pattern on the west side of England here. And it literally is, day after interminable day of drizzly, cool gloom and featureless stratus. Never known anything like it. Depressing...

[laserguy]

Can't add anything to this.Bizarrely we are pretty much stuck with the same pattern on the west side of England here. And it literally is, day after interminable day of drizzly, cool gloom and featureless stratus. Never known anything like it. Depressing...

Oh it could be much,much worse - day after day of blue skies and relentless sun and 30C+. Yuk!