Summer 2016

[interested & confused]

Thick cloud most of the day, however a sunny spell between 2 and 3pm raised the temp to 18C whereas the rest of the day had only been around 15/16C  

The heating has now clicked on as it's down to 14C outside. Forecast is for single figures overnight - best go and close up the greenhouse.

[draztik]

10 minutes ago, interested & confused said:

Thick cloud most of the day, however a sunny spell between 2 and 3pm raised the temp to 18C whereas the rest of the day had only been around 15/16C  

The heating has now clicked on as it's down to 14C outside. Forecast is for single figures overnight - best go and close up the greenhouse.

fear not. folks over in MOD thread projecting summer will arrive.... (maybe)

Edited July 13, 2016 by draztik

[northwestsnow]

17 minutes ago, draztik said:

fear not. folks over in MOD thread projecting summer will arrive.... (maybe)

+the meto office, for the south of the UK at least

[interested & confused]

30 minutes ago, draztik said:

fear not. folks over in MOD thread projecting summer will arrive.... (maybe)

I really do hope it happens

[Summer Sun]

GFS shows temps getting into the high 20's early next week - the beeb say no

http://www.bbc.co.uk/weather/features/36790561

[weatherguru14]

what exactly does heat on hold MEAN!??  just more confusing nonsense from the bbc.

[stainesbloke]

3 hours ago, IanR said:

mid july and still too cold to sit out in the garden without a thick sweater on to be comfortable 

You know it's bad when 19.6C is the highest recorded temperature in mid July (Heathrow). Absolutely pathetic! 

[March]

Problem with the Beeb is that they only take 2 updates a day and are behind by the time of the weather for the week ahead. 

[Frost HoIIow]

2 minutes ago, weatherguru14 said:

what exactly does heat on hold MEAN!??  just more confusing nonsense from the bbc.

Sounds very much like they mean somewhere in the Med??? LOL surely not this wind swept damp island in NW Europe.

[weatherguru14]

7 minutes ago, Frost HoIIow said:

Sounds very much like they mean somewhere in the Med??? LOL surely not this wind swept damp island in NW Europe.

yeah ..Or  Its been on hold for 3 years

[weather_it_will]

5 hours ago, markyo said:

Out in shorts and t shirt,loving the weather,so comfortable and easy to live with in my opinion,but everybody to their own. I'm still feeling August may produce something but July to be honest looks a spent force.

When I see people wearing shorts at the same time I am wearing a coat, I just think they are nuts. The last 2 days have been coat weather, even though I have seen nutters wearing shorts.

[markyo]

6 hours ago, 'ColdIsBest' said:

When I see people wearing shorts at the same time I am wearing a coat, I just think they are nuts. The last 2 days have been coat weather, even though I have seen nutters wearing shorts.

Strange i'm the total opposite,i see people with coats on and it's above say 12c to 13c and i think their nuts! Have never got why they would. Its just how you each feel the weather i suppose.

[Evening thunder]

9 hours ago, B87 said:

I use the data from the historic data page rather than the regional summaries, as it is more accurate. Other areas in London and Surrey have definitely seen a massive decrease in summer sun since August 2006.

 

the only summers to see sunshine above average since 2007 were 2013 (625 hrs) and 2014 (650 hrs). Heathrow's summer average is 621 hrs. All the others ranged from 470-560 hrs.

Fair enough though I'd have thought their official maps and graphs wouldn't be that inaccurate tbh. 

If you mean this page http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/pub/data/weather/uk/climate/stationdata/heathrowdata.txt it looks like the data isn't corrected to take account of the change from a Campbell Stokes recorder to a Kipp and Zonen sensor in September 2005, though I'm guessing from previous posts you have taken account of that.

Also a quick look at the sunshine maps, and they correlate well for around Heathrow until the change, but after, in e.g. July 2006, the maps show higher values.

I have looked into the regional values for England SE and Central South: http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/pub/data/weather/uk/climate/datasets/Sunshine/ranked/England_SE_and_Central_S.txt

and calculate the 2007-2015 averages are as follows:

June: 211.85  [or 203.85 including 2016]
July: 217.12 
Aug: 177.2 

Yet according to the climate averages section, the 1981-2010 averages are:

June: 201.4
July: 214.9
Aug: 203.9

So June and July have actually averaged a little above normal!

August is notably below normal though, as many of us could have guessed.

For summer as a whole:

2007-15: 606.2 
1981-10: 620.2 

So only 14 hours down on average.

June 2016 was the dullest on record though...

For interest's sake 2007-2015 contained the 2nd and 10th sunniest Julys (2013, 2014), and the 8th sunniest June (2010).. meanwhile we also had the 5th dullest June (2012), and the 3rd, 4th, and 8th dullest August (2008, 2010, and 2015)

Why the major difference between the recent Heathrow averages and the district averages I can only guess... (maybe it has been really unlucky, though that doesn't seem to be the larger scale picture if so).
    
 

9 hours ago, Wildswimmer Pete said:

To quote the old saw: there are lies, damn lies and then there are statistics.  The sunshine figures don't even show half of the truth.  Under the conditions we've experienced the past few years, most of any sunshine is during the small hours before the inevitable  grey lid slams down.  Those of us who are up and about during conventional waking hours see little or no sun, hence the prevalence of SAD which shouldn't be a problem through the summer months.  Sunshine recorders record ALL sunshine whereas what interests most of us is sensible sunshine, to borrow Nouska's excellent term.

Yes but I imagine that effect of diurnal cloud buildup would have also occurred in previous poor summers. Though I'd happily see such figures for 'sensible' sunshine if they did exist. 2013 and 2014 were good here anyway.

Not denying this one's been bad so far this year.. though we were quite lucky here yesterday with a mostly sunny afternoon.

[Evening thunder]

9 hours ago, 'ColdIsBest' said:

When I see people wearing shorts at the same time I am wearing a coat, I just think they are nuts. The last 2 days have been coat weather, even though I have seen nutters wearing shorts.

Lol, reminds me of Christmas Day 2010 when it was -14C but someone in shorts jogged by!

[B87]

30 minutes ago, Evening thunder said:

Fair enough though I'd have thought their official maps and graphs wouldn't be that inaccurate tbh. 

If you mean this page http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/pub/data/weather/uk/climate/stationdata/heathrowdata.txt it looks like the data isn't corrected to take account of the change from a Campbell Stokes recorder to a Kipp and Zonen sensor in September 2005, though I'm guessing from previous posts you have taken account of that.
 

The values on that link have already been corrected to CS values, even though they have been recorded with a KZ since 2005.  July 2006 recorded 302 hrs with the new electronic sensor, but that was adjusted to 260ish so it could be compared to the older data.  Same with Feb 2008 (138 to 130) June 2012 (130ish to 118.5), July 2013 (300ish to 266). 

I think they should show the new sunshine figures alongside the old ones; the rest of Europe uses the 120W/m2 standard.  I think our sun hours would be about 13-14% higher in summer, and 5-10% higher in winter, using the KZ (threshold 120W vs the CS threshold of 140W).

Maybe the regional maps are using the data from the KZ (which gives higher values), but then comparing it against the CS average?  That would explain why the values are close to normal rather than below average.  If you look at the sunshine section of the Southern England summary, the Heathrow graph shows about 130 hrs as the June minimum, and 302 hrs as the July maximum (both of these were recorded with KZ and since been downgraded to fit in with the CS).

Edited July 14, 2016 by B87

[B87]

What's all this talk of amazing charts this morning, showing what is essentially average conditions for July?

[weatherguru14]

Its been a poor july so  far for the UK. dont know why the previous poster is complaining.Hopefully the second half of the month will be better..

[B87]

22 minutes ago, weatherguru14 said:

Its been a poor july so  far for the UK. dont know why the previous poster is complaining.Hopefully the second half of the month will be better..

I'm complaining because it's been a poor summer, as have about 7 of the last 10.

[Mapantz]

19 hours ago, stainesbloke said:

You know it's bad when 19.6C is the highest recorded temperature in mid July (Heathrow). Absolutely pathetic! 

Are you referring to your own back yard, or the official Heathrow data? -  A fair few 22's - 23°C on the 6th, 8th, 9th, 24°C on the 7th, 10th  ..

[stainesbloke]

1 minute ago, Mapantz said:

Are you referring to your own back yard, or the official Heathrow data? -  A fair few 22's - 23°C on the 6th, 8th, 9th, 24°C on the 7th, 10th  ..

I was referring to yesterday specifically. Most days in July have been below average with a couple of days reaching average. Very unimpressive.

[weather09]

Not sure why people are complaining... 

[Mapantz]

1 minute ago, stainesbloke said:

I was referring to yesterday specifically. Most days in July have been below average with a couple of days reaching average. Very unimpressive.

Ah I see!

Still no complaints for my location at the moment. My July average temp is above the MetO regional average (81 - 00) - Rainfall is at a mere 4.8mm, sunshine could be better, but it is way better than what June was up until the same date.

[B87]

2 minutes ago, Mapantz said:

Are you referring to your own back yard, or the official Heathrow data? -  A fair few 22's - 23°C on the 6th, 8th, 9th, 24°C on the 7th, 10th  ..

The warmest day at Heathrow all month was 23.6c, which is 0.1c above the monthly average.  11 of the 13 days so far have been below normal, with 2 even below 20c!

Usually July gets a couple of 30c days, it won't this year.  The long term average is 4.5 days above 30c per summer, but look at the last 2 decades.

2007-2016: 21 days >30c

1997-2006: 48 days >30c

[Mapantz]

1 minute ago, B87 said:

which is 0.1c above the monthly average.

That's the average maximum. If you look at the whole average, it won't seem all that bad.

[B87]

3 minutes ago, Mapantz said:

That's the average maximum. If you look at the whole average, it won't seem all that bad.

It's bad when 11 of the 13 days so far have been below average.