October 2023 C.E.T. and EWP contests

[The PIT]

Sunny Sheffield finished on 11.8C +1.4C above average. Rainfall 217.5mm 262.7% of the monthly average.

October the wettest ever October recorded. It's also the 3rd wettest month we ever recorded.

Yearly rain is likely to be over 1000mm unless November and December are both on the dry side. There's only been five years over 1000mm here so far.

[damianslaw]

October in the Lake District can be the wettest month of the year. This year oddly we have escaped any significant rain and suspect we've ended up around average. It hasn't been a south westerly/westerly dominated month, hence why not so wet here. 

[CryoraptorA303]

54 minutes ago, damianslaw said:

October in the Lake District can be the wettest month of the year. This year oddly we have escaped any significant rain and suspect we've ended up around average. It hasn't been a south westerly/westerly dominated month, hence why not so wet here. 

The Lake District actually looks drier than average, oddly enough. Most stations there are going for 60-70% average precip. The east coast got absolutely blasted in the second half of October, which meant you got less of the usual Autumn thrashing.

[CryoraptorA303]

On 31/10/2023 at 14:21, Metwatch said:

Fairly happy with my CET guess of 11.8C.

However big difference on the rainfall part, I wasn't expecting another deluge of an October. I thought we would get a more drier one, but shouldn't be too surprising given the state of the sea surface temperatures and other teleconnections. Maybe next year we finally get a drier October, but that would be a complete guess to predict that.

Finally? October 2021 was dry.

[Metwatch]

8 minutes ago, CryoraptorA303 said:

Finally? October 2021 was dry.

2021 had a fairly long dryish spell but by no means it was a dry month.

Edited November 1, 2023 by Metwatch

[CryoraptorA303]

1 minute ago, Metwatch said:

2021 had a a fairly long dryish spell but by no means it was a dry month.

Fair enough, I remember Autumn 2021 as being the driest and sunniest since 2011. I think November was the most anomalously driest.

3 hours ago, Roger J Smith said:

CET and EWP ranking table above is adjusted for 12.1 ... congrats to summer18, Typhoon John and Frigid for picking winning CET  forecast, and top EWP forecasts are from cryoraptorA303 (172 mm) , AlexisJ9 (175 mm) and rwtwm (150 mm).

Best combined forecast is from summer8906 (ranks 4, 10), Roger J Smith was second (ranks 13, 4) and  summer shower was third (16, 6). 

Will post final EWP tracker value tomorrow, expect 170-172. 

I had a feeling this October was going to be a very wet one.

[summer blizzard]

1 hour ago, CryoraptorA303 said:

Fair enough, I remember Autumn 2021 as being the driest and sunniest since 2011. I think November was the most anomalously driest.

I had a feeling this October was going to be a very wet one.

The years I was using for analogues did suggest the broad pattern, hence the high rainfall prediction. Got screwed by the opening third though on the CET.

I don't recall much of Autumn bar snow in late November. In terms of sunshine the only one that stands out is 2016 in memory. Most Autumns are fairly forgettable though as a whole. 

[Roger J Smith]

EWP tracker actually found a bit more to add, finished on 176.2 mm. This simply exchanges first and second place between Alexis J9 and cryoraptorA303, will fix details on 5 Nov if the final table value doesn't reverse back to plan A. 

 

[Weather-history]

Wettest October since 2000 for the EWP by the looks of it.

[Roger J Smith]

3 minutes ago, Weather-history said:

Wettest October since 2000 for the EWP by the looks of it.

Currently sits fourth wettest, will see what happens on 5 Nov when they post a table value (it's not in tables yet). Only 1903, 2000 and 1987 were wetter. 

[Roger J Smith]

2023 is already at a total rainfall similar to 90th wettest year (about 932 mm counting 1-2 Nov) ... and even average rainfall now to 31 Dec would place it in top ten, 300 mm more will pass all but top four years since EWP began in 1766, and two more months like October would get 2023 very close to wettest year (1872 _ 1284.9 mm). 

 

[Airedalejoe]

6 minutes ago, Roger J Smith said:

2023 is already at a total rainfall similar to 90th wettest year (about 932 mm counting 1-2 Nov) ... and even average rainfall now to 31 Dec would place it in top ten, 300 mm more will pass all but top four years since EWP began in 1766, and two more months like October would get 2023 very close to wettest year (1872 _ 1284.9 mm). 

 

I don't have figures but in my little part of the world 2023 is the wettest I've known. It's incessant at times. The very wet weather started about 12 months ago and apart from very brief breaks has continued.

A horrible summer, very wet, cloudy and cool was followed by a very wet autumn.

I'm amazed we've had 5 frosts already.

 

[Metwatch]

October 2023 was the wettest single month since January 2014 for the England & Wales region.

Edited November 2, 2023 by Metwatch

[LetItSnow!]

6 hours ago, Roger J Smith said:

Currently sits fourth wettest, will see what happens on 5 Nov when they post a table value (it's not in tables yet). Only 1903, 2000 and 1987 were wetter. 

As stated a few days ago, amazing the change in just a year. We really did go from anomalously fry to anomalously wet!

[Man With Beard]

6 hours ago, Weather-history said:

Wettest October since 2000 for the EWP by the looks of it.

Nothing could possibly be as wet as October 2000!

[cheese]

7 minutes ago, Man With Beard said:

Nothing could possibly be as wet as October 2000!

This October (157mm) was significantly wetter than October 2000 (115mm) here. 

Edited November 2, 2023 by cheese

[summer blizzard]

4 hours ago, Airedalejoe said:

I don't have figures but in my little part of the world 2023 is the wettest I've known. It's incessant at times. The very wet weather started about 12 months ago and apart from very brief breaks has continued.

A horrible summer, very wet, cloudy and cool was followed by a very wet autumn.

I'm amazed we've had 5 frosts already.

 

This October was very wet but as a year it does not compare to the memory of 2012 from April onwards. 

[CryoraptorA303]

1 hour ago, summer blizzard said:

This October was very wet but as a year it does not compare to the memory of 2012 from April onwards. 

Here in Kent 2012 was certainly wetter than this year has been, at least it was up to September. April and August in particular were really wet here. It was weird because March 2012 was one of the warmest on record, and had something like a consecutive week above 20C nationwide, which I'm almost certain has never happened before or since. Then after that April and the first half of May went wet and dull again. After summer it got a lot drier here and if anything I remember October having quite a few sunny, cold days, although winter itself was quite dull and if anything February was the marginally sunnier month, not January like you'd expect. I also remember January 2014 and October 2020 being really wet here as well. I think the latter half of winter 2020 was also wet here, although it dried up significantly come spring. May 2021 was also wet but not to a ridiculous degree, and the July 2021 storms missed us out - It was just dull, although after the August 2020 heatwave and 2020 in general I thoroughly enjoyed August 2021 - Not overly wet and really mild. Overall the only month of this year that stuck out to me as really unusually wet was March and some of April. The Met Office map showed the west Kent and east Surrey area was the only place in the whole country to receive near-normal levels of rainfall in July. I was really confused by people complaining about how wet July was until the national statistics came out. I kept insisting that I had experienced far wetter summer months than this for some time... The dull and wet July in particular will probably be sticking out in most people's minds and make this year seem unbearably wet, forgetting the dry/record hot June we had experienced the month before. August in a similar boat with the last two weeks being largely warm and fine, but the first week being a hangover from the wet July without a big heatwave as a counterbalance later on will stick out in people's minds. This year has had almost as many dry spells as wet, it just seems that our weather is running at very high amplitude this year and the wet spells are coming down hard, and of course being British the wet spells will stick out in our minds more than the dry spells in the first place. It also doesn't help that a lot of last year was also very dry and of course a wetter-than-average year is going to stick out as really wet happening just after that.

Of course after Ciaran and the second cyclone we'll probably be due a drier spell which will likely last into December, so this year won't end up breaking any records and might fall short of top 10, but certainly a shock to the system after 2022.

If I'm not mistaken, after the very dry first eight months (aside from February), 2022 got a lot wetter. Where did it end up overall? Significantly drier than average? With how wet October onwards seemed (also looks like 112mm in November in the SE&C) it wouldn't surprise me much if that alone counterbalanced and made 2022 a statistically average rainfall year.

Edited November 2, 2023 by CryoraptorA303

[LetItSnow!]

19 minutes ago, CryoraptorA303 said:

Here in Kent 2012 was certainly wetter than this year has been, at least it was up to September. April and August in particular were really wet here. It was weird because March 2012 was one of the warmest on record, and had something like a consecutive week above 20C nationwide, which I'm almost certain has never happened before or since. Then after that April and the first half of May went wet and dull again. After summer it got a lot drier here and if anything I remember October having quite a few sunny, cold days, although winter itself was quite dull and if anything February was the marginally sunnier month, not January like you'd expect. I also remember January 2014 and October 2020 being really wet here as well. I think the latter half of winter 2020 was also wet here, although it dried up significantly come spring. May 2021 was also wet but not to a ridiculous degree, and the July 2021 storms missed us out - It was just dull, although after the August 2020 heatwave and 2020 in general I thoroughly enjoyed August 2021 - Not overly wet and really mild. Overall the only month of this year that stuck out to me as really unusually wet was March and some of April. The Met Office map showed the west Kent and east Surrey area was the only place in the whole country to receive near-normal levels of rainfall in July. I was really confused by people complaining about how wet July was until the national statistics came out. I kept insisting that I had experienced far wetter summer months than this for some time... The dull and wet July in particular will probably be sticking out in most people's minds and make this year seem unbearably wet, forgetting the dry/record hot June we had experienced the month before. August in a similar boat with the last two weeks being largely warm and fine, but the first week being a hangover from the wet July without a big heatwave as a counterbalance later on will stick out in people's minds. This year has had almost as many dry spells as wet, it just seems that our weather is running at very high amplitude this year and the wet spells are coming down hard, and of course being British the wet spells will stick out in our minds more than the dry spells in the first place. It also doesn't help that a lot of last year was also very dry and of course a wetter-than-average year is going to stick out as really wet happening just after that.

Of course after Ciaran and the second cyclone we'll probably be due a drier spell which will likely last into December, so this year won't end up breaking any records and might fall short of top 10, but certainly a shock to the system after 2022.

If I'm not mistaken, after the very dry first eight months (aside from February), 2022 got a lot wetter. Where did it end up overall? Significantly drier than average? With how wet October onwards seemed (also looks like 112mm in November in the SE&C) it wouldn't surprise me much if that alone counterbalanced and made 2022 a statistically average rainfall year.

You seem rather certain about a drier spell? I think all we need is near-normal rainfall during November and December to enter the top 10. November is very much playing its part in hoping we get there.

 

2022 was dry and the final couple months did reduce the anomaly somewhat, but not enough to make it average. 

 

[CryoraptorA303]

7 minutes ago, LetItSnow! said:

You seem rather certain about a drier spell? I think all we need is near-normal rainfall during November and December to enter the top 10. November is very much playing its part in hoping we get there.

Just observing the general pattern. We've had a wet spell for a few weeks now, another week or so into November and then we'll probably flip to something drier. I wouldn't be surprised if we make top 10 but I would also not write off a dry surprise for the remainder of the year considering how extreme our weather has been this year. Top 10 is far from guaranteed, but it's also far from unlikely. I'd say even top 5 is far from unlikely, but bottoming out below 10 is also far from unlikely at this stage if a dry surprise comes its way.

[Roger J Smith]

2022 (in total EWP) was fifth driest year of 21st century, behind 2003, 2011, 2010 and 2005 in order. Back to 1945, it was drier than about two thirds of years 1945-2000.

[CryoraptorA303]

1 hour ago, LetItSnow! said:

You seem rather certain about a drier spell? I think all we need is near-normal rainfall during November and December to enter the top 10. November is very much playing its part in hoping we get there.

 

2022 was dry and the final couple months did reduce the anomaly somewhat, but not enough to make it average. 

 

 

35 minutes ago, Roger J Smith said:

2022 (in total EWP) was fifth driest year of 21st century, behind 2003, 2011, 2010 and 2005 in order. Back to 1945, it was drier than about two thirds of years 1945-2000.

Makes sense. You wouldn't think of 2005 as a dry year... 2006 certainly would've been on the list had it not turned wet after August. 2011 is probably the most bizarre example in this century: Spring was one of the driest on record, then summer turned mostly mild and not-wet, and then autumn was again one of the driest on record. 2009, 2010 and 2011 all threatened really hot summers after the way their springs went, but somehow we got lucky in all three not carrying out that threat. 2018 or 2022 with the spring precip of 2010 or 2011 would've been even more of a disaster than they were. I think 03 overall is the driest because of the lack of precip all year - September was the driest month iirc, and the spring was dry but not as dry as 2010 or 2011, and of course it goes without saying that summer was dry. Spring 2020 was also really dry but it was cut from being a dry year when June turned wetter, and then from the second half of August the rest of the year was very wet. The August 2020 heatwave would've probably been our 40C had 2020 stayed dry over the summer; we managed 37.8C after that wet June and July. I'm pretty sure that June recorded some of the lowest temps since March, with how hot April and May had been.

What year is the overall driest? 1893? I know June 1893 was the driest on record (although had the period from around the second half of June to the third week of July 2018 been a single month it would've easily been the driest month ever recorded) and even drier than June 76. 1990 was also really dry although I don't know if it turned wetter in autumn. 1995 was also really dry but I think it was only just not the driest. 1947 might also be a contender. The first half of 1911 was very dry but autumn turned wet so that's not the driest. I don't think 1911 even holds any records anymore apart from the most sunshine hours ever recorded at Eastbourne. Funnily enough one of its last records, that being the joint-most 30C days in September with 1959, just got binned this year. Spring 1911 turned up as one of the 10 sunniest springs on record if I'm not mistaken but it's not high on the list.

2000 is the wettest year ever recorded if I'm not mistaken. At least it is in SE&C; it might not be elsewhere but every month in the SE&C region of 2000 was wetter than average, some significantly so.

6 hours ago, Man With Beard said:

Nothing could possibly be as wet as October 2000!

There has been wetter. October 1903 is the wettest on record, and apparently rain fell over the UK every day of the month... apart from Kent of course. October 2000 must surely be up there as one of the wettest though. I wasn't alive for it but 2000 in general was an extremely wet year and every single month was wetter than average. In fact I think it's overall the wettest year on record.

[virtualsphere]

Wet, but not out of the ordinary here in SW Wales, March was wetter as was last November and October 2019, with October 2021 coming close.   I think the depressions taking a more southerly track and also passing further east through the UK have led to more of the country being affected by the rain this autumn, and possibly quite an unusual rainfall distribution for Scotland and N England with maybe as much or more rain in the east than the west.  By comparison, Dec 2015 is by far the wettest month I've experienced in recent times whereas I think some eastern parts were fairly dry.

[Roger J Smith]

1788 was driest of all (612 mm) and 1921 was second driest (629 mm); 1854 was 673 mm. Since 1921, 1933 at 718 mm, 1964 at 726 mm and 1973 at 740 mm were all driest until now occasions. 1996 (766 mm) was close to tying 2003 (762 mm). 

[LetItSnow!]

1 hour ago, CryoraptorA303 said:

I wasn't alive for it but 2000 in general was an extremely wet year and every single month was wetter than average. In fact I think it's overall the wettest year on record.

Not true. 2000 really worked overtime in the latter half of the year, not including April. January, March, June and July were all pretty dry. The wettest year ever is something like 1872 I think. 2000 ranks within the top 5 I think, but Roger may correct me on that.