Worryingly Wet & Worryingly Sunless

[Atleastitwillbemild]

 SunSean  Fed up? I am way past that. Easterlies that don't materialise are frustrating. Good winter synpoptics with no cold air to tap into is annoying. Missing a good thunderstorm in the summer as it passes by another town next to you is disappointing.

But this s**t ? Our stupid miserable little patch of p**s island becoming mysteriously, maddeningly high pressure repllent for months and months on end with no mercy ? Pretty much unforgivable. To me this nightmare started in November 2022. February and June 2023 were two very welcome respite months but even the mercy of an occasional dry month seems to be off the menu now. Its been non stop darkness, gloom and endless rain since July and it has destroyed my relationship with this country. 

Granted I am massively projecting all my mental health problems on to this weather. I'd probably be a little less angry and desperate if I hadn't had one of the worst periods of anxiety and depression I've ever experienced during the last year but I truly believe I would not have had such a hard time with it if the weather hadn't been so oppressively, aggressively dull. Its a very unfortunate coincidence that the bad weather and my bad health have paralleled quite precisely but I don't think its that much of a coincidence. All I really needed was a week or two of sunny weather to balance out the gloom and waited so patiently for it and day after day after miserable day it just plays out like some endless nightmare. "Its been a bit unsettled"

This rant probably seems overly extreme and tbh it is, but most people don't realise how much weather and sunlight levels really affect people with mental health issues. I just watched yet another cheery, breezy met office upload on the tube where another presenter stands there cheerfully announcing  "another band of low pressure moving in" grinning ear to ear, as if the total lack of high pressure anywhere near this godawful island for the past 10 months is the most normal, unremarkable thing in the world. Nothing extraordinary about it. Totally fine!  No explanation of why. No comiseration or acknowledgement of how much we're suffering because of it. Not a glimmer of hope offered. The Northern blocking and projected easterly is likely to bring nothing but damp, gloomy murk. Or as they like to cheerfully refer to it as "rather unsettled". 

Why is it so hard to get a stupid lump of high pressure to sit over us for five minutes? It shouldn't be as impossible as this. And to be honest I've f*****g had it. I know of course that atmospheric systems don't have a mind of their own and don't do things with deliberate intent but its really hard not to take this total denial of sunlight that I'm desperate for personally. I'm done. I used to love this country and defended it quite passionately to critics but I am finished with it. I will dedicate the rest of my life to getting as far away from this nightmare hell of an island and will never come back. 

This slightly crazed and irrationally angry rant was brought to you by low serotonin and weather being "a bit unsettled".

Edited March 2 by Atleastitwillbemild

[Atleastitwillbemild]

 In Absence of True Seasons

This. The forecasts are laughable at this point. Truly pathetic. Every single projection of dryness or sun gets downgraded every singe time. Its like they just chuck in the odd sun symbol in for a laugh. I know they're automatically updated as computer models change but I swear there is some human input where they put some sun symbols in just for deocration. You can actually watch it downgrade hour by hour. First a full sun. Then a partly cloudy symbol with sun. Then white cloud with no sun. Then a dark cloud. Then just rain. The met office are hilariously useless right now.

Edited March 2 by Atleastitwillbemild

[Atleastitwillbemild]

 In Absence of True Seasons  This logic that I use on myself for hope is the only thing keeping me sane right now. I mean, it HAS TO end at some point......right?

[Atleastitwillbemild]

 SunSean  2012 was an extraordinarily bad year but the sheer longevity of this nightmare is unprecedented for me and I am 40 years old. Never lived through anything like it. Never will again if I can get the hell away from here in the next 5-10 years. I will never subject myself to this again if I can help it. Almeria looks like a good place to retire to for me.

[CryoraptorA303]

 B87 I wouldn't write off this summer just yet. I doubt anyone thought summer 1995 was going to be a household name until a relentless dry spell began in April, after a mild, wet and unremarkable start to the year.

One interesting thing about the Nino-Nina flip is in 1998 and 2010 the flip both times disrupted a dry spell. In 1995 it disrupted the evolving wet spell. So perhaps this time in contrast to 1998 and 2010 the flip will be disrupting this wet spell like in 1995... Much to think about. It also makes you wonder what summer 2010 and beyond could've ended up like if the emerging dry spell wasn't disrupted by the materialising strong Nina.

I also suspect at this point the models are overanalysing the collapse of the Nino; a Nino rapidly collapsing does not necessarily have to begin a Nina, it could collapse by April or May and then remain at around neutral, or the resultant Nina could be significantly weaker than the models are pointing to.

This wet spell has now been in full force for an entire 12 months, and we're now at the most turbulent point of the year; I'd be frankly shocked if there's no serious changes in the next couple of months.

[Sun Chaser]

Since the end of summer 2022 -

Wetter than average: Sep 2022, Oct 2022, Nov 2022, Jan 2023, Mar 2023, Apr 2023, Jul 2023, Oct 2023, Nov 2023, Dec 2023, Feb 2024

Drier than average: Feb 2023, May 2023, Jun 2023 - THAT IS ALL.

When does this spell end? Because it's looking increasingly like March will not be the month to break it.

[In Absence of True Seasons]

 CryoraptorA303 Lack of moderation is definitely the main issue.

As much as I could quite happily not see a single drop more rain until 2025, 6 months of below average rainfall is just as damaging to flora and fauna as 6 months of above average. 

 Atleastitwillbemild They update it hour by hour as they look out the window and see what is manifesting, lol

Edited March 2 by In Absence of True Seasons

[CryoraptorA303]

 Atleastitwillbemild I'm sorry the weather is having such a negative impact on you.

As someone with mental health issues I understand how undesirable weather can affect it for the worse. Especially since October the level of unabated "autumnness" has been depressing but spring last year was also not great and I wasn't a fan of that, and I can see how if autumnal weather negatively affects you, the past 12 months have been a trying time.

While dull, mild and grossly wet weather is not my worst weather, it is definitely starting to feel a bit spirit-drowning now. It's also starting to show in the public. I deal with the public in my job and it's in my interest that the weather is at least not bad, as miserable weather certainly has an impact on how happy the average customer is. In turn, I don't appreciate it being made my problem and that's part of why it's starting to feel depressing for me now. The other part is because, well, I do like to see the Sun sometimes and the rain is becoming really disruptive now. It is also just a bit miserable after a while.

I am of the opinion that the distortion of the seasons we are supposed to experience is heavily contributing to mental health problems. As we are increasingly not experiencing normal seasonal cycles anymore it is causing psychological distress for the same reason the distortion of such a cycle causes problems in other animals.

If I had to try and explain why this has happened, I'd probably suggest the Altantic being very warm in the aftermath of 2022, and then June 2023 being very badly placed as the Atlantic then got microwaved again just as it might have been starting to run out of steam from April onwards. I know the May-June spell was a needed break from the autumnal conditions for many but without it the original wet spell would've had a decent chance of petering out by now. We may have even ended up with a dry autumn. Of course, atmospheric phenomena are also to blame here - we seem to have experienced a lot of NAO+ over the winter which has driven these mild westerlies. Without this the cyclones from the Atlantic can't get here in the first place and are instead deflected to Scandinavia as they were in January while we had that brief dryaverage spell. I think IOD+ has also been suggested as a driver of westerlies.

As I've mentioned, we're now at the most turbulent point of the year and we also seem to be on the cusp of a deep SSW - These factors will hopefully come together to completely flush out the current regime we have altogether. Moving onto summer it will depend on what sets up in the spring reset and how ENSO develops.

If you have the means to, I'd highly suggest a holiday to try and clear your mind a bit. Holidays have always been great for my mental health, although the post-holiday blues can be hard to contend with.

[BlueSkies_do_I_see]

I also suffer with SAD. I bought a SAD lamp which helps a little. It's always hardest in March for me as we have had to endure Oct, Nov, Dec, Jan and Feb. Let's hope for a decent April. We've had some really glorious Aprils in the last 17 years. 2007, 2011, 2015 and 2020 spring to mind. That's roughly one decent April every 4-5 years. We are due one..

I'll keep saving a little each month for my future camper van in retirement.* Then I will just drive somewhere with lower annual rainfall in the winter (Spain) and somewhere to escape the heatwaves in the summer (Scotland). I've worked out the average daily high temperature in Southern Spain in January and Northern Scotland in July is about the same, 18C.

*If the interest rate remained at a constant 5% for the next 40 years, and you started putting away £5 out of the pay packet each week from the age of 25, you would have £30,645 on your 65th birthday.

Edited March 2 by BlueSkies_do_I_see

[Wade]

I love the rain but I think a dry warm spring and summer with the occasional thundery outbreak would do nicely now we have more than enough water at our disposal. No point in people getting angry about the weather as there is nada you can do about it and long may it stay that way.

[marky810]

Its the endless damp that bothers me. It seems to seep into everything. Including my bones!

[Thunders]

 B87  as long as it doesnt get that bad we have to have hosepipe bans again because im a bit fed up with those. 

[B87]

 Thunders As long as every month in the warm part of the year is drier, warmer and sunnier than average. Ideally at least one rainless summer month.

[CryoraptorA303]

 B87 I think only June 2018 and maybe one or two obscure Aprils have managed that in select locations. Supposedly I think it was spring 1879 that was extraordinarily dry in London, take it with a pinch of salt though; I doubt it was actually rainless for 79 solid days as not even August 1947, 1995 or June/July 1976 have managed such streaks.

At the moment I just want to see some consistent dryness and sunshine. Nothing too extreme in the other direction, just enough to start making up for the winter.

Saying that, summer 2018 came after a very wet and cold start to the spring, so I really wouldn't rule out seeing the other extreme later in the year. September 2014 is another one that comes to mind, that was the driest on record after the first few months of the year had been extraordinarily wet.

Edited March 2 by CryoraptorA303

[Weather Enthusiast91]

Yes, I too am fed up of the rain now and some sunshine would be most welcome. Don't care about temperature just yet, I just want a break from the rain.

We need to have a good balance of dry weather and wet weather but that doesn't seem to be the case with our climate nowadays. Not sure if it's just me or not, but over the last few years long wet periods and long dry periods have become more commonplace, sometimes lasting 8 weeks or more.

Those that spring to mind:

Mid April 2018 - July 2018 - (dry)
Late September 2019 - February 2020 (wet)
Mid March 2020 - Early June 2020 (dry)
Summer 2020 - (wet)
April 2021 (dry)
May 2021 (wet)
January 2022 - August 2022 (dry)
Autumn 2022 (wet)
Spring 2023 to present (wet)

 

Edited March 2 by Weather Enthusiast91

[Petorious]

First post on this forum for some time, the weather for me has been getting me down and rather miserable, moving on from my own thoughts and behaviour though and it really is shocking at how wet it has been. From what I read though, it sounds like this could be the new norm as the climate change slowly creates a warmer and DAMP atmosphere.

 

What I really worry about it the eco system and out food growth, I am a lorry driver and its shocking to see just how long so many fields have sat under water. rivers have burst there banks and simply stayed burst. Even part of the A14 near Newmarket has almost been fully closed off for a couple of weeks due to flooding and bad drainage, only there struggling to empty and fix due to yet more rain. Farmers are really struggling this year, they couldn't get all the fields drilled when the rain arrived late last year and now its time to be planting them with spring crops, still cant get in. I have drove past freshly ploughed fields that look so odd, rather than the usual neat ploughed lines, just looks like a field of sloppy manure/mud.

 

The looking for anything cold is hilarious and non existent, the modelling thread is a joke and all the forecasting seems to be as bad as I can ever remember.

The country really could do with a solid month of no rain minimum.

[Atleastitwillbemild]

 CryoraptorA303 Thank you for that explanation it was really insightful. Hopefully the nightmare ends soon but predictions for march are less than optimistic. I'm sorry you have to deal with the brunt of everyones weather related grumpyness. I bet some customers are obnoxious in the extreme. I'd hate aving to deal with that. I just come on here for my insane rambling rants!

e have just been really, really unlucky. IIRC the months leading up to the 2022 heatwave were anomalously dry. This may be a very heavy handed pay pack. Wouldn't it be wonderful if all this water led to a gloriously flowery and green spring? I remember late May/early June last year was the most glorious Ive ever seen the country looking. It was paradise for about 3 weeks. We know what happened after that. I should just be patient and wind my neck in. And stop blaming the dull weather for all my mood disorder issues. Although I think it should take some of the blame for sure. God I miss blue skies. 

 BlueSkies_do_I_see  I do have a holiday planned for June. It seems so long away. The weather may have changed by then (god help us if it hasn't) The retirement fund is a great idea! If only Brexit hadn't put the kybosh on emmigration. I want to be a climate refugee! Going in the opposite direction. The camper van might be the next best thing. Just literally follow then sun on wheels!

[baddie]

Im counting on something decent in the second half of March. Im so fed up with this rain, its unwelcome and depressing, and a very wet March would only add to such biblical flooding which hasnt stopped since Storm Babet

[baddie]

 Sun Chaser If it can join August 2023 and January 2024 with "average", I would even take that

[BlueSkies_do_I_see]

 Atleastitwillbemild An increasing amount of people are doing it. As much as they would like to tax it, some things will always remain free - the warmth of the Spanish sun in winter, the golden sand on your toes and the sound of the ocean, the serenity of a mountain pass, bird song etc. You have to hope that sometime in the next decade there might be a closer tie with Europe again. If not, i'll be returning to Australia that I left 23 years ago. It's never cold there. Just head north in their winter.

The way I see it is you can burn through £10,000 visiting Florida Disney World and Gulf coast for a few weeks or spend the same amount of money with 9 months on the road. 

Edited March 2 by BlueSkies_do_I_see

[SunSean]

@AtleastitwillbemildI don't think you're exaggerating at all man. Even I, as someone who is content mentally at the moment, am finding this weather pattern extremely testing so i can only imagine how much worse it is for someone who has already got a lot of pain and mental health problems. 

This pattern must change sooner rather than later though as its not something I've experienced in my lifetime of being interested in weather.

Don't ever lose hope though man, I still believe we will have a good number of beautiful months coming up this year, even though its hard to believe at the moment.

[Wade]

If this current gfs run (12z) is accurate, then we could be looking at the first dry spell (lasting more than a week) for god knows how long which would be welcome for many I am sure. People however like to moan, when we get a long period of hot and dry weather which we will, people will whinge that there is not enough rain  

[CryoraptorA303]

10 minutes ago, Petorious said:

From what I read though, it sounds like this could be the new norm as the climate change slowly creates a warmer and DAMP atmosphere.

Indeed, flooding is by far the major threat this country faces due to climate change.

11 minutes ago, Petorious said:

What I really worry about it the eco system and out food growth, I am a lorry driver and its shocking to see just how long so many fields have sat under water. rivers have burst there banks and simply stayed burst. Even part of the A14 near Newmarket has almost been fully closed off for a couple of weeks due to flooding and bad drainage, only there struggling to empty and fix due to yet more rain. Farmers are really struggling this year, they couldn't get all the fields drilled when the rain arrived late last year and now its time to be planting them with spring crops, still cant get in. I have drove past freshly ploughed fields that look so odd, rather than the usual neat ploughed lines, just looks like a field of sloppy manure/mud.

It's the same here in Kent, rivers are breaking their banks, agriculture is being ruined by the worthless soil quality. The worst part here though is the council is barely hanging on by a thread and can't afford to fix the roads anymore - There's going to be a serious accident soon with how much the roads round here are starting to disintegrate from the months of intense rainfall and lack of maintenence in the past few years.

15 minutes ago, Petorious said:

The looking for anything cold is hilarious and non existent, the modelling thread is a joke and all the forecasting seems to be as bad as I can ever remember.

They always perform worse in winter but this year it's been especially bad, the atmosphere has apparently completely broken them in the last few months. So much so that the long-term seasonal actually predicted the winter better than them! The lesson here is they are really still in their infancy and they need significantly more human input than they are clearly getting. Something is obviously misleading them all into constantly seeing false positives for cold signals. I couldn't tell you what it is, perhaps a unique set of background conditions this year that they haven't had to deal with before, perhaps it's unaccounted climate change causing significant disparities between the climate modelled by them and the climate in the real world as we're always going to be one step behind it and we will never know exactly how it's perturbing the climate, it could be something else entirely.

I'm aware that the models weren't as bad as they seem if you look at MOD, it's full of cold rampers who only look at 240h ensembles that fit their agenda. Even then we seem to have had a ton of poor mid-term cold forecasts that haven't materialised. Overall there hasn't been a single one that has performed particularly well.

22 minutes ago, Atleastitwillbemild said:

Thank you for that explanation it was really insightful

22 minutes ago, Atleastitwillbemild said:

Hopefully the nightmare ends soon but predictions for march are less than optimistic

Eh, February was predicted to be on the colder side by the mid-terms and look how that turned out. It's still very early days, anything can happen yet. For all we know February might've been a fluke or dead cat bounce and we're actually strongly heading for a dry spell. I doubt it'll be that fast but it can't be as bad as it has been.

1 hour ago, Atleastitwillbemild said:

I'm sorry you have to deal with the brunt of everyones weather related grumpyness. I bet some customers are obnoxious in the extreme. I'd hate aving to deal with that. I just come on here for my insane rambling rants!

Luckily I don't have to deal with much outright aggression, in my area it's very much passive-aggressiveness and contempt by the poshos that intensifies quite a lot when people are miserable in part due to the weather, and people in general just being less polite.

1 hour ago, Atleastitwillbemild said:

e have just been really, really unlucky. IIRC the months leading up to the 2022 heatwave were anomalously dry

Indeed, I think it even beat January-July 1976. In fact, let's compare it:

January 1976 - 111.4mm

February 1976 - 61.9mm

March 1976 - 77.4mm

April 1976 - 35.8mm

May 1976 - 84.5mm

June 1976 - 38.6mm

July 1976 - 44.4mm

 

January 2022 - 62.9mm

February 2022 - 151.3mm

March 2022 - 50.7mm

April 2022 - 49.8mm

May 2022 - 77.5mm

June 2022 - 61.8mm

July 2022 - 48.4mm

 

Overall:

1976: 454mm

2022: 502.4mm

Looks like 2022 was slightly less dry, but there's really not much in it, which shows you how dry it actually was. A lot of 2022's total comes from February though, which was mostly a northern thing. In the south 2022 will be the drier period as February was mostly average. However 1976 was made a lot worse as summer and autumn 1975 had been dry as well.

1 hour ago, Atleastitwillbemild said:

I remember late May/early June last year was the most glorious Ive ever seen the country looking. It was paradise for about 3 weeks.

My hay fever disagrees with you That's the worst I'd had it since I was little. Late springs are the absolute worst news for my hay fever. When spring comes on time it's at least a lot more drawn out and I don't get the season's load all at once.

1 hour ago, Atleastitwillbemild said:

I should just be patient and wind my neck in. And stop blaming the dull weather for all my mood disorder issues. Although I think it should take some of the blame for sure. God I miss blue skies. 

We're on a weather forum, moaning is about 70% of the airtime

 

 Wade January was the last time a decent swathe of the country saw little rain for a week or more.

It's very likely the first half of March after this will not see significantly more rain, we know that much. The interesting part is what happens as the SSW unfolds. Does it usher in another round of northerlies and more rain or does it lead to more settled conditions? It ultimately depends on what the weather gods decide at this point.

The problem once the rain does stop is the nature of what takes over. Is it something more average with frequent light rain but plenty of settled conditions inbetween, or is it something hot and dry that finds us in the opposite situation by summer? There is no way to know but judging by how increasingly extreme our climate is becoming, I'd not be counting out a very dry turn. Not that I'd be complaining for a good while provided it doesn't get too hot, we need a bit of dryness now.

[Metwatch]

10 hours ago, SunSean said:

Creating this thread as a last ditch attempt at some voodoo/fate tempting to see if there will be an increased chance of a pattern change!

Thanks for creating the thread! Hopefully we get something much drier now as a result of this with the reverse psychology

 

 

Following on from the post above by weather history yesterday, thought I would do a month by month breakdown since September 2022 up to the February just gone (last 18 months) for England & wales then for Central England to really show how wet it's been via the graphs here: https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/hadobs/hadukp/charts/hadukp_daily_plots.html 

If anyone wants to do one for the south east, south west or other regions as well that'd be great!

 

England & Wales since September 2022 + how much from the 1991-20 average (+ for surplus / - for deficit)

Sep 2022: 90.4mm (+14.4mm)

Oct 2022: 114.0mm (+11.1mm)

Nov 2022: 159.0mm (+52.8mm)

Dec 2022: 102.2mm (-1.4mm)

Jan 2023: 97.6mm (+3.4mm)

Feb 2023: 16.5mm (-55.9mm)

Mar 2023: 136.7mm (+71.3mm) 3rd wettest on record

Apr 2023: 76.8mm (+13.6mm)

May 2023: 43.8mm (-18.9mm)

Jun 2023: 49.3mm (-21.2mm)

Jul 2023: 130.5mm (+58.5mm)

Aug 2023: 85.7mm (+3.4mm)

Sep 2023: 91.1mm (+15.1mm)

Oct 2023: 177.5mm (+74.6mm) 4th wettest on record

Nov 2023 127.0mm (+20.8mm)

Dec 2023 161.5mm (+58.1mm)

Jan 2024: 97.2mm (+3.0mm)

Feb 2024: 150.3mm (+77.9mm)

18 month total: 1907mm (+380.6mm surplus / above normal) so that gives an 18 month average value of about 1526mm! I wonder what the wettest and driest 18 month periods are as it would not be an easy task to go through all the data!

 

Now the same for

Central England region since September 2022 + how much from the 1991-20 average (+ for surplus, - for deficit)

Sep 2022: 52.8mm (-4.1mm)

Oct 2022: 85.1mm (+18.3mm)

Nov 2022: 96.7mm (+33mm)

Dec 2022: 52.7mm (-8.4mm)

Jan 2023: 47.2mm (-8.1mm)

Feb 2023: 9.9mm (-34.9mm) 4th driest on record

Mar 2023: 91.3mm (+48.4mm) 5th wettest on record

Apr 2023: 58.9mm (+13.4mm)

May 2023: 36.1mm (-14.5mm)

Jun 2023: 42.1mm (-17.6mm)

Jul 2023: 107.1mm (+46.1mm)

Aug 2023: 62.6mm (-3.5mm)

Sep 2023 78.3mm (+21.4mm)

Oct 2023: 153mm (+86.3mm) the wettest on record

Nov 2023 66.6mm (+2.9mm)

Dec 2023 115.1mm (+54.1mm) 5th wettest on record

Jan 2024: 57.6mm (+2.3mm)

Feb 2024: 116.5mm (+44.8mm) wettest on record and so the winter was the wettest as well for this region

18 month total: 1329mm (+288mm surplus / above normal) so that gives an 18 month average value of about 1041mm!

I trust i've not made any mistakes in all that, but that did take me a fair while without using Excel!

 

 

 

Edited March 2 by Metwatch

[al78]

Funnily enough the northern half of the UK hasn't been that wet relative to its climatology compared to the southern half. Last month according to HadUKP, SE England had double the rainfall of eastern Scotland which says something, climatologically they should be about the same.

I am really hoping for a prolonged dry spell now. I made good progress clearing and digging a new allotment in the cold dry spell in January and have managed to do almost nothing on it for the last month. I have got plenty of worked soil to plant potatoes later this month but if it keeps raining like this they will just rot in the ground. Don't cultivate heavy clay soil when it is wet they say, in that case when I am I ever going to be able to grow anything? I hope this is not going to be a seventh consecutive year of poor productivity. Is it really too much to ask to get a sustained period of weather within one standard deviation of climatology?

Edited March 2 by al78