Overrated summers

[Summer8906]

OK from recent to further back, focusing on this area:

I won't mention 2021 as in this part of the country most agree it was poor.

2019 - mostly an unsettled summer, though July was dry. June was poor until near the end and August had a lengthy cool, breezy, Atlantic-dominated spell from the 5th-19th. The last few days were also unsettled. I am very thankful that the temp record was broken in 2022 as summer 2019 was utterly undeserving of it, IMO.

2018 - a good one true, but not as exceptional as made out. First three weeks of June cloudy (if dry) and unsettled from August 8 to the end of the month. Good yes, but no 1976, 1983, 1989 or 1995.

2017 - slightly overrated IMO. One 10-day hot spell in June and the first half of July was warm with variable cloud, but the second half was dire and there was plenty of cloudy, damp weather in June too away from the 10-day heatwave.  Basically a warmer version of 1986. Nuff said.

 

Edited March 11 by Summer8906

[Summer8906]

On 06/03/2024 at 08:48, Weather-history said:

I do think summer 1990 is overrated, I think the early August heatwave magnifies it. June 1990 was not particular great. 

This probably proves your point on location as here, while June was indeed cool and cloudy, July and parts of August were so good that it made up for it. I remember literally almost constant warmth and sunshine from around July 10 to August 10. I distinctly remember one cloudy day (perhaps the final Monday of July) and thinking how "novel" the cloud seemed after weeks of sunshine!

 Methuselah I don't remember 1973 but according to MWR it was a rare "rain sandwich" summer. Two good months (June and Aug) was relatively unusual for 1960-74 .

[danm]

38 minutes ago, Summer8906 said:

2019 - mostly an unsettled summer, though July was dry. June was poor until near the end and August had a lengthy cool, breezy, Atlantic-dominated spell from the 5th-19th. The last few days were also unsettled. I am very thankful that the temp record was broken in 2022 as summer 2019 was utterly undeserving of it, IMO.

2019 seems to get a bad rap by some. There was a cool and wet spell for a period in June and a unsettled short period in mid August. Other than that there was a lot of warm and sunny weather. 

July was warm:

 

...as was August:

 

The Summer as a whole had around average to slightly above average sunshine for our part of the country:

 

In London, July 2019 had 15 days at or above 25c, 3 above 30c. August had 13 days at or above 25c, with another 4 days above 30c. 

Edited March 11 by danm

[Summer8906]

 danm Interesting to see that the south coast had only average maxima in August 2019 compared to places further north, and I suspect it only even made average thanks to that hot to very hot week towards the end. ISTR even 21C maxima were rare from the 5th-19th, I distinctly remember that period being very un-summery with a constant damp and nagging SW-ly breeze. A very typical contemporary summer month, one intense hot spell but pretty poor outside of that.

August 2023 was similar from the POV of it being locally cooler here; actually cool here by day (and even by mean temp, IIRC) when it was warm further east.

I'm convinced the south coast is doing poorly for summers recently compared to other areas, and Aug 2019 and 2023 provide some evidence for that. As I said, increased frequency of cool, damp onshore SW winds (at the expense of WNW or NW winds) is a possible cause.

 

Edited March 11 by Summer8906

[Sun Chaser]

I'd also say 2017 - the best month of that summer was June and that was a week-long hot spell surrounded by cool and EXTREMELY DULL weather. The final week of June where I was had three hours of sunshine! It was also fairly wet. Having memories of a washout camping trip with school at the end of June 2017.

July started off decent but descended slowly throughout the month and ended up slightly duller, cooler and wetter than average - nothing too bad though. August was just very cool and fairly wet/unsettled - lots of days in the high teens and a couple of hot days during the final BH couldn't save it.

Overall the summer was the 3rd coolest, 3rd wettest and 4th dullest in the last 10 years and kind of fell flat after the solstice. If anything I'd say June 2017 is HEAVILY overrated and helped by the fact it came after the excruciatingly dull June 2016, while August 2017 is slightly underrated (it was sunnier and less wet than other dire Augusts it gets compared to)

I believe most see it as a decent summer but to me it was poor.

Edited March 18 by Sun Chaser

[SummerShower]

 Sun Chaser yes June 2017 was a funny one.  That heatwave in the 3rd week was great, and I'd say quite noteworthy too.

However I'd agree many people forget that the last week was extremely dull and wet, and also that on the 5th/6th there was a vigorous depression with very heavy rain and strong winds.  These 2 periods of weather were as bad as anything in June 2012.  June 2017 was probably one of the most polarised months I remember.

[danm]

2017 was very front loaded. A very hot spell in June, some more hot weather in early July but the Summer then faded away.

13th-26th June was very good. Early July had temperatures between the low/mid 20's to low 30's up until the 18th. Late July and August were poor. Cooler than average right through the second half of the Summer. 

Edited March 18 by danm

[reef]

 Weather-history Only 1980, 1987 and 2012 score lower on the summer index here than 2020 in the last 44 years. It was an atrocious summer in this area. All three summer months were duller and wetter than average. July was particularly bad with 49% of normal sunshine, 1.0C below average and 120% of normal rainfall. It is the only month ever to record below 100 hours of sunshine in summer.  August had just 132 hours so only 229 hours of sunshine between them. 

The summer as a whole had just 411 hours of sunshine, beating out 1987 for the dullest on record by 2 hours.

[LetItSnow!]

 Sun Chaser My main memories of June 2017 other than the hot spell were just unsettled. The minima was the second highest on record for June behind... 2016. As mentioned, early June was extremely unsettled with gale force winds on the 6th that nearly took out our old shed! After another bog standard hot spell in early July the summer left and never really came back. At least locally, summer 2017 was exceptionally wet with frequent thundery downpours. The frequency of thunderstorms (I lived in NW Kent at the time) between late June and early September, in particularly late July, was quite remarkable. I remember the most intense of downpours on the 23rd. In our old garden we had a beautiful array of flowers and herbs including plenty of lavender and the whole garden was an absolute luscious green. August was mostly cloudy and cool bar the warm end which only got up to about 28-29C. We had torrential thundery rain on August 9th which lasted ages and was one of the wettest days in my records at the time. So my main memory of summer 2017 was often cloudy, cool and wet but with frequent violent thunderstorms, including a surprise thunderstorm on September 1st which I may make a historical thread about.

[baddie]

Summer 2014 is overrated mainly due to the August being poor. June was also pretty poor up in East Yorkshire for sunshine, and just average for me. July was the only "good" month of that summer

Edited March 18 by baddie

[kold weather]

 reef Sounds like our version of 2021 down here in the SE, bar the first 7-10 days of June and a 5 day period in July it was a utterly dreadful summer down here, made even worse that statistically its actually pretty good for much of the rest of the country, so causing considerable envy. 

I still contend that locally the spell between mid June 21 and just before the July heatwave was amongst one of the worst I've ever had in summer, even comparing to summers like 07 and 12. 

Kind of an inverse to the usual, I can't imagine we see that kind of pattern all that often.

EDIT - just looked up the local station for June-July 21. We had a 4 week period which had just 58hrs. For context, that would be a slightly below average *February* total locally....

Edited March 18 by kold weather

[Sun Chaser]

 baddie Being a lot smaller and unaware of weather stats, 2014 in my mind was always equal to 2013. I really enjoyed 2014, a rare combination of sunny warm dry June and July without ever being exceptionally hot. August was gross statistically but the following September made up for it pretty well, very settled and warm.

[Sun Chaser]

 SummerShower  Yeah June 2017 was a really funny one! Giving shades of July 2021 and May 2012 with how polarised it was

[reef]

2017 is the second wettest summer here since 1980 and actually came in just 60.1mm lower than 2007. All three months were very wet (200%, 130% and 173% of average) and it is the summer with the most rain days on record (54 days).

The only real highlight was the spell just before the solstice. The rest of the summer only reached 25C three times. The longest dry spells were just 3 and 5 days long (16th-20th June and 16th 18th July). It also contained some very wet days indeed: 26.8mm on 6th June, 49.0mm on 28th June, 57.4mm on 8th August.

[Harry233]

 Sun Chaser I think summer 2017 was a rather poor summer overall. June was dreadful we missed out on the heatwave the best I could do was three days off warm sunshine and dry weather and even then the maximum temperature never rose above 25.C. Either side of that the weather was cold, wet and windy. In fact June 2017 is my wettest June on record for nearly 30 years and in Edinburgh it was the wettest June in over 100 years. July wasn’t overly bad but it was generally cool, strangely though we had most the bad weather in the first half whereas the second half was actually quite pleasant with a few warm days. August was dire the highest maximum I recorded was only 22.4.C and it was generally dull and wet although nowhere near as bad as June. Even the September that followed was also poor.