Summer 2015 overviews and opinions

[damianslaw]

The summer very much saw a marked NW vs rest of the country split, I would count majority of Scotland as in the NW quadrant (Border area excluded), N Ireland, NW Eng and N Wales. There was a marked difference on the east side of the Pennines, sheltered from the incessant west/north west winds which plagued most of the country, hence the difference in Doncaster compared to here for instance, another world... we managed only a handful of days over 21 degrees...

[johnholmes]

Hoping not to get in too much trouble over pasting this in from the COL report for the UK for July

 

 

 

as you can see from the above the prevailing UK'wide wind direction was south of west

 

below is a similar output for June

 

 

When August arrives I will post that. Looking at the data, some of it from Met approved sites then I still find it hard to accept some (not all) the above comments about relentless NW winds etc.

Anyway it is only the weather, I'm happy with the stats for my garden, they also seem to fit quite well with 3 other sites in the local area.

Yep, having spent 5 years forecasting for this area I am very aware of its local climate.

Edited September 1, 2015 by johnholmes

[damianslaw]

Hoping not to get in too much trouble over pasting this in from the COL report for the UK for July

 

wind and t for net wx for july.jpg

 

as you can see from the above the prevailing UK'wide wind direction was south of west

 

below is a similar output for June

 

june t and wind.jpg

 

When August arrives I will post that. Looking at the data, some of it from Met approved sites then I still find it hard to accept some (not all) the above comments about relentless NW winds etc.

Anyway it is only the weather, I'm happy with the stats for my garden, they also seem to fit quite well with 3 other sites in the local area.

Yep, having spent 5 years forecasting for this area I am very aware of its local climate.

 

Thanks for the above - yes perhaps your right winds were more from a west-south quarter but had a source from the NW, returning polar maritime airstream as opposed to tropical maritime and thanks to the below average SST values to our NW, they brought colder temps than perhaps would normally be expected with the NW affected the most.

Edited September 1, 2015 by damianslaw

[johnholmes]

Yes could well be.

The first sentence of the 'Weather'  log for June=

'As in May there was, in the mean, an enhanced westerly gradient across the BI, in June though a greater anticyclonic bias ...'

I am not sure if the westerly refers to the gradient wind or the surface flow. If it was the gradient then that would fit with the wind rose shown with surface winds more south of west. Of course where anyone lives plays a big part, on a hill in an exposed or sheltered valley, to the lee of the main wind flow.

One feature here, more in August I think than the other two months, was the number of times the morning began with clear blue skies only to fill in with cloud before lunch time. A look at the relevant skew-t showed why=moist inversion. 

[Summer of 95]

Would be interesting to see the wind rose for May as well, I can't remember such an incessantly westerly May as this year. It did tend (to me) to have a NW rather than SW bias, but even the wettest Mays I remember (2006, 2007) all had at least a few days of anticyclonic or easterly conditions. 2015 had none, May is supposed to be the least westerly of all months I thought.

The summer overall seemed constantly windy. And it did seem to be mostly NW at least in June and July. Maybe this was a local effect (the Cheshire gap?) but it was notable that the westerly wind carried on even when the isobars suggested a south/southeast direction, or calmer conditions. It really has seemed constant.

[MP-R]

May 2002, 2003 and 2011 were all pretty westerly weren't they? Or at least they were all quite unsettled, especially the former two.

[Summer of 95]

May 2002, 2003 and 2011 were all pretty westerly weren't they? Or at least they were all quite unsettled, especially the former two.

2002 was one I thought of, that year was almost one nonstop southwesterly from mid Jan through to late Nov, save for an anticyclonic spell in September. Still had more warmth in May-Aug than 2015 though, even if it had the same lack of really warm days.

[cheeky_monkey]

Overall a decent summer here was spoilt by the poor last week of August..the only poor week of the entire summer and most of spring come to that.

Edited September 2, 2015 by cheeky_monkey

[MP-R]

2002 was one I thought of, that year was almost one nonstop southwesterly from mid Jan through to late Nov, save for an anticyclonic spell in September. Still had more warmth in May-Aug than 2015 though, even if it had the same lack of really warm days.

 

Not a year I'd like to see repeated personally. It's quite interesting how between mid-July and early October, save for a brief wet spell in September, that the pressure pattern became very slack over Europe with a lot of the unsettled weather in late July and August actually coming from the continent. I think mainland Europe had record breaking floods that summer. I certainly recall August 2002 being quite humid with a few thunderstorms in the first week, and a warm/hot spell in the second-third week. It was probably the most summery month of that year as May-July was pretty dire and I was on holiday during the fine spell around mid July. I'll never forget what an awful cold wet day September 09th was, coinciding with the return to school. Anyway, that's more for another thread.

 

This summer hasn't been as wet as 2002 here but is probably as boring overall.

[johnholmes]

Would be interesting to see the wind rose for May as well, I can't remember such an incessantly westerly May as this year. It did tend (to me) to have a NW rather than SW bias, but even the wettest Mays I remember (2006, 2007) all had at least a few days of anticyclonic or easterly conditions. 2015 had none, May is supposed to be the least westerly of all months I thought.

The summer overall seemed constantly windy. And it did seem to be mostly NW at least in June and July. Maybe this was a local effect (the Cheshire gap?) but it was notable that the westerly wind carried on even when the isobars suggested a south/southeast direction, or calmer conditions. It really has seemed constant.

 

here it is

[Mark Neal.]

Quick summary from my viewpoint in Oxfordshire. Early summer and Mid summer were very Dry and Windy. We had that very hot spell in June. August gave some respite and we saw some better conditions from the 6-9th. Since then an unsettled outlook, with much more in the way of rain. 

[J10]

Hoping not to get in too much trouble over pasting this in from the COL report for the UK for July

 

wind and t for net wx for july.jpg

 

as you can see from the above the prevailing UK'wide wind direction was south of west

 

below is a similar output for June

 

june t and wind.jpg

 

When August arrives I will post that. Looking at the data, some of it from Met approved sites then I still find it hard to accept some (not all) the above comments about relentless NW winds etc.

Anyway it is only the weather, I'm happy with the stats for my garden, they also seem to fit quite well with 3 other sites in the local area.

Yep, having spent 5 years forecasting for this area I am very aware of its local climate.

 

I can totally believe that the wind direction this summer was generally South Westerly.

 

Looking at stats from the Met Office, a cool, summer, sun above average, and rainfall also above average, largely caused by the very wet last 10 days, which saw more than the full average of August rain fall.

[Bradowl]

I'd say its been your typical average british summer, mixture of everything, only things that stick out is the very hot 1st July and 2nd part of August that's been rather wet and thundery. 

[Weather-history]

Can't wait for a 1960's type summer then all those moaning will have something to moan about, this summer was anything but cool, only a handful of coat days at most.

The Manchester Summer Indices of the 1960s

1960 217

1961 203

1962 197

1963 194

1964 197

1965 189

1966 192

1967 223

1968 215

1969 234

In the last 8 years, they were three worst summers than this: 2007, 2008 and 2012.

Interestingly Junes of 2012 and 2013 were cooler than any of the Junes of the 1960s for the CET. The Junes of the 1960s were not cool infact they were on the warmer than average side as a whole. It's the other two months that tended to let those summers down.

Another thing to note is that the summers of 1961, 1962, 1964, 1967 and 1969 were on the whole drier than average for England and Wales.

[lassie23]

Overall a decent summer here was spoilt by the poor last week of August..the only poor week of the entire summer and most of spring come to that.

As Cheeky_monkey says, down  in the south east it was a pretty decent summer,*hides from angry northern mobs armed with pitch forks and flaming torches.* It started off cool but then we had some decent temperatures and many days of sunshine, the humidity increased too, but nowhere near as humid and hot as last summer.  Late August ruined things with cool unsettled weather, but all in all, a good summer down here. Maybe things will flip during the winter period, the south gets all the cold and snow and the north gets a nice mild winter, where it feels like spring half the time.

Edited September 3, 2015 by lassie23

[MP-R]

Once again people are confusing the 'south' and the 'southeast'. Technically I am in the south but I would not go as far as to say the summer was decent - it was usable by the fact that it wasn't overly wet, save for the end of July and last week of August. Taking temperature and sunshine into account, however, it was below par. June had higher than average sunshine but cooler temperatures until the final week. July's temperatures were a notch higher but more noticeably at night as cloudier airmasses from the southwest encroached. August's first half was better than July but the second half was worse than July so they both effectively balance out. The southwest was effectively stuck between good weather in the southeast and bad weather in the northwest leaving much of the summer here 'non descript'.

[joggs]

Well here in Bingley,West Yorkshire,there was 2 notable(abliet short) hot spells but the most memorable aspect has been the storms for here.Saying that though we've not had many decent weekends to enjoy so that's the down side.Would I want a summer like this again?

Apart from the storms,no.Not had a great summer here(what I'm looking for)ever since 2003.

But a few winters since(not the last 2)have evened it out lol.

[weatherguru14]

2006 was an excellent summer and  2013 was pretty good. This year as been way to cold for my liking..

[Turnedoutniceagain]

UK endures 'coldest summer for years' > http://www.standard.co.uk/news/uk/britain-endures-coldest-summer-in-years-met-office-figures-show-a2926106.html

[hillbilly]

UK endures 'coldest summer for years' > http://www.standard.co.uk/news/uk/britain-endures-coldest-summer-in-years-met-office-figures-show-a2926106.html

What a laugh! A picture of London with the 'coldest summer in 20 years' headline,am I missing something,the south and particularly the south east have had a relatively good summer and good parts of the midlands have not really had anything bad,only western and northern areas can be painted with that headline !!

[Singularity]

Behold!

 

 

...

 

I know, it needs a lot of explanation doesn't it? 

 

Okay, so what I've done is take a look at past years in a bid to determine whether it's safe to believe that the cold anomalies in the N. Atlantic this year have encouraged the jet stream to locate unusually far south this summer, while also increasing the strength of the associated west-east flow (zonal wind). I thought about putting this in the climate change science forum, but I'd like non-members to be able to see it as well as members 

 

What you can see above is my fairly crude analysis of where the positive and negative SST anomaly regions are relative to the peak zonal wind anomalies. For all years, the black lines represent areas of anomalously high zonal wind, with particularly strong anomalies represented by two or three lines next to one another. This can be loosely interpreted to represent where the jet stream spent more time than usual.

 

The years up to 1995 only show where SST anomalies were greater than 1*C (solid orange lines) or lower than -1*C (solid blue lines), while for 2000 onward I have included dotted lines to show relatively weak anomalies (0.5 to 1.0*C in orange, -0.5 to -1.0*C in blue). This difference is purely down to this being work in progress - I intend to analyse more years in the near future.

 

What can be interpreted from the analysis output is that the peak zonal wind anomalies tend to occur between areas of SST anomalies near 1.0*C or greater and areas of SST anomalies near -1.0*C or lower that are located to the north of the aforementioned positive anomalies. Sometimes, the peak zonal anomaly lies within the negative SST anomaly region, but rarely does it occur within positive SST anomaly regions.

 

There is also some suggestion that particularly extensive and/or strong SST anomalies add some extra kick to the zonal winds (therefore jet stream);1991, 1992, 1994 and 1995 all show this well, while 2003 at least hints at it.

 

The mechanisms behind these relationships are open to debate, are are the implications should these findings continue to be supported by future analysis. I welcome your input on this matter, forum members 

 

 

Notice that the time series is missing a number of years. These are years where there is little clear relationship between the SST anomalies and zonal wind anomalies, which you can see in the next image:

 

 

 

Of these, the lack of a clear relationship between the SST anomalies and peak zonal wind anomalies could be put down to the following:

 

- 1996 and 1997 are lacking in anything more than weak anomalies (though looking at it now, 1997 could still qualify for the clear relationship group)

- 1999 and 2001 have a very messy SST anomaly pattern

- 1993 has largely negative anomalies, and 1998 largely positive.

 

 

 

 

If you have reasons to disagree with my interpretation, please don't hesitate to put them across 

[weatherguru14]

3 times the average of rain in August? am I missing something? its not been that wet here.. its been a decent august.. nothing special.  byut best summer month of the three.

[weather_it_will]

Very bad summer this year here.

 

In summary, too much rain, not enough sun, low temperatures.

 

Every weekend the weather was cooler than during the week.

[Paul1968]

Despite the regional differences lets face it ladies and gents this Summer will go down as average at best and pony at worst depending on where you live.I don't believe that anyone has had what you would call a decent Summer this year .

[cheeky_monkey]

Despite the regional differences lets face it ladies and gents this Summer will go down as average at best and pony at worst depending on where you live.I don't believe that anyone has had what you would call a decent Summer this year .

I had a near perfect summer...temps mainly 21c-25c with well over 20 days above 25c.. low humidity and very dry apart from the last week..its the low humidity that really got the thumbs up for me with just one uncomfortable day which was July 1st when it got to 36c...even when it got to 31c the other weekend there was a bit of a breeze to temper the heat nicely.