Evening thunder

This spell of weather has been about as I expected here really. A few nice frosts, then mostly cloudy with the easterly, 4-5C maxima and 1-2C minima. Now a few more frosts at the easterly relaxes. A bit of snow on Dartmoor. The marginal temps were always in the model output, suggestions of much more for the south was probably model thread hype. Turning less cold next week but after that? who knows. I try not to get sucked into this day 10+ chase anymore though, let alone 'potential'. If it's showing at day 5/6 I'll take interest.

Had light rain last night at 11pm with a temp of -1.3C.. then radar suggests another shower at 4:15am at -0.5C. Close examination of the glaze on the cars suggests it could have been sleety, but it had the same effect. Webcams show it was snow on Dartmoor and the Blackdown Hills, so there must have been a mild enough layer between that elevation, and the valley inversion. Highest temp all night 0.2C. Currently mostly cloudy and -0.1C. Still a bit of frost/frozen ground left from yesterday.. with an extra crunch to it now.

Cloud cleared around midnight, a min of -4.1C with some freezing fog until about 10:30am, then mostly sunny with a max of 3.8C. Patchy frost stayed in the shade all day. Already -1.6C.. Kind of a shame it will cloud over, always seems hard to stay clear on the would-be coldest nights. Looks cloudy tonight, tomorrow, and tomorrow night all for a system that will probably give very little precipitation here.

That's this year's snow quota used up!

Low of -5.3C here, a slight uptick before dawn due to some cloud. The lowest temp since 3rd February 2019 (-6.2C). A thick hard frost and partly cloudy with a nice sunrise, becoming cloudier through the morning, a pretty wintry grey and frosty scene. We had the thing where frost starts melting on some surfaces (cars, roofs) even at -1C, and on the lawn before 0C.. It seems when it's cloudy that reflected longwave (or redirected shortwave energy that does get through from the sun) warms surfaces to slightly above the air temperature? The opposite is true when it's clear and shaded areas stay frosty all day even if the air temp gets a few degrees above freezing, as they are still radiating energy to the clear sky. Just risen above freezing, 0.1C. Still mostly frosty on the trees and vegetation sticking up into the (until recently) sub-zero air, partly frosty on some fields but melting. Kind of looks odd having the grass all green and dewy but trees/cow parsley etc still white (although that's starting to melt too now).

Very mild today and cloudy although brighter bits at times. Currently 13.9C after 12.6mm overnight bringing the monthly total to 113mm (the heaviest rain on Friday stayed to the west). In contrast, this was 10 years ago yesterday! We got lucky and had more than expected, it turned to rain or a wintry mix near the coast from Dawlish southwards.

Not that wet here this month.. The heaviest rain has often missed here especially at the start of the month. 97.0mm of rain here on the Davis. The manual gauge is probably just over 100mm.. but I forgot to record one of the readings ? My October average for 2007 onwards is 94.6mm. For November it's 119.2mm

Friday was the sort of active/stormy/mobile weather I like. A wet & windy start.. I went to Berry Head and had torrential showers and gales at first, however these cleared to some blue skies and good cloudscapes while it stayed windy. I had an enjoyable walk in those conditions and stormy seas are always fun to watch too. Got home to a pleasant afternoon, with sunny spells and light winds. The countryside looked great in the sun and clear visibility with a backdrop of dark based cumulus. Then a few intense showers formed to my south lit up in the evening light. Basically a lot of weather happened in a day. In contrast, yesterday and today show the opposite side of low pressure. Dull with light/moderate rain all day. Don't think I enjoy that any more than most people. It's the 'everything but the kitchen sink' style of Atlantic weather I like, not slow moving fronts with cloud & rain all day

Yeah, we've had 15.4mm in the last 47 hours. Not really worthy of a yellow warning let alone amber. Although I was never convinced here, I don't want to complain about the initial warning as dynamic situations like this are hard to model/forecast exactly, However, yesterday evening when they extended the warning until 12:00 today I'd have taken the opportunity to remove my area.. it was clear the rain had pretty much stopped here and indeed we've had 0.0mm overnight. Their own forecast had no rain until 12:00 today ironically. On the other hand, the area around London-Reading has had loads again overnight, the most in England, and some of that area isn't even in a yellow warning. Just feels a little bit lazy or like they aren't really monitoring it in real time (especially as they are based less than 10 miles away from here), or that there's an inertia to remove warnings once issued. People around here will think well they got that wrong again.. even though the models didn't really get it wrong.

Not as wet here, 12.6mm so far today. Models seem to be turning down the rainfall totals here for tomorrow too.. Gusty winds, had a 36mph gust on my station. We're kind of sheltered from the NE so not surprised it's not stronger.

Not as wet as it looked like it could have been here, 12.6mm so far today. Gusty winds but we're sheltered from the NE so not too surprised it's not stronger. The East facing coast of South Devon could be a bit blowy.

I haven't minded the weather recently. I enjoyed the warm summery conditions we had, and the recent cooler spell as it was quite sunny here. In my records this September was sunnier than August or the last 4 Septembers. Might be some interesting conditions this weekend, although I could also just be stuck under a front with light/moderate rain here. I'm glad we're getting variety though, because if high pressure goes on and on at this time of year, I can find it a bit boring (harder to get notable warmth or cold at this time of year). We're heading towards the time of year where I most like a few wet/stormy lows too (traditional 'Autumn storms'). It's perhaps the best time for it, as there's less potential for other interesting conditions, before they then give way to the cold and snow of winter

In some ways it can surprise me how quiet it can get in here with these sorts of charts. Ok it may be less pleasant, but there's more weather to talk about than if it was just high pressure at this time of year. Hoping I don't get stuck under a front all weekend but I do otherwise like mobility/variety and I'm finding myself looking at the models a lot more (in part to see potential rainfall amounts here), than if we were high pressure dominated at the moment.

September can seem a bit boring to me.. can be harder to get high temps (even from high 850s, especially in the SW), and often too early for real Autumnal interest. Sometime we seem to get increased high pressure ridging that that just hangs around.. which would have been lovely, and possibly hot, in summer.. but then it just brings near average weather in September and into October when I'm ready for something more active/interesting. It's nice when you do get late warmth though as it is probably the last of the year. I have seen some good plume type thunderstorms in September such as 2014 and 2016 though.. and I kind of liked last September, downpour on the 9th, then a sunny high, and then an active end with heavy showers/rain.. Felt like more a traditional transition into Autumn. With sea temps near their highest, there is perhaps more potential for heavy rains, and the chance of 'Autumn type' thunderstorms near the coast increases theoretically, but high pressure ridging often sees that go to waste. Given that I prefer summer these days I probably prefer September due to daylight and warmer temps than October/November, even if the latter has more active weather. This coming weekend looked unsettled and even had a storm showing on yesterday morning's ECM.. now it seems high pressure ridging just hanging around/building in the south instead. Tbh I kind of wanted the unsettled and breezy/windy weather, more interesting for a kitesurfer Edit: That's not to say I don't like pleasant September weather, I do and appreciate the pleasant weather and more so than when younger when I was more after the extremes. Although it's still more interesting when it isn't just weeks of mostly 18-20C maxima.

At least we've had varied conditions this August to keep some interest, I guess.. If it was constantly average we'd get complaints of the mundane/samey nature of our climate. After all strings of 10C+ above average days like earlier in August have to be balanced out somehow to give our climate averages. Today was quite nice here, 18C and mostly sunny. This summer has been a mixed bag here (like you'd expect in a British summer really). Perhaps a little more on the 'poor' side for rainfall/sunshine but not too bad overall and not as bad as some other parts of the country.

Didn't expect a thunderstorm yesterday but had one after lunch. Some very heavy rain with it although not quite as intense as a few miles further south or further east as that feature developed further. About 12mm in an hour and 22.1mm in the manual rain gauge was the daily total. About 10 rumbles at least, Lightning was close with some quite bright flashes, and loud crashes. I was working outside in it which was fun lol.

Not really sure I've seen anyone doing that or saying that the one week heatwave means summer overall was amazing though? I'd probably rate this summer as not far from average here, maybe a touch below, so about 4 - 5 out of 10. That is taking everything into account, including the hot spell, and the poorer spells. We had some pleasant weather in July when it was worse further north (even on the North coast of Devon/Cornwall). Sunshine has perhaps been slightly below par though. On a personal note, not very good for thunder, except a storm a few miles away on Thursday (that I mostly missed seeing!) which gave 60-70mm to a few villages 5 miles from here, while we had 1mm. In fact it's been quite dry since June (with various light falls of rain/showers, but nothing too significant). Our lawn and the small field behind went quite brown again. Though that will change with showers yesterday, today, and the rain tomorrow. It's clear from the Met Office anomaly maps that it hasn't been that far below average here and areas further north have feared worse.

The dull gloom has remained all day but with the addition of intermittent drizzle/light rain registering 0.8mm. Max 19.8C Min 17.6C Thanks Met Office auto forecast I needed a good laugh today

Late report, but we did get a fairly strong storm a few miles away on Thursday which 60-70mm of rain in a few villages (e.g. Feniton), with surface water flooding. It was constant rumbling from here.. but annoyingly, I missed most of it! Drove back through some torrential rain as it started to weaken, got home to hear the last 6 rumbles or so. Only about 1mm here, after the thunder had stopped. So still not really got my storm fix. Since then, it feels like the weather has died. Dull, dingy, hazy and still. Especially yesterday evening and so far today. High minima though, 18.8C yesterday and 17.6C today. As the chances of any further storm action here appear to be waning, I'd be glad of some Atlantic air to clear this out tbh.

How to you 'turn on the north sea mist' or 'draw a thunderstorm towards somewhere'? Actually, if anyone knows the answer to the latter, please tell me, I'd pay good money!

Another warm humid sweatbox today, temp 26.5C, peak so far 27.3C, with the sun often behind some sort of cloud. There's quite large cumulus bubbling a few miles inland with pileus at times. Other altocumulus cloud around, some Ac Cas at times. It does feel as if it's going to go bang somewhere.

Some cumulus bubbling inland (just east of Exeter). looks like some action may be a bit closer to home today though sea breeze likely to keep my actual location clear of surface based convection

Had quite a lot of Ac Cas yesterday, with some lovely stuff at Sunset, and a mild level shower over Lyme Bay (third pic) Then a brief shower came overhead about 22:40 with a flash and rumble, but it was a one flash wonder (I was looking at the laptop screen of course). Just before that, when in the garden I thought I saw a few faint flickers to the north.. so went into the field behind and yep, faint 'atmospheric flickering' to the north every few seconds.. So I then measured the distance to the midlands storms.. about 120 miles I have seen lightning from far away storms but that's the furthest I've been able to detect it from (couldn't see the clouds, it was just presumably reflecting off any dust/haze etc in the atmosphere). A low of 16.3C last night, warm for this valley with a clear night. A record warm morning, already 25.8C, and a record early arrival of the sea breeze has recently occurred!

Yup, earlier on I could just about make out the flickering of the northern atmosphere from here in Devon! I measured it as about 120 miles as the crow flies. A shower then passed overhead so I couldn't see it anymore, and produced a flash and rumble but it was a one flash wonder.

So we have about the only shower in the area just arrived overhead. Also, looking north, I can see faint 'atmospheric flickers' every few seconds that must be from the storms in the Midlands, about 120 miles away.. That's amazing! And as I type, we just had a flash and rumble from this shower!