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26Th Of December 1998


M1JWR

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Posted
  • Location: The Debatable Lands
  • Location: The Debatable Lands

Hi

I am new here, so greetings to all.

I would like to tell you all about the most frightening devestating weather incedent, i have ever witnessed

Boxing day 1998 was fairly normal to start with, was at a mates house when it kicked off, managed to get home in time before the strongest winds arrived

I remember looking out at one point and seeing a tin roof sheet flying across the yard and impaleing itself in another roof, i had to go into another building to secure

its roof, as the roof on a lean to building next to it, was, i dont know where, and these were good solid roofs, well built.

I live in the scottish borders, hurricane stephen as i later found out it was called, passed over glasgow, so my area was in the fireing line on the southern flank.

100mph + i recon that night, i spent the rest of the night beside the coal fire being pestered by two labrador dogs, the electric went off early on.

The following morning revieled devistation, a whole wood was flattened not far from me, dozens of trees like matchsticks, a guy near me lost the gable end from his house.

Parts of the missing roof were over a hundred yards away and probably there are bits i have never found to this day

I have an idea what people go through in other parts of the world when this type of weather is a regular thing.

I dont mind admitting it frightened the living daylights out of me, i dont ever want to experience the like again

Edited by M1JWR
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Posted
  • Location: Carmarthenshire
  • Location: Carmarthenshire

Here are some charts from the day. Although you mention it originated as a hurricane, the charts show that rather than dissipating the depression deepened as it approached the UK during the day, with the pressure dropping from 970mb to 955mb. There's a brief article about it on Wikipedia which quotes wind speeds of 103mph at Prestwick Airport:

http://en.wikipedia....oxing_Day_Storm

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post-8245-0-66608900-1294517943_thumb.gi

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Posted
  • Location: Windermere 120m asl
  • Location: Windermere 120m asl

I remember christmas 98 being very unsettled and stormy but not as stormy as christmas eve 1997. I remember christmas day 1997 for the power cut and debris everywhere complete contrast to the two preceding christmas days which were cold dry sunny. Infact christmas 1999 was also unsettled wet and windy.. our recent christmas weather has followed this pattern..

95 and 96 - cold sunny and dry

97, 98, 99 - very wet mild and very windy

00 and 01 - cold sunny and dry

02, 03 - mixed and mild

04, 05, 06 - cold variety and settled

07 - mild wet and windy

08, 09, 10, cold, snowy, sunny

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Posted
  • Location: The Debatable Lands
  • Location: The Debatable Lands

I also remember the one in january 2005, the more well known storm that flooded carlisle, it was quite nasty.

The big difference was rain, there was a shed load in 2005, cant remember any in 1998, wind wise, 2005

although bad wasent a patch on 1998, and it was cold too.

Windermere is quite a bit south of me, that would have made a bit of a difference.

The area around the solway, bad weather is a formality, ive lived here all my life, and have seen some bad stuff.

But for me something has to be remembered above all others, and that was boxing day 1998

Edited by M1JWR
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Posted
  • Location: Cleeve, North Somerset
  • Weather Preferences: Continental winters & summers.
  • Location: Cleeve, North Somerset

Christmas 1999 certainly sticks in my memory. Can't remember whether it was Christmas Day or Boxing Day but it was very windy indeed with a number of torrential squals of driving rain, hail and eventually snow moved through but there was thunder and lightning on two occasions too. Looking at the charts archive it looked like a real full on cold zonality scenario but anyone else recall such whether that Christmas?

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Posted
  • Location: Lincoln, Lincolnshire
  • Weather Preferences: Sunshine, convective precipitation, snow, thunderstorms, "episodic" months.
  • Location: Lincoln, Lincolnshire

In Cleadon the 25th December 1999 was a day of sunshine and showers, it started off warm with temperatures of 7-8C but gradually got colder and in the early afternoon, despite a temperature of around 4-5C, a rain shower turned to snow on its backward edge and gave a bookies' white Christmas here. Even the London Weather Centre saw some brief wet snowfalls mixed with rain showers, making the bookies pay out, though that particular cool zonal spell gave widespread lying snow only to high ground.

The storm of Boxing Day 1998 was followed by a couple of days of sunshine and wintry showers in northern areas, unusually from a south-westerly flow, and a number of places had lying snow to low levels early on the 28th. There was no snow at Cleadon but I remember having a trip out to the rural parts of County Durham and seeing snow flurries there, and lying snow above about 200m. There was no snow around the time of the storms of Christmas 1997 which saw a particularly vicious one on Christmas Eve.

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  • 1 month later...
Posted
  • Location: Windermere 120m asl
  • Location: Windermere 120m asl

As I stated in an earlier post, whilst boxing day 98 was a wild windy one, it was not as severe as christmas eve 97, would like to see any reports about the christmas eve 97 storm which hit these parts particularly badly. We had no power until late on christmas day, and we had to take the turkey to my nanas house who had gas power as we only had electric.. fond memories!

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Posted
  • Location: Camborne
  • Location: Camborne
New 28 Dec 1997

A remarkably intense and rapidly developing storm cut across the United Kingdom during the evening of Christmas Eve, killing three people, leaving at least 35,000 homes without power, causing great damage to homes, power lines and trees, and causing traffic chaos. Winds and damage was greatest in a swathe from Northern Ireland, across north Wales and the Wirral and Merseyside regions about Liverpool.

Winds were strongest over Ireland in the afternoon and over Wales and the Mersey early evening as a small secondary low pressure system, which developed in the Atlantic northwest of Ireland earlier in the day, passed across the northern Irish Sea. Sustained winds between 40 and 50 knots were commonplace. Cork on the Irish south coast had a mean speed of 56 kts at 14.00 UTC with gusts to 80 kts at 15.00, at the same time as Valentia Observatory, on Ireland's southwest coast, recorded gusts to 87 kts. At 1650 UTC, Valley on the Isle of Anglesey off the NW coast of Wales had a mean speed of 53 kts, with gusts to 79 kts. Aberdaron Automatic Weather Station, on the tip of the Lleyn Peninsula in NW Wales, recorded a peak gust of 97 kts at 18.00. On the east coast, the gales arrived early Christmas morning, with 70kt gusts reported from a road bridge near Goole, west of Hull.

Pressure falls ahead of the low were as great as 15 hPa over 3 hours, with pressure rises behind the low of up to 22 hPa over 3 hours.

http://www.australianweathernews.com/news/1997/arc9712.html

Charts for 1800z on the 24th.

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Posted
  • Location: The Debatable Lands
  • Location: The Debatable Lands

The storm of boxing day 1998 will always stay in my mind, i will never forget it, ive seen some dodgy weather over the years.

For example the winter of '81/'82, over minus 20 for a lot of nights, milked cows then, was a nightmare, they sent 1000 litre

plastic bags for the milk to go into when the tank was full as tankers were frozen and couldent collect very often, to my mind

it made last december like a spring day and it went on for 7 weeks

That freaky summer of 2007 went to nearest town on motorbike one day went round a corner into a literal wall of water,so i

backtracked and stood under a tree, the wall of water slowly came towards me, just as it got to me it changed direction and

went north, i looked up and two angry clound were heading oppisite each other and looked to me as thry were trying to make

water spouts, i reconed i know what comes after that, so i got out of there fast

In april that year i was wallpapering for a friend and we saw hail stones the size of golfballs

2006 was the hottest summer i can remember, and i can remember 1976

1985 was the wettest year i can remember, apart from the day of donnington monsters of rock, the rest of that summer was

constant rain and fog

News years eve 1974/'75 there was a thunderstorm, the like ive never heard since

I remember 1975, 1976, 1984 and 1995 being long hot summers

They were some of the stand out bits that stick in the mind

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  • 3 months later...
Posted
  • Location: Caldercruix, North Lanarkshire - 188m asl
  • Location: Caldercruix, North Lanarkshire - 188m asl

I remember this storm very well, even although I was only 7 years old. We sat in the midst of a power-cut, listening to the winds battering off the walls of our house. There were more trees felled, than left standing in the field opposite from our house. And around 11pm I looked out the kitchen window just in time to see our Garage roof tearing off and flying through the neighbours' gardens. Quite a brilliant sight considering the roof is 10 x 20 foot in size. Definitely one of my favourite weather events so far . . . . laugh.gif

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  • 5 months later...
Posted
  • Location: Carlisle, Cumbria
  • Weather Preferences: Atlantic storms, severe gales, blowing snow and frost :)
  • Location: Carlisle, Cumbria

This is probably one of my most memorable weather events that has occurred over Christmas, very frightening indeed as we were travelling back from my grandparents during the evening which is about 30 miles from home, we intentionally set off before the peak of the storm was due but it was too late! The car was being blown all over the road, there was huge piles of leaves, big branches and all sorts of debris being airborne and flying past us, we come across two trees which had been flattened which were blocking the road and also street lights bent over. My mum was driving and I could tell she was scared stiff, me and my brother kept very quiet as she was concentrating hard and determined to get us home safe, we had come to far at this stage to turn round.

TV forecasts we watched through boxing day afternoon mentioned gusts of 80-90mph with isolated gusts to 100mph.

When I look back at this I think why on earth did we even make that journey!! to think what could have happened, we were lucky to get home that night and ever since this my mum has been extra cautious and thinks twice of driving in stormy conditions!!

The peak of the storm was late evening and lasted until after midnight, we got to sleep about 2am after the intense roar had subsided and the house has stopped shuddering. We lost 3 ridge tiles and about 6-8 slates and some guttering.

post-9615-0-24873200-1320185248_thumb.pn

Edited by Liam J
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  • 2 months later...
Posted
  • Location: Wildwood, Stafford 104m asl
  • Weather Preferences: obviously snow!
  • Location: Wildwood, Stafford 104m asl

legendary bbc forecasts, good to see mild air in good old 90's, seemed like it snowed every day in winter

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Posted
  • Location: Windermere 120m asl
  • Location: Windermere 120m asl

Remember the stormy wet conditions of boxing day 1998, however, it wasn;t a patch on the storm we endured on christmas eve in 1997 which brought a power cut on christmas day - a memorable christmas day indeed!

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