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Prolonged Dry Spell


reef

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Posted
  • Location: London
  • Location: London
On 21/04/2019 at 11:06, Gray-Wolf said:

We have been really dry since last winter. Now we are at the point of cracked earth and yellowed grasses where first silage has been taken.

Thing is I do not see it letting up any time soon. In the same time the washout summer highlighted we can now find ourselves forced into  patterns very different to those of the last century ( even though it is just 'weathers' we did see in the last century)

I do not think we can remove the measured changes we see across our world ( be it the background global temp rise  and the associated water vapour increases in what the air now holds or the odd circulation behaviours we see as the planet struggles to balance its 'new' extremes) from what we see happening in our weather day to day?

Is our current H.P. dominance ( everything resets to H.P. over UK be it azores extension or Scandiwegian extension?) which itself is driven by a very different polar jet positioning than that which gave us our run of 'washout summers'?

You find your own reason for these different patterns but don't ignore the existence of them!

For my part I was leaning toward a low ice forcing for both washout summers and now or entrance into our 'drought' forcing until I ran into the 2013 paper that was investigation the Holocene optimum weather across NW Europe?

Now I do not know which to weight more as we sit around the global temps ( and so forcing) of the Holocene optimum yet the low Arctic sea ice ( and the shedding of copious amounts of energy into the arctic atmosphere each autumn/early winter now) is also obviously impacting the polar jet behaviour ( frequency/amplitude).

It does appear that all roads point to drought until the next major change in forcing? ( if the record lows of 2012 installed this current pattern and the Changes in Pacific Naturals in 2014 augmented it once the super Nino was spent)

As such we should sit back and enjoy the dry weather and any sun it might bring with it!

But do not think we will not see potential record breaking precipitation events thrown in for good measure!

I think 2020 will see a shift back to cooler wetter and cloudier summers for a time, maybe until the mid 2020s. I see a return to something similar between 2007-12 happening.

This drier warmer phase that’s set in since 2013 will come to an end soon. That said, 2015-17 had cooler wet spells, but the length of drier spells seem more long lasting and evident since 2013.

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Posted
  • Location: Mytholmroyd, West Yorks.......
  • Weather Preferences: Hot & Sunny, Cold & Snowy
  • Location: Mytholmroyd, West Yorks.......

Cannot see it Sunny 76'

If it is a pattern tweaked by low sea ice do you see another 2012 any time soon to free up more 'energy soaking' ocean surface to power the kinks in the polar jet?

If it is reduced dimming/flip to IPO+ve then we have up 25 years more of IPO+ve and China will continue in its efforts to clean up its emissions

If it is the global temp we have arrived at ( mimicking the thermal max) then we stay here but impacts intensify?

 

Going back to low ice it was the 2012 opening up of the pacific side of the basin that added in another area acting like Barentsz/Kara had been doing through the noughties. The only area left ready to give up the ghost is the central basin so how will this impact circulation over the basin in Autumn/early winter compared to the current 2 hotspots of the ocean entrances?

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Posted
  • Location: Skirlaugh, East Yorkshire
  • Location: Skirlaugh, East Yorkshire

Today failed to produce any rain here at all so we've now had only 10.4mm in the last 38 days.

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Posted
  • Location: North York Moors
  • Location: North York Moors
10 hours ago, reef said:

Today failed to produce any rain here at all so we've now had only 10.4mm in the last 38 days.

Similar here, about 13mm in passing showers since 16th March which was the last day with any significant amount that might have soaked in a bit.
I fancy today will struggle to produce more than 5mm, 3mm or so on Saturday maybe.

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Posted
  • Location: South Norfolk, 44 m ASL.
  • Weather Preferences: Varied and not extreme.
  • Location: South Norfolk, 44 m ASL.

Long-range Met Office forecast suggests East Anglia will be a desert by June.  Something seriously weird is happening here.

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Posted
  • Location: sheffield
  • Weather Preferences: Basically intresting weather,cold,windy you name it
  • Location: sheffield
11 minutes ago, chrisbell-nottheweatherman said:

Long-range Met Office forecast suggests East Anglia will be a desert by June.  Something seriously weird is happening here.

So many folk either are not understanding how serious this could become or just don't care. We need a lot of rain and soon.

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Posted
  • Location: Sheffield South Yorkshire 160M Powering the Sheffield Shield
  • Weather Preferences: Any Extreme
  • Location: Sheffield South Yorkshire 160M Powering the Sheffield Shield

This unsettled spell hasn't produced much in the way of rain. We've zoomed up 7.9mm plus today's rain. Saturday is supposed to be wet but we shall see.

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Posted
  • Location: Hadleigh, Suffolk
  • Weather Preferences: An Alpine climate - snowy winters and sunny summers
  • Location: Hadleigh, Suffolk

Great analysis from Dan Holley at Weatherquest illustrating the deficit in rainfall across East Anglia over the last 3 years. The highlights:

  • Up to yesterday (24th) EA has received only 8mm of rain so far this April (17% of average).
  • Since May 2016 the rainfall deficit is now 220mm (and is 180mm over the last 12 months).

The graph shows how each month compares to average over the past 3 years - green wetter than normal, brown drier than normal.

1187361219_EastAngliaRainfallMay2016toApril2019.thumb.jpg.c7f548d607adcba0a3eb6894b26496d1.jpg

https://twitter.com/danholley_/status/1121323367938842624

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Posted
  • Location: East London
  • Location: East London

Is it ever going to rain again here in London? Just light showers that lasted 5 minutes around here. 

Rhetorical question......... thankfully it seems as if this weekend will bring some rain around these ends. 

Edited by Zesyph
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Posted
  • Location: Skirlaugh, East Yorkshire
  • Location: Skirlaugh, East Yorkshire

The dry spell well and truly broke today for us with those thunderstorms. 18.6mm in total and the hail is still melting in the rain gauge.

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

We didn't see much rain yesterday just a few shortlived heavy showers, the same has happened today, heavy rain/shower activity happened further east. Tomorrow and Saturday promise more general long lasting rain, something we haven't had for over 3 weeks now.

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Posted
  • Location: Sheffield South Yorkshire 160M Powering the Sheffield Shield
  • Weather Preferences: Any Extreme
  • Location: Sheffield South Yorkshire 160M Powering the Sheffield Shield
1 hour ago, Zesyph said:

Is it ever going to rain again here in London? Just light showers that lasted 5 minutes around here. 

Rhetorical question......... thankfully it seems as if this weekend will bring some rain around these ends. 

Yes certainly. We are not in uncharted history.

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Posted
  • Location: Godalming
  • Weather Preferences: Plumes and streamers
  • Location: Godalming
1 hour ago, Zesyph said:

Is it ever going to rain again here in London? Just light showers that lasted 5 minutes around here. 

Rhetorical question......... thankfully it seems as if this weekend will bring some rain around these ends. 

If they forecast it two days out chances are it isn’t gonna happen. I saw complete rainmageddon a couple of days back for today and tomo and most of next week but now it’s all changed to dry and cloudy with some sun - proper MOR weather, with no exciting parts added.

now we’ve got to wait another 3 weeks for the next chance of any storms too, which they will forecast and which won’t happen. Seriously bored with southern UK weather already and it’s only April. Storms and rain everywhere except here.

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Posted
  • Location: South Norfolk, 44 m ASL.
  • Weather Preferences: Varied and not extreme.
  • Location: South Norfolk, 44 m ASL.
2 hours ago, Blessed Weather said:

Great analysis from Dan Holley at Weatherquest illustrating the deficit in rainfall across East Anglia over the last 3 years. The highlights:

  • Up to yesterday (24th) EA has received only 8mm of rain so far this April (17% of average).
  • Since May 2016 the rainfall deficit is now 220mm (and is 180mm over the last 12 months).

The graph shows how each month compares to average over the past 3 years - green wetter than normal, brown drier than normal.

1187361219_EastAngliaRainfallMay2016toApril2019.thumb.jpg.c7f548d607adcba0a3eb6894b26496d1.jpg

https://twitter.com/danholley_/status/1121323367938842624

Indeed, that chart demonstrates the problem for those who doubt that there is one.

Edited by chrisbell-nottheweatherman
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Posted
  • Location: Efford, Plymouth
  • Weather Preferences: Misty Autumn Mornings, Thunderstorms and snow
  • Location: Efford, Plymouth

Interesting debate.

Winter 2017-18 was pretty dreadful here in the South West but then we had the lovely Spring/Summer before the drier Autumn and last Winter. 

 

Going by Burrator, we’re well down on water levels already here. I do get the feeling that we’re in a pattern not dissimilar to 1975-1976, so if we get a 76 summer (looking more likely this year) we’ll be in fair bit of trouble. Thankfully we’ve more water reserves now compared to 1976 down here.

32699935-0071-4A98-BA88-F39370B6120B.png

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Posted
  • Location: Wigan, Greater Manchester/Lancashire
  • Weather Preferences: Warm, sunny.
  • Location: Wigan, Greater Manchester/Lancashire

I think we’ll actually get an average month as far as rain goes. My nearest met office forecast station is Crosby, where there was 50% rainfall before all the rain yesterday and today. If not average at least 80%

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Posted
  • Location: South Norfolk, 44 m ASL.
  • Weather Preferences: Varied and not extreme.
  • Location: South Norfolk, 44 m ASL.
On 26/04/2019 at 09:59, MIKE LEVITT said:

looks like an average summer coming up.

Based on what?

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Posted
  • Location: Sheffield South Yorkshire 160M Powering the Sheffield Shield
  • Weather Preferences: Any Extreme
  • Location: Sheffield South Yorkshire 160M Powering the Sheffield Shield

Well yesterdays rain wasn't enough so had to top the ponds up. Probably get severe storms this afternoon now I've done that.

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Posted
  • Location: Irlam
  • Location: Irlam
On 19/04/2019 at 13:11, reef said:

Is there anyone else having a prolonged dry spell at the moment?

We've only had 109mm (56%) since 23rd December (nearly 4 months!) and have a rolling 12 month total of 453.6mm (68%). Anything below 450mm in a rolling 12 month period is very unusual in this area. It has only happened in ten 12 month rolling periods since 1980 in three distinct dry spells.

The first was August - November 1989, the second February - June 1992 (May was just above this) and most recently in February and March 2012.

Certainly in 2019 useful rainfall has been pretty rare (just 20 days with >1mm so far and only 9 of those were >3mm) and following on from 2018 it is certainly getting even those not usually interested in the weather talking.

How much rain have you seen in your area?

Regionally, it was the 2nd wettest March on record and now April is around average, This spring even now, is the wettest since 2015 

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Posted
  • Location: South Norfolk, 44 m ASL.
  • Weather Preferences: Varied and not extreme.
  • Location: South Norfolk, 44 m ASL.
6 hours ago, Weather-history said:

Regionally, it was the 2nd wettest March on record and now April is around average, This spring even now, is the wettest since 2015 

Shows how pronounced regional differences are!

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Posted
  • Location: Cambridge, UK
  • Weather Preferences: Summer > Spring > Winter > Autumn :-)
  • Location: Cambridge, UK

Only 16mm for the month so far here in the desert city of Cambridge. We had 21mm in March, 18mm in February and 15mm in January.

Even stepping back into 2018, December only had 33mm and November 19mm. October was the last truly 'wet' month with 54mm recorded.....even that is only around average though. 

It's dry as a bone. A pretty common theme across a fair number of locations it would appear.

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Posted
  • Location: Skirlaugh, East Yorkshire
  • Location: Skirlaugh, East Yorkshire
4 hours ago, chrisbell-nottheweatherman said:

Shows how pronounced regional differences are!

It must definitely be an east-west thing, because here last spring was very wet at 195.0mm, the second wettest since 2000. 2015 on the other hand was drier than average with 116.2mm compared to the average of 143.6mm.

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Posted
  • Location: Crewe, Cheshire
  • Weather Preferences: Snow, storms and other extremes
  • Location: Crewe, Cheshire
11 hours ago, Weather-history said:

Regionally, it was the 2nd wettest March on record and now April is around average, This spring even now, is the wettest since 2015 

I noticed today that even after a sunny day, the ground is still wet from Saturday's 24hr deluge. 

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Posted
  • Location: Cleeve, North Somerset
  • Weather Preferences: Continental winters & summers.
  • Location: Cleeve, North Somerset
4 hours ago, mb018538 said:

Only 16mm for the month so far here in the desert city of Cambridge. We had 21mm in March, 18mm in February and 15mm in January.

Even stepping back into 2018, December only had 33mm and November 19mm. October was the last truly 'wet' month with 54mm recorded.....even that is only around average though. 

It's dry as a bone. A pretty common theme across a fair number of locations it would appear.

This is incredible, more so November and December, which brought 100mm and 127mm respectively here! Conversely, October was much drier, as was January. What was last year's total for you?

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