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Summer 2020 - Moans, Ramps & Chat


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

Yes I think 2011/12 goes down as a decent example for much of south-eastern Britain.  February was a "month of two halves" and in the SE the cold first half managed to outweigh the mild second half.

Also, while June 2020 was rather wet for many, it was a warmer than average month with sunshine just a smidgeon below normal for the UK as a whole, so I don't think comparing with a mild Dec/Jan and cold Feb is a fair comparison.  Even if you took the global warming trend out of the equation June would come out no cooler than average.  By this measure the likes of 1982/83 and 1993/94 stand out more as potential winter equivalents, both having a near-average December, mild January and cold February (and the average December 1993 hides a regional contrast, it was mild in the SE but cold in Scotland).

Perceptions of this summer are being affected by what has admittedly been an unusually dull first half of July.

Edited by Thundery wintry showers
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Posted
  • Location: Windermere 120m asl
  • Location: Windermere 120m asl
1 hour ago, East Lancs Rain said:

I have been thinking that in recent days actually. Especially when songs like “please don’t stop the music” by Rihanna  come on the radio that came out around that time.

Umbrella from summer 07 very apt. This year 'rain on me' by Lady Gaga went to no 1 just when summer started.. ust a coincidence?

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Posted
  • Location: Pendle, East Lancashire, North West England
  • Weather Preferences: Not too hot, not too cold
  • Location: Pendle, East Lancashire, North West England
5 hours ago, al78 said:

I haven't checked to see if someone has already posted this, but the 700mb geopotential height anomaly from 1st to 14th July looks like the anomalous northwesterly pattern, and explains why temperatures have been suppressed.

 

compday.qy316nkKfc.gif

It does, but it doesn't explain why it's been so dull and cloudy. Don't northwesterlies usually bring sunshine and showers type weather?

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Posted
  • Location: Pendle, East Lancashire, North West England
  • Weather Preferences: Not too hot, not too cold
  • Location: Pendle, East Lancashire, North West England
2 hours ago, al78 said:

Going by CET since 1950:

1974/5

2017/8

It doesn't happen very often, that is because you are specifying exactly mild-mild-cold. There are more winters with one mild month and one or two cold or near average months.

December 2017 and January 2018 were mild?  I remember having quite a bit of snow and ice in December 2017, and January 2018 had a lot of cold zonality and cold winds. There was also quite a lot of frost during that winter too. The cold was on/off rather than continuous, but still. They definitely felt cold to me! 

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Posted
  • Location: Pendle, East Lancashire, North West England
  • Weather Preferences: Not too hot, not too cold
  • Location: Pendle, East Lancashire, North West England

Dull and overcast today here in east lancs , and feeling cool for the time of year with a high of around 17C. No rain though which is good. I don't mind the cloud too much but I wish it was warmer. Been in a hoodie and joggers since end of June! It's July for gods sake, I want some warmth!

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Posted
  • Location: Leeds/Bradford border, 185 metres above sea level, around 600 feet
  • Location: Leeds/Bradford border, 185 metres above sea level, around 600 feet
23 minutes ago, East Lancs Rain said:

December 2017 and January 2018 were mild?  I remember having quite a bit of snow and ice in December 2017, and January 2018 had a lot of cold zonality and cold winds. There was also quite a lot of frost during that winter too. The cold was on/off rather than continuous, but still. They definitely felt cold to me! 

Dec was close to average.

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Posted
  • Location: Lincoln, Lincolnshire
  • Weather Preferences: Sunshine, convective precipitation, snow, thunderstorms, "episodic" months.
  • Location: Lincoln, Lincolnshire
42 minutes ago, East Lancs Rain said:

It does, but it doesn't explain why it's been so dull and cloudy. Don't northwesterlies usually bring sunshine and showers type weather?

It's an interesting question, as my experience has been that at most times of the year this holds true, but not so much in high summer.  There are a couple of reasons for this that I can think of:

  • The dominant/strong Azores High in high summer, which results in a fair amount of moist tropical maritime air coming into the circulation, rather than clear, showery polar maritime air masses.  There's been a lot of frontal activity around so far this month which has prevented clear showery polar maritime air from getting going for long.
  • Sunshine and showers type weather requires instability, which is assisted by relatively cold air masses blowing over relatively warm seas.  In the summer months, the sea tends to be cool relative to the land masses, and so we're more likely to get relatively stable air and stratocumulus coming in off the sea. 
  • In summer polar maritime air masses can become very unstable as they pass over the land mass due to solar heating, hence East Anglia, Lincolnshire and the south-east tending to be favoured for thundery activity off a showery west to north-westerly in summer due to the large amount of land mass that the air mass passes over before its gets there.  But for that to happen you ideally need sunshine to begin with... 

In summer we tend to get sunshine and showers type weather most often from relatively slack setups, often indeed with a westerly or north-westerly flow, but with a weak jet stream and not much frontal activity - in contrast to what we've had so far this July.

Edited by Thundery wintry showers
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Posted
  • Location: Hounslow, London
  • Weather Preferences: Csa/Csb
  • Location: Hounslow, London

It's certainly looking like this summer could rival 2007 for cloudiness. June only managed 175 hours here, and it'll be a miracle if July even reaches 150. I don't want to think about how bad August will be.

A ridiculous 67 hours of sun so far this month, while just 200 miles away Paris is on 115 hours. Both average 212 hours in July.

Edited by B87
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Posted
  • Location: Redlynch, Wiltshire / 110m asl
  • Weather Preferences: Cold snowy winters, warm springs, hot summers, warm then stormy autumn
  • Location: Redlynch, Wiltshire / 110m asl

Hope August is better. Would rather a sunshine and showers setup, even if it was cooler, than the cloud bore fest. There’s been a handful of nice days but there’s been nothing exactly consistent.

Glad it’s been pretty dry here though. 

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Posted
  • Location: London
  • Location: London
10 hours ago, East Lancs Rain said:

December 2017 and January 2018 were mild?  I remember having quite a bit of snow and ice in December 2017, and January 2018 had a lot of cold zonality and cold winds. There was also quite a lot of frost during that winter too. The cold was on/off rather than continuous, but still. They definitely felt cold to me! 

Yes it was much colder during the whole winter, with some mild spells in the mix. I like to see a winter like that return to our shores.

I don’t want another 2018/19 or 19/20. Boring winters.

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Posted
  • Location: London
  • Location: London
11 hours ago, Thundery wintry showers said:

Yes I think 2011/12 goes down as a decent example for much of south-eastern Britain.  February was a "month of two halves" and in the SE the cold first half managed to outweigh the mild second half.

Also, while June 2020 was rather wet for many, it was a warmer than average month with sunshine just a smidgeon below normal for the UK as a whole, so I don't think comparing with a mild Dec/Jan and cold Feb is a fair comparison.  Even if you took the global warming trend out of the equation June would come out no cooler than average.  By this measure the likes of 1982/83 and 1993/94 stand out more as potential winter equivalents, both having a near-average December, mild January and cold February (and the average December 1993 hides a regional contrast, it was mild in the SE but cold in Scotland).

Perceptions of this summer are being affected by what has admittedly been an unusually dull first half of July.

June was pretty awful at times also. 

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Posted
  • Location: Barton on Sea, Hampshire
  • Weather Preferences: Snowy winter, warm/hot summer with the odd storm thrown in
  • Location: Barton on Sea, Hampshire

Rare clear blue skies here now which is nice to see. Shame the breeze has returned which isn’t so nice 

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Posted
  • Location: Horsham
  • Weather Preferences: Anything non-disruptive, and some variety
  • Location: Horsham
13 hours ago, B87 said:

It's certainly looking like this summer could rival 2007 for cloudiness. June only managed 175 hours here, and it'll be a miracle if July even reaches 150. I don't want to think about how bad August will be.

A ridiculous 67 hours of sun so far this month, while just 200 miles away Paris is on 115 hours. Both average 212 hours in July.

What makes you so certain that August will be bad?

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Posted
  • Location: Hounslow, London
  • Weather Preferences: Csa/Csb
  • Location: Hounslow, London
12 minutes ago, al78 said:

What makes you so certain that August will be bad?

Because it's a very safe bet these days.

It's been 17 years since the last hot August, and since the month went downhill in 2006, we've only had 6 that were average or warmer than average. The rest have been cool, cloudy, poor excuses of summer months. 2008, 2010, 2011, 2014, 2015, 2017 especially.

This August will need to average 25c+ and 230 hours of sun or more to save the summer.

 

Just watch it struggle with 21-22c average highs and 150 hours of sun.

Edited by B87
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Posted
  • Location: Horsham
  • Weather Preferences: Anything non-disruptive, and some variety
  • Location: Horsham
4 hours ago, B87 said:

Because it's a very safe bet these days.

It's been 17 years since the last hot August, and since the month went downhill in 2006, we've only had 6 that were average or warmer than average. The rest have been cool, cloudy, poor excuses of summer months. 2008, 2010, 2011, 2014, 2015, 2017 especially.

This August will need to average 25c+ and 230 hours of sun or more to save the summer.

 

Just watch it struggle with 21-22c average highs and 150 hours of sun.

If you toss a coin and it comes up heads 10 times in a row, does that mean it will come up heads next time?

What happened last August, the August before that, or any of the previous 17 Augusts has no bearing on what this August will turn out like. The UK weather is not that predictable.

Six out of the last 14 have been average or warmer than average. If you use tercile boundaries to define below average/average/above average, then over a large number of years, you would expect August to fall in each categor one third of the time. For 14 years, you should expect about 4-5 years of poor Augusts, 4-5 years of average Augusts, and 4-5 years of good Augusts. Six average or warmer than average is a bit below 8-10, but not significantly so because of the small sample size. This depends on whether you are defining above-average, average and below-average using objective data (e.g. CET and hadUKP), or subjectively going by your own definition of what a good August means.

previewimage.jpg
WWW.LOGICALLYFALLACIOUS.COM

The hot hand fallacy is the irrational belief that if you win or lose several chance games in a row, you are either “hot” or “cold,” respectively, meaning that the...

 

Edited by al78
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Posted
  • Location: Edinburgh (previously Chelmsford and Birmingham)
  • Weather Preferences: Unseasonably cold weather (at all times of year), wind, and thunderstorms.
  • Location: Edinburgh (previously Chelmsford and Birmingham)
1 hour ago, al78 said:

If you toss a coin and it comes up heads 10 times in a row, does that mean it will come up heads next time?

What happened last August, the August before that, or any of the previous 17 Augusts has no bearing on what this August will turn out like. The UK weather is not that predictable.

Six out of the last 14 have been average or warmer than average. If you use tercile boundaries to define below average/average/above average, then over a large number of years, you would expect August to fall in each categor one third of the time. For 14 years, you should expect about 4-5 years of poor Augusts, 4-5 years of average Augusts, and 4-5 years of good Augusts. Six average or warmer than average is a bit below 8-10, but not significantly so because of the small sample size. This depends on whether you are defining above-average, average and below-average using objective data (e.g. CET and hadUKP), or subjectively going by your own definition of what a good August means.

previewimage.jpg
WWW.LOGICALLYFALLACIOUS.COM

The hot hand fallacy is the irrational belief that if you win or lose several chance games in a row, you are either “hot” or “cold,” respectively, meaning that the...

 

This argument is slightly flawed since coin tosses are uncorrelated events. A run of poor Augusts, on the other hand, could be a response to a shift in climatic state initiated by, for example, an increase in greenhouse-gas concentrations. In the coin analogy, that could be like weighting the coin on one side so as to favour a particular outcome (i.e. the results become correlated). Equally, a particular climatic state might have no effect whatsoever -- in which case the coin analogy holds -- but there is no way of knowing that for sure.

Edited by Relativistic
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Posted
  • Location: Horsham
  • Weather Preferences: Anything non-disruptive, and some variety
  • Location: Horsham
1 hour ago, Relativistic said:

This argument is slightly flawed since coin tosses are uncorrelated events. A run of poor Augusts, on the other hand, could be a response to a shift in climatic state initiated by, for example, an increase in greenhouse-gas concentrations. In the coin analogy, that could be like weighting the coin on one side so as to favour a particular outcome (i.e. the results become correlated). Equally, a particular climatic state might have no effect whatsoever -- in which case the coin analogy holds -- but there is no way of knowing that for sure.

You could be right if a warming Arctic is leading to more high latitude blocking in summer, which tends to send the jet stream south over the UK or put the UK under a trough. I think the jury is out on whether that can be seen to be happening now though. It does seem that summer Greenland blocking has become more frequent since the very low Arctic sea ice extent in 2007.

https://rmets.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/joc.4673

I would still say that even if UK summer months have become biased towards poorness, it does not justify automatically writing off this August, because the weather can be thought of as probabilistic in nature. A bias towards a poor summer month does not exclude the possibility of a decent summer month, in the same way that a weighted die might be more likely that 1/6 to throw a six, but it won't necessarily always produce a six on any one throw (reminds me of the Bond film Octopussy).

Edited by al78
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Posted
  • Location: Windermere 120m asl
  • Location: Windermere 120m asl

June the further south and east you go wasnt too bad. Here we had double average rainfall, lower than average sunshine and temps only a tad above average, overall a poor month. July so far has been woeful, exceptionally dull and significantly below average temps and wetter than normal -triple whammy. Still 2 weeks to go but if not much improvement, a dry warm sunny August wont be enough to salvage the summer as a whole. For here we are at a tipping point in terms of how this summer will be ranked, and outlook suggesting average at the very best most we can now yield and that requires a very food August, always a tall order for us.

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Posted
  • Location: Pendle, East Lancashire, North West England
  • Weather Preferences: Not too hot, not too cold
  • Location: Pendle, East Lancashire, North West England
1 hour ago, Josh Rubio said:

Any turbulence weather on the horizon, be it heavy rain or strong winds?

It’s been a total cloud fest and dare I say pretty boring. 

Not that I know of, it is forecast to get sunnier in the days ahead but temperatures nothing to get excited about.

 

I agree about the dullness, it's the cloudiest (and coolest) July I've ever known!

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