Which of 2007 and 2012 was actually the worst summer?

[SummerShower]

Both of these were as we all know, poor summers, especially by modern day standards but which was worse?  The characteristics of the weather varied throughout each part of the summer and of course this varied regionally.

The CET was practically identical for both years, both coming out at 15.2, and they both had a mean min of 11.2.  2007 mean max was 19.3 and 2012 19.2.

The EWP was slightly wetter in 2012, 375mm v 343mm for 2007 (June 2012 being the wettest ever and August 2007 being relatively dry could be the separator here)

The first 2/3 of June 2007 was actually warm (though not hot) and quite thundery in various parts but of course serious flooding occurred too.  June 2012 had 1 hot day in the SE and of course those storms in the midlands/NE on 28th but was a cool washout other than that.

July 2007 was awful, no heat (1 warm day with a thunderstorm here on the 15th) with serious flooding in many parts around 20/21st. However 2012 was different.. despite being an exceptionally wet month also, it had a much warmer sunnier period after the 20th, although I think Scotland missed out on this.

August was the 'best' month of both summers.  2012 was actually decent enough in the south with some warm/hot days but not consistently.  2007 was better in the north and west I believe but the month overall was cool.

Taking this into account I'd say 2012 was the better one here in the south, but wondered what other peoples opinions are?  Of course this will also depend on your preferences for thunder/heat/sunshine etc?

[summer blizzard]

I would say that 2007 is a good clear winner here for me purely because round here even August was relatively poor as opposed to a summer of two halves for 2012 (the second half being relatively average and barely worth remembering). 

June 2012 is probably the worst calendar month (and had some spectacular showers) however the June 10th-July 10th period for 2007 would certainly be close. July 2007 of course was epic as the month summer completely failed (not a shred of heat) but it does get narrowly beaten by June 2012 for me. Despite similar weather patterns (if you swap the first and back halves around) June 2007 was also a much worse month than July 2012 so adding the worse July and August only extends that lead.

Two fantastic summers for the annuls though.  

[Harry233]

This is another fantastic comparison topic. I always thought it would be impossible to get a summer as poor as 2007, but I would say 2012 was even worse. 2007 and 2012 are the only summers in my area that haven’t exceeded 25.C since 2000.

My memories for these summers.

June 2007 actually started OK, admittedly it was dull but there was quite a lot of dry and warm weather in the first half, the second half was a complete washout however. The month was slightly warmer than average but nighttime temperatures were almost a degree warmer than average, daytime temperatures were slightly above average, almost double the average rainfall fell and it was the wettest June on record until 2017. It was the complete lack of sunshine which was the most notable feature that month, there was only 68 hours of sunshine which is only 40% of average.

July 2007 was very unsettled as well with double the amount of rainfall once again temperatures were around a degree below average but unlike June the sunshine was about average. I can remember a few very pleasant days in July 2007 however there was a lot of complete howlers of days. It was quite a thundery month from what I can recall as well. It seemed similar to July 2010 and 2016 in the sense it was generally cool and wet but there was the occasional really good day. 

August 2007 was another wet month but nowhere near as wet as June or July and like July the sunshine was average. It was quite cool a lot of the time though and even on sunny days temperatures barely exceeded 20.C. Don’t remember a lot from that month.

June 2012 if there was a month for abysmal then this would have to be it. Constant cool, wet and dull weather, the only time we had good, sunny days was between the 18th-20th. The highest temperature all month was 20.1.C. It was plain awful. Even the thunderstorms on the 28th we missed out completely and it just rained. I think what made it worse was despite being slightly drier and sunnier than 2007 the rain was just constant moderate falls we had no flooding issues that month.

July 2012 was another abysmal month. It was duller than the June and just seemed to never stop raining. There was occasional days where it would actually dawn sunny and dry but it wouldn’t always start raining by lunchtime. There was a short spell just before the olympics where it was quite settled but the highest we reached was 22.C. It was an appalling month felt like October.

August 2012 was still very wet but was an improvement somewhat. There was good spells of warm weather on the weekends of 11th-12th and 18th-19th. It didn’t have that autumnal feel like June or July it was a lot more humid. Sunshine was close to average and it was more thundery. It was like a cooler and less intense version of August 2004. Although it was noticeably cold at night right at the end.

 

Summer 2007 I’d say was the better summer as it wasn’t as dull and there was some good days spread out in the season. Whereas 2012 was an absolute stinker of a summer.

 

[philglossop]

Easy 

2012 was worse.

I got married () 7th July 2007,  that year on the only half decent Saturday when it rained pretty dry. Honeymoon in New Forest was wet and thunder with some half decent weather. August wasnt half bad, but didnt get any better heat wise.

But summer 2012 was just dreadful here, 1 BBQ the whole summer, it was cold throughout and frequently wet and depressing. Remember June after the jubilee just being cold, dull and almost monotonous.  July wasnt much better. Not a good year weather wise and set the tone for me personally until September 2013! 

[Summer18]

I think 2012 edges it for THAT June, it really was the worst summer month I have lived through. Every Friday seemed to be a complete washout and that Jubilee weekend felt more like November.

The rest of the summer wasn’t as bad but that’s not saying much, I personally think 2008 was worse than 2007 but it could be my memory being hazy. 

[SummerShower]

50 minutes ago, adam93 said:

I think 2012 edges it for THAT June, it really was the worst summer month I have lived through. Every Friday seemed to be a complete washout and that Jubilee weekend felt more like November.

The rest of the summer wasn’t as bad but that’s not saying much, I personally think 2008 was worse than 2007 but it could be my memory being hazy. 

Yes, 2008 was definitely the 3rd worse summer since the turn of the century.  It wasnt as much of a washout overall.  June was cool but had some ok days.  July had a summery last 10 days but was not good until then.  However August was atrocious and had no redeeming features whatsoever, it was one of those like June '12 that I dont think anyone would want to see repeated.

[hillbilly]

Not even a serious question.2012 was without doubt worse than 2007.I had 2008 and 2012 level pegging,both atrocious and if you look at the Manchester summer index it tallys with what I expected for this area.

2007 174

1931 173

1978 173

1980 173

1909 171

1946 170

1987 169

2008 168

2012 164

1924 158

1912 156

1956 155

1907 147

1954 143

[B87]

Summer index in London.

2007: 244

2012: 233

[Thundery wintry showers]

I was up in Tyneside in summer 2007 and in June 2012, moved down to North Yorkshire for July/August 2012 and just missed out on the big Tyne and Wear thunderstorm of 28 June 2012.  From my recollections 2012 was considerably worse than 2007. 

The Junes of 2007 and 2012 were both comparably dull and wet in that part of the country, mainly because early June 2007 had a lot of haar near the east coast while much of the rest of the country had some warm sunshine, but June 2007 was nonetheless about a degree warmer than June 2012 even near the coast.  July 2012 continued dull and wet, whereas July 2007 at least had close to average sunshine.  Late June and early July 2007 were also thundery with 7 thunder-days during the period 20 June-4 July.  I rather enjoyed the first half of August 2012, which had a week of sunshine and thundery showers followed by a few days of dry sunny weather, but the second half returned to being dull and wet.  August 2007 on the other hand was quite dry and sunny, if rather cool.

Indeed I thought summer 2008 was about as bad as 2007 due mainly to that August, which was widely the dullest since 1912.

Edited June 21, 2020 by Thundery wintry showers

[MP-R]

Just imagine we had a summer of June 2012, July 2007 and August 2008...!

Really tricky one as all three are about the same in my book. 2012 June was a write off completely, as was the first 2/3 of July, then the final third saw a much overdue summery spell. August was a real mix but often warm until the final week, indeed the 08th-14th was often sunny and warm, as was the that third weekend, and between it there was plenty of summer convective weather (6 thunderstorms that month). 2007 June actually had a largely fine first half, but the second half was poor. July 2007 was just awful. August 2007, however, despite being a rather uninteresting month, was very dry and sunny albeit never overly warm/hot.

In addition, 2008 June was ok down here, quite sunny in fact until the end, and much drier than May. July was mostly poor, although the summery spell at the end saved it from being a complete write off. August, however, was nothing short of turd. July 2008 and 2012 were pretty similar I feel.

[Summer of 95]

2012 definitely. 2007 had a cracking April, a fairly decent spell in early June and some spells of decent weather in August (particularly the bank holiday). It was most of May, late June (though that was thundery) and especially July that were bad. The rain seemed to come in a few great 2-3 week deluges with drier spells in between.

2012 had only that brief warm sunny spell in late May. Otherwise it was a cloudy, cold, damp crapfest from early April until late September. Even when it was drier and warmer it was still mostly dull (eg August), even that attempt at a good spell in July was spoilt by nuisance cloud here on many days. Then there was that 32C and sunny with storms in London, 21C and cloudy elsewhere day or two in August as a final insult.

The second best summer spell of the year was in late March. That was how awful it was. One thing redeemed the April though, the only significant snowfall of the year on the 4th. It really was a year without any semblance of seasons in the right place. December was also a washout and very mild in the second half.

I'd be inclined to agree 2008 was also worse than 2007, it had a decent first half of May and a hot week in July but that was it. June was just mediocre (not unlike 2002) but it was August that really stank it out. Unlike the deluges of 2007 it was just grey cloud and steady rain all month, even when it wasn't raining it was overcast. July and August 2010 were also appallingly cloudy but not as wet (June 2010 had more sun than July and August combined here). The best summer of that period was Autumn 2011!

Edited June 21, 2020 by Summer of 95

[Weather-history]

2012, that started off bad from the off. Remember the Diamond Jubilee? The only good thing about that summer were the Olympics. 

2007 started off OK and August was not as bad as July. Also felt the rainfall was more convective in nature, whilst with summer 2012, the rainfall felt more persistent. 

Regionally, 2012 is the wettest summer on record and 2007 is the 4th wettest.

 

 

[Scorcher]

2012 was the worst and probably the worst year for weather overall that I can remember.

After March it was almost completely devoid of warmth apart from a couple of spells. Even September ended up cool after a promising start to the month.

[Evening thunder]

I don't have statistics or such a good memory of 2007, but on balance I'd probably go for 2012.

2012 was certainly wetter here, no doubt the wettest on record. June: 186mm, July: 149.4mm. August: 136.2mm. Total: 471.6mm!
Also severe flooding in this area on the 7th July (unlike 2007 that was just wet with us missing the flooding rains).

2012 did however have an overhead thunderstorm with frequent lightning at 4am on the 28th June. Also another late evening thunderstorm in August. It also had a very warm few days in late July (one was a touch warmer than any days 2008-2011), and some warmth in August.

Just outside summer technically but 2012 also had a very warm spell in late May with 27.5C here, beating anything from the 2007-2012 summers lol.

June 2012 maxima were basically in the teens apart from a brief 23.7C on the 28th.
June 2007 didn't start too badly, and some of August was ok, with some low 20's. However the whole summer and especially July looks to have had a big lack of warmth. Had to wait till August 25th to even get 24C at Exeter Airport that year!! (Sometimes I have suspicions over those figures but it seems plausible looking at Dunkeswell). I don't remember much interesting stuff happening locally either, or much thunder. 

So 2012 was possibly a bit more 'interesting' meteorologically here and if I had to pick one I might even choose it. but perhaps a little worse from a summer point of view and general public perception.

Edited June 22, 2020 by Evening thunder

[B87]

June 2007 was better than June 2012.

July 2012 was better than July 2007.

August 2012 was better than August 2007.

[cheeky_monkey]

for me 2007 was hand down the worst summer..simply because in 2012 i was living in Calgary and that year was one of the hottest driest and sunniest summers on record there.

[hillbilly]

Must have been far different in the south,here in the pennines it is a no contest although the temps are very similar which is surprising but 2007 had 30 hours more sun every month and with the exception of June July and Aug were far wetter.

2007          average high                     rainfall                       sun hours

June            18                                     261                               127

july               18                                     93                                 161

Aug               19                                     34                                173

2012

June             16                                    164                                 101

July            18                                     115                                   138    

Aug             19                                      127                                 139

[A Face like Thunder]

I can only speak from my own experience rather than stats. After the fine weather of June and July 2006, the same months in 2007 were a nightmare from the point of view of outdoor work, with major storms in S Cheshire causing no end of problems. On Sat 30th June, I attended a reunion weekend in the south east of England, and it poured for most of the weekend. So I am going to go for 2007 as the 'worse or worst' summer of the two.

[Alexis]

2007 because of the relentless days of rain. It just rained and rained and rained. 

[Thundery wintry showers]

Having compiled the UK area-average summer index, I get 2007 196, 2012 175.  Averaged over the UK, summer 2012 had a mean max temp 0.35C cooler than summer 2007, it had 69 hours less sunshine and it also had 5.6 more wet days.  Indeed, 2012 had the highest number of wet days of any summer in the period from 1919 to 2019 inclusive.  Of course there will be regional variation around that. 

By this index 2012 ranks as the worst summer since 1985 and as the 4th worst since 1954, which has the lowest score (161), due to not being quite as cool and/or cloudy as those other summers.  Also, if you remove the global warming trend from the data, 2012 comes out with the second lowest index of the whole 101-year period, narrowly ahead of 1954.

Since 1980, the summer 2007 score of 196 was exceeded on the low side only by 1980, 1985, 1987, 1988, 1998 and 2012, and equalled by 2008, so by most standards 2007 was still a pretty poor summer for the UK.

Edited July 8, 2020 by Thundery wintry showers

[Weather26]

2007 just about edges it but 2012 would be equal in terms of rain we're it not for the fact that the most of the Olympics in 2012 had decent weather during it.

[East Lancs Rain]

I don't remember much of summer 2007, but summer 2012 was pretty terrible with some torrential downpours in June in particular. I remember July and August were very dull and wet. 2012 was also cold and wet from April - October. I remember a week of hot sunny weather at the end of May but that was it. 

 

My gut feeling is 2012 was worse.

[Weather-history]

CET: (Jun 1-12): 16.4°C (+2.9 degC) 

E&W Rain: (Jun 1-12): 4.4mm ( 16 per cent)

E&W Sun: (Jun 1-12): 75.8hr (100 per cent)

Shows that June 2007 didn't start out too bad. Look how dry it was up to the 12th

Edited July 16, 2020 by Weather-history

[danm]

The worst month out of both summers was June 2012. It was diabolical - wet, windy and very cool. However, 2012 - down here at least - did pick up after that. Early July was still cool and quite wet, however from mid month it became a lot drier and we then had a good spell of warm/hot weather that coincided with just before the start of the Olympics. August 2012 for London turned out to be a really nice, pleasantly warm month with good amounts of sunshine. From the 9th to the 20th we had 8 days at 25c or above, with the 18th and 19th exceeding 30c. So nothing spectacular, but very pleasant indeed.

2007 wasn't quite as wet here as June 2012, but it was worse for almost a complete lack of any real warmth. 2012 at least exceeded 30c on 3 occasions. In 2007 we didn't even exceed 30c once. It got to 29c in early August, but that was it. 

[LetItSnow!]

Interesting footage (and very low quality of its time!) of a severe hailstorm in south-west London on July 3rd, 2007.