Still some warm sunshine midweek but no sign of heat. An incoming low pressure will bring lots of heavy showers for the rest of this week. Dodge the downpour time.
As the week progresses there will be more heavy showers across the UK with the risk of thundery downpours. There will be bright spells in between. We’ve seen a lot of this recently as the radar image from Tuesday shows. Bright echoes from slow-moving rain showers but dry gaps around about. You might be lucky today but by Friday most people will be seeing showers.
London and Northern Ireland saw temperatures over 23C yesterday. It’s not the dizzy heights of the heat from mid-July, when Castlederg reached over 31C but in the strong sunshine with light winds, it feels warm enough. Many parts of the UK will reach into the low 20sC today but some western areas still in the high teens.
This is where the temperatures stay for the rest of the week. Next week should slowly get a bit warmer for eastern Britain but similar further west.
It has felt slightly cooler first thing and with hardly any breeze there is some mist, even patchy fog about this morning inland. A reminder that we are tipping into the back half of the year now.
Again, it is the heavy, sometimes thundery showers that need keeping an eye on and these will become more widespread for the rest of this week. A low pressure is moving its way across the Atlantic today which will then park itself over the UK for Thursday, Friday and the weekend.
This morning there is rain for the NW Highlands, frontal rain edging into Northern Ireland from the west and showery rain for Jersey as a low pressure moves by over northern France. The unsettled weather continues for the Channel Islands this week with a fresh SW wind.
Many places will stay dry with sunshine and feel fine. However, a scattering of showers with some heavy downpours begin to develop up through central England and just into eastern Wales. These drift towards North Yorkshire by this afternoon with a few still through the Midlands, inland Wales and convergence lines for inland SW England.
For Ireland up to NW Scotland, there will be more heavy showers, feeding north/NE with the risk of thunderstorms too. There will be clusters of heavy showers moving from Northern Ireland up through western Scotland tonight as the main low pressure arrives from the west.
It will be a more breezy day with strong winds through the Irish Sea and North Channel. Eastern England and the far NE of Scotland should manage to see some warmth and sunshine, but the heavy showers really get going from the west. There will be more cloud and rain with thundery showers over Northern Ireland. Through Friday and Saturday there will be warm, humid air wrapped up in the low pressure, giving fuel and energy to the convection.
The UK Met Office has already issued a Thunderstorm warning for Friday, currently across a central swathe of the UK. Again, there are concerns for high rainfall totals in some locations, up to 100mm is possible but not likely in any one place. There will be plenty of heavy showers about.
“Slow-moving thundery downpours may cause localised surface water impacts” MO
You can watch the Radar for a spot of Nowcasting if you want to nip out (click Animation on and watch the movement of the showers over time, add your postcode for a pin). Don’t rely on weather apps in situations like these. Not the amount or pattern of shower symbols or bright spells, nor the timings. The model output can show you that there is a risk of showers, even heavy showers or thunderstorms but it can’t yet give the accuracy to pinpoint your exact location at a specific time.
If it does, it’s lucky. Prepare for a downpour, a shower that comes along, gives a soaking and then moves away to let the sun appear again. Some places will get lots, others fewer. You’ll have to take your chances, and a raincoat.
A look back at July's weather in the UK - the heatwave and downpours.
