January 2026 has been very wet for parts of the UK. Northern Ireland has (provisionally) seen its second wettest January on record, and the wettest January in 149 years. Cornwall and County Down have recorded their wettest January as three named storms interacted with the UK.
There has been river and surface water flooding, coastal impacts especially with the spring tides, and now concerns for groundwater flooding. Northern Scotland was buried in snow for a week after Hogmanay, which brought impactful weather of a different type until heavy rain set in, and the thaw led to flooding here too.
Heavy snow in early January Oyne, Aberdeenshire - SnowandRocks Netweather community
Southern England recorded its sixth wettest January (the series began in 1836). For the UK overall, there was above-average rainfall, slightly below-average temperatures, and sunshine levels close to average for the month. The northeastern half of the UK was slightly below the mean temperature and the other half around average. Angus in eastern Scotland has been very dull in January with a persistent onshore damp flow off the North Sea.
Often, there has been a southeasterly or even easterly flow which has provided some shelter to NW Britain. Northwestern Scotland has been notably drier than average and it has been drier than average for western Scotland through the Central Belt and for the high ground of northwest England and for Snowdonia. Without the usual prevailing southwesterly flow, Dumfries & Galloway, Lancashire, County Derry and Anglesey were some of the areas that saw above average sunshine.
A more joyful event was the wide reaching Aurora of January 19th. A dramatic Northern Lights show was seen from Scotland down to Devon for those lucky enough to have clear skies or just cloud breaks. There were bright green and red colours across the evening skies making yet another memorable sighting close to the solar maximum.
The deep cold over North America has powered up the jetstream across the Atlantic, which has developed many low pressures. High pressure over Scandinavia has played a large part in slowing down these incoming lows and their frontal bands. These rainbands have dumped lots of rain over SW and southern Britain, but also allowed persistent onshore flows for NE Britain with a lot of cloud and wet weather. It has also been windy at times, especially as the named storms arrived.
Storm Chandra was the next named from the Western naming group after Bram in early December. However, January 2026 saw Storm Goretti and Ingrid impact the UK and Ireland, being named by Meteo France and IPMA, the Portuguese Met Service from the southwestern naming group.
All of this added to the increasingly saturated ground and various flood warnings. There has been little opportunity for flooded areas to dry out and recover before the next Atlantic low shows up.
“Overall, the UK recorded 17% more rainfall than the long-term meteorological average for January. Northern Ireland recorded 70% more than its January average. England was also very wet, with the nation recording 50% more rainfall than average.” Met Office
There was variation across the nations. Northern England recorded 10% more rainfall than average whilst southern England recorded 74% more. Scotland was below average with 87% but eastern Scotland saw 48% more rainfall than average (so 148%) with the drier weather in the west and northwest. Co. Londonderry, Dorset, Kincardineshire, Angus, Hampshire, Devon and Surrey all recorded their second wettest January since 1836 and some daily rainfall records fell.
“Katesbridge in County Down recorded 100.8 mm of rain, far surpassing the previous site record of 38.2 mm from 2005 (on the 26th). Dunkeswell Aerodrome in Devon reached 52.8 mm, while Hurn in Dorset, Cardinham in Cornwall and Plymouth Mountbatten in Devon all exceeded their previous daily records.” MO
Storm Goretti was named by Météo France but will be remembered here for its red wind warning for the Isles of Scilly and Cornwall as people were sent home, businesses closed and the storm howled into the night. Damage occurred from the 8th- 9th January 2026 with a gust of 99mph recorded at St Mary’s Airport on the Scillies.
Around the northern edge of the low there was widespread lying snow for Wales, the West Midlands and south Pennines with major rail disruption. Thousands of properties in southwest Britain lost power and water supply issues continued for days after the storm. The tree damage in the centre of the storm included historic gardens.
January coastal storm damage - Jo Farrow eastern Scotland
Ingrid did not gather such wide news coverage but brought more wet and windy weekend weather to southwest England with coastal damage to the south Devon coast. Teignmouth pier fell into the sea on the night of the 24th/25th.
Flooded roads late January Tauton, Somerset - Kiru, Netweather community
With this picture of saturated ground, high river levels and rising groundwater the UK Met Office named Storm Chandra for the next low pressure ready for the 26th-27th January. There was impactful flooding in Northern Ireland and again for the West Country. Somerset Council declared a major incident due to the amount of water and flooding. There were strong winds and hill snow further north in Britain and power outages for Northern Ireland and Ireland thanks to the storm.
January 2026 will be remembered for its very wet weather particularly in Northern Ireland, NE/E Scotland and SW Britain as named storms added to the wild conditions, especially Goretti for the extreme southwest. Northern Scotland will be wondering if that first week of January will be their main snow event of this winter.
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