UK Weather - Autumn 2024

[Simon Culling]

It has turned colder over the UK although it has taken three days for the cold air to finally reach us in the SW of England. The high pressure retreated SW to the Azores over the weekend as a deep low persisted over Scandinavia giving a more general northerly flow towards the UK. Another low moving eastward across the middle of England on Mon/Tues complicated the picture and presented one of those will it or won't it snow dilemas for the forecasters. It snowed and more widely than expected with a general cover over much of England + Wales north of the M4 corridor - so no snow for us in Tiverton. The snow was heavy in places with up to 15cm or so recorded. The two attached photos are copied from the BBC Weather Watchers page and are both from locations close to Nottingham in the English Midlands.

Scotland has been in the colder air for a few days and the temperature fell to -11.2°C at Braemar this morning (Tues 20th Nov).

The cold air will persist until the weekend with plenty of frost and a few more snow showers in places.

[Simon Culling]

With cold air estblished over the UK, another low moving SE from Ireland Weds/Thurs was always going to give difficulties for the forecasters. The expectation was that rain into the SW would turn to snow inland and give a general light covering for the SW of England on Thursday away from the coasts. This did eventuate, but the snow was much more widespread and heavier than expected, with up to 25cm in places and it fell right down to sea level and even on the beaches.

Here in Tiverton, the rain turned to sleet around 6:30am and to snow an hour or so later and we had a general covering by 9am. We were on the northern edge of the rain so only had a 1 to 1.5cm snow depth, but this is not bad for mid-November. Picture attached was taken around 10am at the time of maximum coverage. The snow in the sunlit areas melted in the afternoon although the max was only 4°C, and we now only have a partial cover.

[Orion]

Next, Storm Bert through the weekend; looks like some heavy rainfalls and strong winds forecast:

https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/about-us/n ... is-weekend

[Simon Culling]

Indeed, Orion. With Storm Bert comes a plethora of warnings from rain + gales here in the south to Amber warnings for heavy snow + blizzards in far Northern England and Scotland - mostly for ground over 200m. Looks like being a miserable weekend for us Brits. The storm will also bring some very mild air northwards over the UK and we may see up to 16°C in more southern parts on Sunday.

The low is currnetly approaching the UK and deepeneing rapidly, and is expected to be around 936mb on the 18Z forecast chart for Saturday - but thankfully it is some way west of the UK whilst at its deepest. It will then slow down and meander across Scotland as it fills and still be in the North Sea by next Wednesday.

CET for November was 7.5°C (+1.0°C) up to the 21st and the EWR was 25mm up to the 20th which is 23% of the monthly average. We will make up a fair chunk of the rainfall defecit this weekend.

[Simon Culling]

Storm Bert (plenty of Sesame Street jokes about this ) provided the UK with a very wet and windy weekend with some serious flooding in South Wales and parts of the English Midlands. Rainfall totals were 150-200mm for the high ground of SW England and South Wales with most of this falling in a day and a half. The flooding was worst in South Wales and particularly in and around Pontypridd in the Rhondda Valley.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cgj7qvj097po

Here in Tiverton it rained all day Saturday + Sunday with around 40mm locally - so no flooding for us, although the local river Exe filled up quite noticably. Today, Monday 25th November, the sun has come out, but we are now seeing the usual showers we would expect to see in a SW-W flow in winter. A case of dodging them on the way to and from the shops!

Storm Bert also brought some very mild air northwards over the UK and especially in the south. Overnight Sat/Sun the temperature lifted to 16°C here in Tiverton and on the Sunday a high of 18.6°C was recorded in Santon Downham in Suffolk with 18°C quite widely in and around London.

[Simon Culling]

Thankfully the weather has calmed down since Storm Bert, and nothing extreme is in the current 7-day forecast. Storm Conall was named by the Dutch Met Service and only gave heavy rain to southern parts of the UK as it deepened as it moved away and into the southern North Sea. It gave The Netherlands a windy day on Wednesday (27th Nov) with the highest gust I can find being 128km/hr (80mph) on Vlieland which is an outer island on the north coast of the country.

It will turn quite mild again in the UK over the weekend as we move into the winter season, with 15°C expected on both Saturday + Sunday here in Tiverton and only a few splashes of rain - hopefully.

The CET for November was 7.1°C (+0.7°C) up to the 28th and the EWR was 78mm also up to the 28th which is only 73% of the monthly average. Following Storm Bert there is quite a wide variation in monthly rainfall anomalies.

[Simon Culling]

November 2024 was, averaged over the UK, slightly warmer but also significantly drier than normal. But as the attached Met Office summary explains, it was a month of two halves with a very dry first half and a very wet second half.

For November, the final CET was 7.2°C (+0.8°C) and the final EWR was 86mm which is 81% of the monthly average. Note, it was colder than both February + March of this year.

Autumn 2024 as a whole was a little milder, drier and duller than average.

https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/about-us/n ... 2024-stats