Spring Weather Report 2013: Buckley's Heavy Snowfall and Report on Summer Weather 2012"

Mold Road, Mynydd Isa

23 March 2013

WAS THE 2012 SUMMER IN BUCKLEY SO BAD? By Neville Dunn

I was somewhat surprised to read the Daily Post's front page headline on 3 September 2012 which read WETTEST SUMMER FOR 100 YEARS. The details behind this headline had been provided by the official weather station based at Hawarden Airport and revealed that 345mm (13.6in) of rain had been recorded there between 1 June and 31 August. However. my recordings at Mold Road, Mynydd Isa showed that we had only had 296.5mm (11.7in) in the same three summer months.

Hawarden Airport at Broughton lies on the flat land that was reclaimed from the Dee Estuary many years ago and is only 4.9m (16 feet) or so above sea level whereas in Mynydd Isa I am 122m (400 feet) up and situated to the east of the Clwydian Hills. This difference in local topography could account for the rainfall difference - I know that in early August I travelled to Nantwich via Chester and Tarporley with lovely sunshine at home but we crossed a line on the road at Tarvin into torrential rain that ended a few miles on with another straight line.

I then set out to check from my recordings how other summer weather details for earlier years compared with 2012. The rainfall figure for 2012 was well above my average, 173.9mm (6.85in), confirming that it had indeed been a very wet summer. However I only had to go back to the summer of 2007 in Mynydd Isa to confirm that the rainfall in that year, 360mm (14.2in) was not only the highest I had ever recorded but was also higher than Hawarden's record figure for 2012.

I then checked the number of days in the three summer months when I had recorded some measurable rainfall. The average was 34.5 days and 2012, with 50 days out of the summer's 92 days on which I had rain in my gauge, was certainly soggy. There were only 44 rainfall days in my wettest summer of 2007 which indicated that, in the latter summer, there were probably more days with heavier downpours, these being often associated with thunderstorms.

I then checked temperatures, knowing that many people had grumbled at the dearth of warm, sunny days in 2012, spoiling their holiday prospects. The average temperature for the three summer months in Mynydd Isa is 15.8C (60.4F) and the 2012 average only reached a disappointing 14.7C (58.5F). I then looked for the lack of warm days in 2012 - weathermen consider these to have a maximum temperature of 21C (70F) or more, and also hot days when the maximum temperature reaches 26.5C (80F) or more.

Compared with my long term average of 34.5 warm days, 2012 had only 23 but looking back in my records, 2010 had only 21 and the wet summer of 2007 had an even more miserable 20, while by contrast the lovely summer of 2003 had 52. Hot summer days have become even more scarce with none recorded again in 2012, the third year running without any, compared with an average of 4. For comparison, 2003 had 9 hot days while 2006 was even better with 14.

I do not record sunshine hours but do record days that are entirely fine and sunny. In weather terms this means that the cloud cover for the whole of the day is less than 30% of the sky whereas for comparison fair and sunny days have skies with broken cloud cover that exceeds 30% of the sky. My average for summer in Mynydd Isa is 10 fine and sunny days and 2012 was disappointing with only 5. What is interesting is that we have now had less than the average such fine days every year since 2006 when we last had more of them at 16. Is it global cooling rather than global warming?

My records show that summers after 2006 have been consistently cooler and with more rainy days than previous years. The weathermen blame this change on the movement southward of the high level jet stream that crosses the Atlantic from west to east. This movement is in turn connected by them with the melting of the Arctic ice cap. If their predictions are correct, perhaps we are in for more soggy summers in the future.

Author: Dunn, Neville 2

Spring Weather Report 2013: Buckley's Heavy Snowfall and Report on Summer Weather 2012"

Mold Road, Mynydd Isa

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