Was the summer weather really as bad as you think?
- Published
Anecdotally, I've heard from a lot of people about how "bad" our summer has been.
Summer holidays hit by rain, summer fetes cancelled or days out made a bit more miserable.
We've even had two named storms - Antoni and Betty bringing unseasonably strong winds.
However, the statistics of meteorological summer show something a little different from our perceptions.
Meteorologically speaking, summer is defined as June, July and August. This is to ensure that statistically, when comparing years, we are always using the same timeframe.
Overall, summer 2023 has been pretty standard for the UK with rainfall and sunshine amounts close to or just below average. Temperatures however have ended up above average.
It's only when we break it down to specific periods that we see some stark contrasts.
Lots of sunshine throughout June with record temperatures.
Flamin' June
The weather throughout June was mostly dry, fine and at times, very warm. It goes into the books as the hottest on record.
Most of us will probably remember quite a lengthy heatwave around the middle of the month.
Temperatures exceeded 25 degrees widely for at least a fortnight and we had a maximum temperature of 32.2 Celsius recorded in both Chertsey and Coningsby.
The overall June mean temperature - this is maximum and minimum combined - across the UK was 15.8 degrees Celsius. That's 2.5 degrees above average.
It was also the fourth sunniest on record with much more sunshine than average across the UK.
Wetter July
Through July, the weather turned much wetter.
The jet stream - a fast wind high in the atmosphere - shifted to the south of the UK allowing rain-bearing weather systems to move in.
For the UK as a whole, rainfall was above average with Northern Ireland and parts of north-west England seeing double the normal rainfall.
It was also slightly cooler than average with the maximum temperature failing regularly to reach 20 Celsius. Sunshine was also in short supply.
Storm Antoni brought strong winds and heavy rain to many over a weekend in August
We're all going on a summer holiday?
The unsettled weather continued into the start of August and the peak time of holidays, summer fetes and events.
Anyone headed to southern Europe would have experienced extreme heat and the threat of wildfires.
Meanwhile, in the UK, the first named storms of the 2022/23 storm season - Antoni and Betty - barrelled in, bringing numerous Met Office warnings for wind and rain.
There are always regional differences in rainfall distribution but overall, we ended up having around the normal amount of August rain.
While sunshine amounts were again limited to below average, it was actually slightly warmer than you'd expect for August - but only by a degree or so.
Typical summer scene with fair weather cloud and some sunny spells.
The verdict?
June was by far the driest and warmest month but I suspect most of us will judge how good the weather was from mid-July to the end of August, during the school holidays.
The statistics for this period will actually say that - climatologically - this summer was warmer than average, mostly skewed by the warmth in June.
Rainfall was slightly above normal and sunshine slightly below.
Anecdotally, "it was rubbish".
I think the main reason we thought it wasn't particularly good is because over the last five years at least, our summers have tended to be drier, sunnier and warmer than average.
And within the school holiday period there was typically a time - however small - when the weather settled down with warm sunshine or even a heatwave.
As we move into autumn and children go back to school, will the weather turn into the summer we probably wanted?
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