August 2018: The start of the month saw the continuation of the hot weather with a peak of 29.3C on August 5 and two days at 28.6C on August 3 and August 6.
Then, towards the end of August, we began to feel as if autumn was approaching as several chilly nights arrived, the coldest of which saw the thermometer fall to a minimum of 5.8C.
August gave us a summer month with 168 hours of strong sunshine, which was 60 hours above the average over the four years since this instrument was installed. There were 11 days when the UV level rose into the Very High category, the remaining days all registered as High except the damp, overcast day on August 26 when the UV was Low.
The sunniest day occurred on August 5 with a total of 15.03 hours of strong sunshine – that’s when the sunshine recorder reaches a strength greater than 100w/sq.m.
Unlike the two previous months rainfall was close to the average with a total of 62.5mm, just 4mm below the 34-year average. This total principally fell on three very wet days with 18.8mm, 13.0mm and 11.5mm on August 26, 10 and 15 respectively.
There were sixteen totally dry days.
The equivalent rainfall lost to evaporation from ground sources and plant life was 81mm, which was 8mm greater than the nine year average and exceeded rainfall by over 18mm.
With so much sunshine it was not unexpected to find that the mean temperature was 0.8C above the average being the warmest August since 2004. The days were well above average (+1.1C) whereas the nights were much closer to the 34-year average (+0.4C).
As individuals we do have to adjust daily to our changing weather and August was no exception. The diurnal temperature for two particular days show that on August 5 there was a temperature variation of 19.7C whereas August 12 saw as little as 3.7C between day and night.
Summer 2018: The summer of 2018 was the second warmest I have recorded since the station was set up in Marlborough in 1984. The record summer for warmth was in 2006.
Due to the very dry months of June and July, before the wet days of August occurred, the rainfall for the three months was just 93mm – being 51 per cent of the 34-year average.
The equivalent rainfall lost through evaporation over the summer totalled 318mm, which was 55mm greater than the 8-year average.
Sunshine for the three months totalled 652 hours, which was 74 per cent above the average for the previous four years when the instrument was installed.
There’s more information at www.windrushweather.co.uk