Wettest days in Durham

After the heavy rain of 14th August 2023, I set about looking back on days with similar totals in Durham since I started recording here.   The total for 14th August was exactly 30.0 mm, which seems a suitable total to use as a threshold. Here’s what I found: 14th August 2023   30.0mm 17th … Read more

October 5th 2021 – What a Deluge!

As some of you may have noticed, yesterday (October 5th 2021) was extremely wet! After a long spell with no real heavy rain, it seemingly all arrived on one day. We’d been warned to expect heavy rainfall, but it proved even wetter than that. Durham and North East England just seemed to be in the … Read more

January 2021 Weather in Durham – Wet and Cold

Durham Cathedral in the snow, January 2021

January 2021 – A cold, wet month at Durham With Storm Christoph a noteable feature Temperature After the warmth of January 2020, this month proved to be the exact opposite. The month proved to be both wet and wintry, with an exceptional snowfall in the North East area on or around the 6th-8th of the … Read more

How Heavy is ‘Heavy’? Rain, sleet and snow

Raining Cats and Dogs

Alright my weather mateys. Who’s sick of wet weather? If you didn’t put your hand up there you must be some kind of weirdo. It seems like it’s been raining for years non-stop now. The dry soils of last spring are now a distant memory. We often hear it said that it’s ‘raining cats and … Read more

October 2020 Weather in Durham – Starts very wet with Storm Alex, then continues moist.

Rainfall October 2020 opened very wet. A total of 32.7mm of rain was recorded at Gilesgate, Durham on 3rd resulted in a rapid rise in the River Wear, overtopping the banks in places, and reaching 2.76m at 8:15am on the 4th. The river level fell back rapidly and had dropped a metre by mid afternoon. … Read more

August 2020 Weather in Durham : Good start, poor end

Durham Weather : August 2020 The weather in Durham in August 2020 was disappointing overall after starting out really well. It was typical of the summer really. There were no long settled spells as such at Durham, although some very warm weather was experienced in the south of the country, culminating with 36.4C recorded at … Read more

An August Deluge – Nearly 1/2” of rain in 10 minutes in Durham!

View of durham cathedral and castle in heavy rain

23rd August 2020. Very heavy rain in Durham This is the scene from the Bandstand by the River Wear in Durham on Sunday 23rd August 2020. The heavy deluge dropped 9mm of rain in 10 minutes on Durham and it’s surroundings. That’s a rate of 54mm per hour, which is a proper dowpour. In the … Read more

February 2020 Weather in Durham – Wet and Wild

There was a very wild start to February, although it was relatively mild. Storm Ciara over the weekend of 8th/9th brought damaging gusts and flooding. The worst of it passed to the South of us, but there was major flooding in Yorkshire and winds gusted to 93mph in Wales. The River Wear in Durham rose dramatically … Read more