Local Forecasts, History & Records
Flooding and Rainfall in Durham UK
Cold, Wet and Cheerless Once again I have poor weather to report for this month in Durham. There were particularly high rainfall totals again and an incredible dullness that depressed the soul. I know that November is sometimes a cheerless month, but this one has been really rubbish. The weather has also been cold, with depressed maxima by day, although …
Here’s a graphic released by the Met Office, attempting to illustrate the wet weather we’ve had in the first half of November 2019. Now, the first half of November has been pretty wet. In fact 85mm of rain has fallen on Gilesgate since the start of November, continuing the soggy 6 months we’ve had. I looked at the map and …
Discovered this one today, via Facebook (credit Julian Harrop and the Beamish Archive). It shows a guy cycling through floodwater in 1950 (unknown exact date). The riverside was a bit different then. The bus shelters can be seen to the right of the photograph (Gypsy Queen, Diamond and Hammel bus stops). Some of the worst floods ever in Durham …
The headline says it all. September 2019 was really dry and quite pleasant for the first three weeks before the rains came back. Only 8.1mm fell in the first three weeks, as pressure remained high. Remarkable that the total for the month ended up at 81.0mm, making it a ‘wet’ month overall. That just shows how monthly statistics can completely …
After June and July gave us above average rainfall, August continued with the theme. There were brief spells of real warmth, but no real sustained anticyclonic spells. Thunderstorms were quite frequent in the disturbed weather patterns which came mainly from the Atlantic. We were on the North side of the Jet Stream for long periods. The opening week was reasonable, …
While I was researching weather ‘top tens’, I discovered Jonathan Webb of TORRO’s top 30. He’s given his top fifteen widespread events and his top fifteen convective (more local thunderstorms events). I’ll try to contextualise the widespread events as to how they affected Durham. I’ve also colour coded them (Green = Yes, Red = No) Widespread Events (as defined by …
The article was produced following a bizarre weather event in July 1968. The month was a very active one for thunderstorms and featured one of the greatest falls of Saharan dust in the UK in recent times. From Trevor Harley’s Weather website: July 1968 Generally dull, cool, and wet, especially in the south, but with two exceptional thundery outbreaks. The …
I don’t think I would be being too harsh on Summer 2019 if I said I thought it was slow getting started. After the first half of June, the prospects of summer were looking dire. There had already been over 100mm of rain by the time we’d reached the half way point. There had already been 5 days with more …
Heavy rain overnight on 16th March resulted in the River Wear in Durham rising to 2.36m just after 9pm. This was a rise of 1.8m in less than 12 hours. The river was a raging torrent, lapping over riverside paths. The river also carried lots of broken tree branches and wood downstream, snagging on bridges and the weirs further around …
This was a very wet day, but most of the rainfall fell after 8pm on 22nd. We were travelling back home from Ferryhill and had to pull the car over in Tudhoe as we couldn’t make out where the road was! There were also some crazy drivers on the road that night, one white van in particular. Rainfall became absolutely …
December 2015 was easily the mildest December on record. The mean of 7.9 degC at Durham was 3.9 degC above average. Top 5 warmest Decembers in Durham 1 2015 7.9 degC 2= 1843 7.3 2= 1988 7.3 4 1857 7.0 5 1934 6.8 December 19th 2015 featured the highest ever December temperature recorded in Durham. It reached 15.9 degC, a …
