Spring 2015 Seasonal Report

Spring 2015 has been a typical spring in many respects, certainly we've experienced plenty of weather!  From a minimum cold of -3.1°C in March, the thermometer in April climbed to a balmy 20.9°C during a three-week spell of generally fine weather.  Indeed, April would have really stood out as an exceptional month had it not been for some lively April showers at the end of the month. March and May by contrast were both on the cool side, making spring overall a little cooler on average than we'd expect.

Looking at temperature in more detail, March's average of 5.2°C was almost 2°C below the typical value for the month (7°C).  April was ever so slightly below average (8.1°C compared to 8.5°C), but then May was much cooler, averaging 9.8°C against an expected figure of 12°C.  Of these, April's is perhaps the most surprising, as we had a sustained spell of fine weather, but those two weeks of clear skies, although they brought high day-time temperatures (April's mean max was 1.4°C above the average), also meant nights were cold.  March and May were both more typical, though minimum temperatures for both months were about 1.5°C cooler than usual.

Spring 2015 also goes down as slightly wetter than usual (average 64.2mm per month against a typical 46.1mm, though this figure does seem very low for East Lancashire).  March had rain in line with what we'd expect, but despite the wet end to April, on the whole 42mm for the month seems quite good.  May by contrast had twice the rainfall (85.8mm), as we got hit by streams of weather off the Atlantic.

Here's the full data for spring (expected figure in brackets where available):

Temperature
Mean temperature: 7.7°C (9.2°C)
Mean maximum: 11.8°C (12.0°C)
Mean minimum: 3.7°C (5.3°C)
Highest temperature: 20.9°C
Lowest temperature: -3.1°C

Rainfall / Snow
Average monthly rainfall: 64.2mm (46.1mm)
Wettest Day: 15.0mm
Rain days: 56 (52)
Dry days: 36 (40)
Snow days: 2 (3)

Wind
Average windspeed: 5.4mph
Highest gust: 38.0mph
Wind run: 12,045.9 miles

Winter 2014/15 Seasonal Report

Oakdale Weather Station has been logging weather data continuously since 24 November 2014, which means we have a complete 3-month record of weather through December, January and February, the meteorological winter.  This means we can give a view on the entire season.  For comparison purposes, we have used data from the internet (weatherbase.com for average temperatures and msn.com for all other data, both of which reports monthly data that we have averaged out across the season).

So what does this mean for Winter 2014-15?  Firstly, let's look at temperature.  December 2014 was warmer than average (mean 4.8°C against an average of 4°C, but January and February were both cooler.  Overall, winter 2014-15 was around 0.4°C cooler than a typical winter, and minimum temperatures in particular 0.8°C below normal.  We had an average 84.6mm of rain per month, well above the expected 70.6mm, and it rained on 67 days, above the expected figure of 58 days.  We haven't any data to compare for wind, but we did note that December and January were windy months.  Finally, we had several snowy days in winter 14-15, mainly in January, where snow fell for 9 days in the month.  Overall, the 11 snowy days we had was above the 8 expected.

Here's this information set out in a table (expected figure in brackets where available):

Temperature
Mean temperature: 4.1°C (4.5°C)
Mean maximum: 6.6°C (7.0°C)
Mean minimum: 1.5°C (2.3°C)
Highest temperature: 12.9°C
Lowest temperature: -5.1°C

Rainfall / Snow
Average monthly rainfall: 84.6mm (70.6mm)
Wettest Day: 18.3mm
Rain days: 67 (58)
Dry days: 23
Snow days: 11 (8)

Wind
Average windspeed: 6.6mph
Highest gust: 36.5mph
Wind run: 13,112.9 miles