Author: Eric Gilbert

Although the breeze picked up on Monday afternoon the morning and evening were very calm after Storm Bert. The thermometer reached a high of 10.8C at 11.42 in the welcome sunshine, which was 0.5C above the average. During the late afternoon and evening the temperature began to drop away to reach a low of 3.0C at 07.17 early Tuesday, which was 1.0C below the average.

It was, thankfully, a dry day with some weak UV light that did trigger the sensor, if briefly, against the no show for the previous two days under the thick, continuous cloud.

Tuesday brought a brought start to the new day with the promise of sunshine as the pressure has been rising due to Storm Bert moving away eastwards with its the centre now over Scandinavia. The barometric pressure has risen 24mb over the past forty-eight hours to read 1014.8mb at 08.00.

A small depression has recently formed off the west coast that will travel across southern England today with an associated weather front that is predicted to bring more rain late evening and overnight. As a result the wind will back from southwest into a southeasterly quadrant as the afternoon progresses but remain light.

Incidentally,the images I have recently uploaded were from the storm in 1984, not from the past weekend, but seemed appropriate.

Storm Bert brought us another day on Sunday with many continuous hours of steady rain that gave a daily total of 32.1mm. That took the monthly total to exactly 88mm being 3.7mm below my 40-year average for November. Storm Bert brought us in total 59.3mm of precipitation. The day started at 08.00 with a temperature of 16.8C that crept up to 17.1C at 08.41 and then began to very slowly fall away as the day progressed. That maximum was 6.9C above my long-term average. The minimum occurred at 07.55 on Monday with a low of 8.3C, which coincided with the thick cloud easing away over the eastern horizon followed by a clearing sky. A maximum gust of 40mph was logged at 14.01.

Monday after dawn saw the last of the weather front departing the eastern horizon to leave much blue sky and the end of the almost 48 hours of continuous rainfall.

Storm Bert is now centred off the northeast of Scotland and will continue to feed a southwesterly airstream but thankfully no rain and much calmer conditions. The barometric pressure has already risen 7mb since 07.00 on Sunday.

The thermometer read 8.1C at 08.00 on Saturday and rose almost continuously all day, and through the night, to reach an exceptional 16.9C at 08.00 on Sunday, which was 6.6C above my 40-year average. It was the highest November maximum since 12th November 2022 (17.5C). Therefore the maximum temperature was logged when it is usually the minimum. The wind was strong all day from the southwest and increased in the early hours with a peak of 36mph logged at 06.34. The rain was almost continuous over the last twenty-four hours and totalled 27.2mm that took the monthly total to 27.2mm when the average is 91.7mm. It was the wettest day since 23rd September (43.4mm).

It was the first occasion that no evaporation was logged since that apparatus was installed due to the almost continuous rain over twenty-four hours. No UV light triggered the sensor also the solar energy sensor briefly flickered on then off again.

Sunday after dawn revealed a sky thick with low cloud and the wind still blowing strongly although a short break from the rain, that began again at 08.20.

The soil temperature at a depth of 5cm has recovered significantly from the 0.9C on Friday to 13.1C at the same time today.

The centre of Storm Bert is just off the west coast of Scotland that will continue the strong winds all day, slowly abating after midday. The barometric pressure at 08.00 read 992.2mb, the lowest since 9th October. The centre of the depression had a extremely low pressure reading of 941.2mb at midnight and a forecast pressure of 952mb at midday so producing a severe pressure gradient with the isobars showing very tightly packed on the surface pressure chart.

Friday was the last of the very cool days that saw the thermometer hover around 6C for much of the day and drop away in the evening. The maximum of 6.9C was logged at 12.40 being 3.4C below my 40-year average and the minimum of -0.7C was logged in the evening at 19.51 being 4.7C below average.

After 20.00 on Friday evening thin cloud began to drift across ahead of the main weather front that saw the thermometer begin to slowly rise reaching 0C at 21.38 and 1C at 22.15. After midnight the warmer air began to flood across our area that saw the thermometer rise to 8.1C by 08.00 on Saturday as a warm front crossed southern England. The limited rain after 05.00 amounted to 3.2mm as we are on the periphery of the intense rain area at the moment.

Saturday revealed a wet start to the new day but so much milder. The temperature of 8.1C meant it was the warmest start to a day at that time since the 14th.

Storm Bert is currently off the coast of Northern Ireland with the centre of the depression falling rapidly with an extreme low just 937mb at 08.00. The barometric pressure is dropping rapidly here with a pressure of 1003.7mb logged at 08.00. Being so far from the coast we will not experience the extremes of wind gusts with a high of 21mph so far the morning but it is rising.

When the high winds have ceased there won’t be many late autumn leaves left on the trees!

Thursday was a bitterly cold day that saw the thermometer struggle to reach a maximum of 3.4C at 13.10. The was due to the lack of sunshine, the very brisk wind from the Northeast and the continuing feed of Arctic air. At 11.30 the thermometer read 2.4C but the combined effect of wind strength, direction, humidity and temperature meant outside it felt more like -0.5C due to wind chill. Initially during the evening the temperature dropped away reaching a minimum of -1.7C at 20.25 but after that time the thermometer began to rise again reaching 0C at 00.50 just after midnight and 2.3C at 08.00 Friday. This change was due to cloud cover increasing although the major factor of the wind changing direction to come from the west, a slightly warmer direction that began to cut off the flow of Arctic air. The strongest gust of wind all month was logged at 04.05 early Friday with a peak of 22mph. The maximum was 6.9C below the long-term average and the minimum 5.7C below.

Friday brought a much brighter start to the day with minimal cloud cover and the possibility of sunshine as the morning progresses.

A depression in mid-atlantic is beginning to fill rapidly that will close in on the UK over the weekend and has been named Storm Bert by the Meteorological Office.

The low temperatures by day and night are causing the cold to continue to seep into the ground with the temperature at a depth of 5cm reading 0.9C at 08.00, the lowest since 20th January 2024