Author: Eric Gilbert

Yesterday stared with blue skies and strong sunshine but just before 11.00 cloud started to arrive from the south heralding an afternoon of thunderstorms. At 12.40 the first rumble of thunder was heard as the storm approached that reached its climax mid-afternoon with frequent lighting, at times overhead, that temporarily zapped my weather station and shut off the main electricity supply for a time. The barometer dropped over 3mb after midday to the lowest this month although rainfall was a modest total with 1.4mm.

A very warm and moist night followed with the lowest temperature at 15.4C rising quickly to 17.7C at 08.00.

Although the barometric pressure is the lowest this month the continental air pushed the temperature to  a maximum of 22.9C yesterday but combined wth much higher humidity. A very mild night followed with a mmimim of 14.6C, which is 6C above the mean for September. The strong sunshine was at a minimum yesterday, only 0.6 hours due to the thicker cloud at times.

Dawn broke today with strong sunshine and minimal cloud producing a temperature of 15.8C at 08.00.

With 9.65 hours  of strong sunshine yesterday it was in direct contrast to previous cloudy, wet days. As a result the thermometer rose to 19.7C. which is 1C above the mean for September. After much blue sky yesterday, cloud drifted in overnight blocking sunshine at dawn.

Rain persisted into the early afternoon yesterday and with the cold front moving east the sky broke late afternoon with limited brightness. The rainfall measured 6.7mm bringing the total for September to 34.0mm. The temperature dropped from a maximum of 17.9C, the first below average this month, for over thirteen hours to a very cool minimum of 5.7C at 06.56. The early valley mist quickly evaporated after dawn as the sun rose with strong sunshine.

After another day with above average temperatures and a little sunshine rain arrived after midnight with a heavy pulse starting just before 5am. The maximum yesterday was 20.6C followed by a  very mild night with the minimum not falling below that at the start of friday (15.9C). The rainfall overnight amounted to 9.2mm and continues during this morning.