Monthly Summary for January 2012

For much of the month it seemed as if we had missed winter and had moved into early spring as there were eleven days when the maximum reached double figures [mean maximum over 28 years is 6.5C] and with only a few modest frosts. The mean temperature for the month was 5.17C being 1.3C above the long-term average. It was the warmest January since 2008. The most severe frost was a low of -5.7C in the early hours of the 14th. With air frosts occurring on 9 days this was the lowest total since 2008 and three fewer than the long-term average.
There were elven totally dry days and some useful rainfall although the total at 69.2mm was only 78% of the long-term average. With another month of below average rainfall the fact that evaporation was 133% higher than the two previous years, did not help the groundwater levels. The wettest day was the 3rd when total of 17.2mm was recorded and this coincided with very strong winds gusting to 44mph. Snow fell only on the 30th and with the air temperature at the time just above freezing, did not lay on the ground for more than a few hours and had largely melted before midday.
The winds were quite a feature of the month as maximum gusts exceeded 40mph on each of the 2nd, 3rd, 4th and 5th. The highest gust was recorded at 47mph on the 5th, although this is not a record as a gust of 54mph occurred on 18th January 2007.
Bright sunshine was 134% higher than last year and related to this, was a rise of 120% over the 2011 total, for solar energy, similar to the figure for 2010.