Saturday 4th October
We got off very lightly after Storm Amey passed over the UK during the past twenty-four hours. Thankfully, it tracked far to the north of our area so although windy and wet we did not experience extreme conditions due to the distance from the centre of the storm. At 20.00 the centre of the storm had a very deep barometric pressure reading of 955mb whilst the pressure here at that time was 999mb, quite a contrast in the pressure gradient, hence the strong winds that gusted to 30mph. The warm southwesterly wind meant a mild day that saw the temperature rise to a maximum of 17.0C, unusually late in the day, in fact in the early evening at 19.10. The high was 2.1C above average. This temperature was held until just after 23.00 before the thermometer began to fall reaching a minimum 9.6C at 07.31 early Saturday morning. The thermometer fell steadily in the early hours as the sky began to clear thus the drop in temperature that started just before midnight.
The rainfall over the past twenty-four hours amounted to 12.4mm.
The start to the new day on Saturday revealed a mainly clear sky with welcome sunshine. The rain radar indicated that several showers over recent hours had been passing just to the south of Marlborough and continued. The wind has been veering into the west, as the storm relocates, which is a slightly cooler direction and with less moisture, the humidity at 08.00 read 76.5%, the lowest for a couple of weeks at that time. The wind strength will increase during the morning, and only subside during the evening and into Sunday, which will still be breezy. The pressure gradient was still considerable at 12.00, between the centre pressure over Scotland of 948mb and 1001mb in Marlborough, hence the strong, gusty winds.
Storm Amey is now slowly tracking northeastwards towards Scandinavia, which will result in calmer conditions today and mainly dry. At the same time a high pressure area is developing just to the west of the Bay of Biscay that will slowly ridge across the UK bringing more settled conditions with the return of sunshine and average temperatures over the next few days.
Marlborough Mop Fairs. It is aid that to show their trade and availability for work, domestic workers would carry a mop, and farm workers would carry a rake or other tool, hence the name Mop Fairs.