Wettest day in a month on Saturday & exceptionally mild

Saturday brought us the effects of Storm Dennis with many hours of steady rain and drizzle also the occasional heavy burst as early Sunday morning. The rainfall over the last twenty-four hours amounted to 21.5mm. This was the wettest day since 14th January (21.6mm) and the monthly total to 75.2mm, which is 116% of the 35-year February average.

We did not experience the intense rainfall or deluges that other areas to the west and north on higher ground experienced. It is interesting to note that each of the last seven months have recorded above average rainfall.

The wind was very strong all day with frequent gusts in excess of 30 mph with a maximum of 46mph at 14.27.

The temperature slowly rose during Saturday and into Sunday reaching a maximum of 12.7C at 05.40, which was 5.2C above the 35-year average. We have only experienced two days with maxima below average during February.

Just after 05.30 on Sunday the barometric pressure began to rise as the latest weather front eased away to the east and the thermometer began to drop reading 8.7C at 08.00. This minimum was 7.3C above the February average.

Update at 18.15: another 10mm of rainfall since 08.00 so Marlborough very fortunately missed the long periods of intense rainfall to the north and west. A peak wind gust of 30mph was recorded at 14.52.

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