Friday 27th February
The breeze on Thursday picked up speed as the morning progressed with a peak gust of 33mph at 12.59 and then began to fall away after 14.00. This gave us a much cooler day, that combined with little if any sunshine, saw the thermometer rise to 12.6C at 12.00 before the advancing cloud from the next weather front began to thicken. The first drizzle and light rain was observed at 15.45 that became a little heavier but sporadic as the evening progressed. The weather front extended from Cornwall to the Kent and being slow moving meant precipitation was logged in the automatic rain gauge every hour from 1700 to 08.00 on Friday with the exception of a brief break between 03.00 and 04.00. The span of twelve or more hours meant an accumulation of 6.8mm of rainfall. The monthly rainfall now stands at 122.8mm being 181% of my 42-year record. The minimum of 9.3C logged at 03.10 was 7.4C above average.
Friday arrived with the hang back of cloud from the old weather front. The view is for the low, thick cloud to once again mask the tops of the Marlborough Downs and Savernake Forest. As that, hopefully, slowly eases away there is a good possibility that the sun could arrive as the morning progresses. However, by 09.30. the mist seems reluctant to clear, the radar showing a large area of low cloud over southern England.
The weekend looks if we will have sunshine and showers with temperatures by day and night much lower than of late, nearer to the early March average.
How accurate are the Met Office’s weather forecasts?
The Met Office has weather stations around the UK, as well as in Gibraltar and the Falkland Islands, and operates using some of the most powerful supercomputers in the world.
Although forecasting has improved significantly in the past 30 years, it is still known as a “chaotic” system, with the slightest shift in conditions having big effects.
“Even seemingly small discrepancies in the current conditions can lead to inaccuracies that grow as the forecast runs further into the future
“However good our observations, we can never know every detail of current conditions.
“Therefore, relying on ensemble modelling, where we run many simulations from very slightly different starting conditions, is much better than just one run of one weather simulation model.”
Weather forecasting is improving all the time as models and systems become better understood, while technology also develops.