Wettest day since March 2016

The fourteen hours of rainfall yesterday, starting late afternoon, amounted to 20.5mm. This is not far short of the rainfall for the whole of July.

Summary for July 2016
July was memorable for the minimal rainfall. Although there were only eighteen totally dry days, there many days with the occasional light shower. The total precipitation amounted to 23.7mm when the mean is 61.0mm, which is the fourth driest July since this station started in 1984. The wettest day occurred on the 28th with 7.3mm that is almost one third of the month’s rainfall in one day.

The driest July was in 1999 with just 10.1mm of rainfall, the previous very dry months were in 1994 and 1984. In the past there have been many very wet July months, the record being set in 2007 with 127.2mm.

There has been a rising trend for heavier rainfall since the year 2000, which has levelled out in recent years.

The evaporation from the ground, water sources and plant life for the month was 96.3mm giving a deficit of equivalent rainfall of almost 73mm. No wonder my six water buts ran dry looking after the greenhouse, fishpond and many flower planters. Following the below average rainfall in June, this makes the deficit for the combined months of almost 93mm.

It was not a July to remember as a prolonged hot month. The mean temperature was 0.5C above the log-term mean principally due to the night temperatures being 0.4C above the average. There was a very warm, even hot spell, around the middle of the month when the thermometer soared to 31.7C on the 19th with several days just before and after in the high 20s. The record was set in 2006 with a high of 34.9C.

The solar energy for the month was close to the average helped by 111 hours of strong sunshine.

The UV levels were consistently in the Very High category on 28 days in the month. The gloomiest day occurred on the 28th with a Moderate rating due to the cloud cover, which produced the wettest day.

Fog occurred during the early morning of the 18th with visibility down to 100m.