January 2002
184mm in January 2002 compares with 132mm in January 2001. So, wet –
as though we needed telling. The first half of the month produced only
26mm, and so the second half made up for it with 158mm.There were nine
days with double-figure rainfall, including 29mm (26th) and 25mm
(25th), with 17th, 18th, 20th, 22nd, 23rd, 27th and 31st all having
10mm or more. All this rain came with ferocious gales, but Spring also
arrived, several months early.
February 2002
February was wet at the beginning and at the end, with a dryish patch
in the middle. But so mild: I had frogspawn in my pond in the second
week of the month. The total rainfall was 163mm, about the same as
January's 184mm if you take the short month into account. We had two
days with 34mm (4th and 25th) and one with 24mm (2nd). Otherwise no day
reached double figures. And March has started dry: no rain in the
first week.
March 2002
I spoke too soon at the end of my February report. March did indeed
start dry, and it ended dry as well. But in the middle it was wet.
There were 81mm of rain in the whole month, all except 4mm of which
fell in the ten days from 10th, and three days (10th, 12th and 17th)
accounted for 46mm. But there was no rain at all on 19 days in the
month, so it was pretty dry on the whole: March last year gave us
156mm, almost twice as much.
April 2002
April this year was comparatively dry. There were 19 days with no
rain at all, following a dry March. But January and February were
wetter than last year, and so the year's total for the first four
months of 2002 is virtually the same as 2001: 520mm in 2002, 526mm in
2001. April this year produced 92mm, most of it in the last four days
of the month and in a spectacular thunderstorm on the 2nd. Only those
five days gave us 10mm or more.
May 2002
Compared with last year May was wet: 154mm against 34mm in 2001.
Nearly all the rain fell in the couple of weeks between the 12th and
the 27th, with the 12th, 17th and 21st having 20mm or more and five
other days having over 10mm. Altogether those 16 days produced 142mm. I
have also started recording temperatures, since the middle of May:
maximum, minimum and the average. I will give the first full month's
figures next time, but so far the warmest day was 16th May (max.
24.2ºC, min. 16.9ºC, av. 20.1ºC) and the coldest the
26th (max. 13.9ºC, min. 7.1ºC, av. 10.5ºC).
June 2002
70mm of rain this year, against 32mm last time. Only 8mm fell in the
second half of the month, so 62mm in the first half. The 9th (19mm),
15th (13mm) and 6th (11mm) were the only days with 10mm or more. I
have had to water some small seedlings in the last couple of weeks. The
warmest day was 2nd (max. 23.9ºC), the coldest night was 10th
(min. 10.0ºC). The average for the whole month was 15.7ºC,
with the monthly average maximum 19.1ºC and minimum 12.2ºC.
I think the July average is about 18ºC, so we have yet to have
our summer! Maybe July ...
July 2002
July was extraordinary: it began and ended with deluges of rain and yet
in between had 21 days without any rain at all. There were 102mm in the
month, of which all but 15mm fell on four days: 2nd (31mm), 4th (10mm),
8th (24mm) and 31st (22mm). The skies threatened, but did not deliver,
though there was often a heavy dew which does not reach my raingauge.
But these 21 rainless days were beaten by the 27 days last year between
18th May and 13th June. The warmest day this July was 15th (25.9°C
max), the coolest day 1st (16.9°C max) The coolest night was 2nd
(11.0°C min), the warmest night 28th (17.5°C min). The average
temperatures for the whole month were 21.2°C max, 14.1°C min,
17.6°C average.
August 2002
The average rainfall for August seems to be about 80mm. This year we
had 101mm, virtually identical to July's 102mm. There have been several
very heavy dews first thing in the morning and even a slight drizzle,
none of which produces the 1mm that is the smallest amount my gauge can
measure. (Real meteorologists measure down to 0.1mm!) In this warm
weather, too, a tiny amount in the gauge can evaporate during the day
and never show up in the record. But we had some deluges as well: 21mm
on the 7th, 36mm on the 9th and 25mm on the 23rd, which account for 82mm
of the total. The highest daytime temperature was 23.9°C and the
lowest 16.9°. The warmest night was 16.5° and the coolest
12.0°. The average maximum was 21.2°, average minimum was
14.7° and the average for the month was 18.0°.
September 2002
Briefly, September was mild and dry. All the 43mm of rain in the month
fell during the week between the 3rd and the 9th, with 36mm falling on
the 9th. The average for September in Evershot is about 110mm! The
average daytime temperature was 18.9ºC, with the maximum being
21.9º on the 13th and the minimum 14.9º on the 9th. The
average nighttime temperature was 11.2º, the maximum 15.5º on
the 3rd and the minimum 9.1º on the 23rd. So not even close to a
frost. The overall monthly average was 13.9º.
October 2002
October was mild, wet and, at times, very windy. The highest daytime
temperature was 17.9°C on 3rd, the lowest daytime temperature
9.4° on 19th. The warmest night was also on 3rd at 13.5°, the
coolest 3.5° on 18th. So still no air frost. The monthly average
maximum was 14.2°, the average minimum was 9.3° and the overall
average for the month was 11.8°. Rainfall totalled 247mm, not far
off the 266mm that fell in October 2000, when we had a deluge on the
20th of 71mm or nearly three inches. It was the wettest autumn ever,
people said. The wettest days this October were 13th, 14th and 15th,
with 57mm, 13mm and 49mm, 21st (35mm) and 26th (21mm). The total for the
year so far, at 1237mm, is over 100mm more than the total for the whole
of 2001. The beginning of November has continued the trend with 47mm in
the first three days. Now if that had been snow ... !
November 2002
Nobody in Evershot needs telling that November was wet. Dorchester is
boasting that it had the wettest November since 1926, with 'nearly 12
inches'. Evershot can beat that without even getting out of bed: we had
368mm or nearly 14.5 inches. As I have said before, weather like this
makes a nonsense of statistics and averages. Last year we had only 74mm
and in 2000, in the exceptionally wet autumn, 232mm. Peter Cooper, who
has been keeping records much longer than I have, has an average for
November of 136.8mm since 1995. This year there were only three days
without at least some rain, and there were 16 days with 10mm or more,
including 43mm on 13th. Temperatures were on the mild side: the minimum
daytime temperature was 9.9°C on 18th, and the nighttime
temperatures never dropped below 7°C. Now December is promising us a
cold spell and, some say, a white Christmas. But I would not bet on it.
If it does snow, remember the rule of thumb is that 1 inch of rain
equals 1 foot of snow. If the rain in November had been snow, it would
have reached the eaves!
December 2002
December finished off a wet Autumn with 200mm exactly. There were only
10 days with no rain, and twice we had 41mm in a day. This made a total
of 815mm for the October to December period, beating even the 784mm of
Autumn 2000. As a whole, 2002 gave us an amazing 1805mm or over 71in.
Peter Cooper's average for 1995 to 2002 is only 1060mm (41.75in), so
this was some kind of dismal record. We had two coldish snaps, but
nothing like the early part of January 2003 when the temperature
struggled to get above freezing during the day. Never mind: it will soon
be Spring once more!
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