Now that the winter of 2009-10 is over, at least as far as
climatologists are concerned (the weather may have other ideas), I've
attempted to put it into perspective in terms of its mean temperature.
I've looked at the mean CET for each winter since 1900 (since December
1899, to be precise). From 1974 onwards, I've used the figures on Philip
Eden's website at

http://www.climate-uk.com/provisional.htm

since these are - Philip claims - more consistent with the earlier
values in the series derived by Gordon Manley than the Hadley Centre's
version is. That means that from 1974 I was using monthly values to two
decimal places, as quoted by Philip, rather than one, but the impact of
that should be minimal. In calculating the mean for each winter, I've
weighted the monthly means by the lengths of the months, except that I
was too lazy to adjust the formula in leap years. Again the effect of
this will be minimal.

For 2009-10, we have monthly means and anomalies (relative to 1971-2000)
of:

Mean Anomaly
Dec 3.14 -2.0
Jan 1.19 -3.0
Feb 2.9 -1.3

Note that the Feb figure is as yet only available to one decimal place,
and the same applies to all three monthly anomalies.

For the winter as a whole, the mean CET was 2.39 and the anomaly -2.1

It was the eighth coldest winter since 1900, the top ten being:

1 1963 -0.32 (ie Dec 1962 to January 1963)
2 1947 1.23
3 1940 1.43
4 1917 1.49
5 1929 1.74
6 1979 1.82
7 1942 2.27
8 2010 2.39
9 1941 2.57
10 1982 2.71

Those values probably ought to be rounded to one decimal place prior to
1974 and perhaps also for 2010, but doing so would not affect the
ranking.

The CET applies to a region roughly coinciding with the English
Midlands. The comparison might work out differently for other regions.
For example, the winter seems to have been more severe in Scotland than
in most of England when compared to other years.

Of other relatively recent years, 1985 is 11th, 1996 15th, 1991 16th,
1986 20th. 2008-9 was 35th out of 111. The three mildest winters, by a
widish margin, were 1989 and 2007, both with a mean of 6.52, and 1975,
with a mean of 6.51.
--
John Hall
"Acting is merely the art of keeping a large group of people
from coughing."
Sir Ralph Richardson (1902-83)

On Mon, 1 Mar 2010 20:49:39 +0000, John Hall wrote in


read but snipped

For Ireland north and south it was the coldest winter since 1962/63

--
Mike Tullett - Coleraine 55.13°N 6.69°W posted 01/03/2010 21:44:38 GMT

On Mon, 1 Mar 2010 21:44:38 +0000, Mike Tullett wrote in


For Ireland north and south it was the coldest winter since 1962/63

And Cork airport had a total sunshine of 311 hours (the highest winter
total on record in Ireland).

--
Mike Tullett - Coleraine 55.13°N 6.69°W posted 01/03/2010 21:51:07 GMT

For Birmingham Winterbourne it was the coldest winter since 1978/9 and the
9th coldest since records began in 1881.

Chris



"John Hall" wrote in message
...
Now that the winter of 2009-10 is over, at least as far as climatologists
are concerned (the weather may have other ideas), I've attempted to put it
into perspective in terms of its mean temperature. I've looked at the mean
CET for each winter since 1900 (since December 1899, to be precise). From
1974 onwards, I've used the figures on Philip Eden's website at

http://www.climate-uk.com/provisional.htm

since these are - Philip claims - more consistent with the earlier values
in the series derived by Gordon Manley than the Hadley Centre's version
is. That means that from 1974 I was using monthly values to two decimal
places, as quoted by Philip, rather than one, but the impact of that
should be minimal. In calculating the mean for each winter, I've weighted
the monthly means by the lengths of the months, except that I was too lazy
to adjust the formula in leap years. Again the effect of this will be
minimal.

For 2009-10, we have monthly means and anomalies (relative to 1971-2000)
of:

Mean Anomaly
Dec 3.14 -2.0
Jan 1.19 -3.0
Feb 2.9 -1.3

Note that the Feb figure is as yet only available to one decimal place,
and the same applies to all three monthly anomalies.

For the winter as a whole, the mean CET was 2.39 and the anomaly -2.1

It was the eighth coldest winter since 1900, the top ten being:

1 1963 -0.32 (ie Dec 1962 to January 1963)
2 1947 1.23
3 1940 1.43
4 1917 1.49
5 1929 1.74
6 1979 1.82
7 1942 2.27
8 2010 2.39
9 1941 2.57
10 1982 2.71

Those values probably ought to be rounded to one decimal place prior to
1974 and perhaps also for 2010, but doing so would not affect the ranking.

The CET applies to a region roughly coinciding with the English Midlands.
The comparison might work out differently for other regions. For example,
the winter seems to have been more severe in Scotland than in most of
England when compared to other years.

Of other relatively recent years, 1985 is 11th, 1996 15th, 1991 16th, 1986
20th. 2008-9 was 35th out of 111. The three mildest winters, by a widish
margin, were 1989 and 2007, both with a mean of 6.52, and 1975, with a
mean of 6.51.
--
John Hall
"Acting is merely the art of keeping a large group of people
from coughing."
Sir Ralph Richardson (1902-83)

In article ,
Mike Tullett writes:
On Mon, 1 Mar 2010 20:49:39 +0000, John Hall wrote in
d

read but snipped

For Ireland north and south it was the coldest winter since 1962/63


I see that the Met Office is quoting a mean UK temperature for the
winter of 1.5C, which presumably is influenced by Scotland and Northern
Ireland having been very cold. Even so, I am a little surprised that it
is quite so low.

http://www.meto.gov.uk/corporate/pre...r20100301.html

Looking at the small print, I've just seen that their figures are for 1
December to 24 February, which may partly explain it.
--
John Hall
"Acting is merely the art of keeping a large group of people
from coughing."
Sir Ralph Richardson (1902-83)

"John Hall" wrote in message
...

Looking at the small print, I've just seen that their figures are for 1
December to 24 February, which may partly explain it.
--
John Hall
"Acting is merely the art of keeping a large group of people
from coughing."
Sir Ralph Richardson (1902-83)

The final four days of winter were very cold or very cold in many parts of
the north John, so I wouldn't expect the winter mean to deviate very much
from the figure given when those four days are included.

Alex.

On 01/03/10 20:49, John Hall wrote:
1 1963 -0.32 (ie Dec 1962 to January 1963)

February 1963, not January?

--
Graham P Davis, Bracknell, Berks., UK. E-mail: newsman not newsboy
"I wear the cheese. It does not wear me."

"John Hall" wrote in message
...
Now that the winter of 2009-10 is over, at least as far as climatologists
are concerned (the weather may have other ideas), I've attempted to put
it into perspective in terms of its mean temperature. I've looked at the
mean CET for each winter since 1900 (since December 1899, to be precise).
From 1974 onwards, I've used the figures on Philip Eden's website at

http://www.climate-uk.com/provisional.htm

since these are - Philip claims - more consistent with the earlier values
in the series derived by Gordon Manley than the Hadley Centre's version
is. That means that from 1974 I was using monthly values to two decimal
places, as quoted by Philip, rather than one, but the impact of that
should be minimal. In calculating the mean for each winter, I've weighted
the monthly means by the lengths of the months, except that I was too
lazy to adjust the formula in leap years. Again the effect of this will
be minimal.

For 2009-10, we have monthly means and anomalies (relative to 1971-2000)
of:

Mean Anomaly
Dec 3.14 -2.0
Jan 1.19 -3.0
Feb 2.9 -1.3

Note that the Feb figure is as yet only available to one decimal place,
and the same applies to all three monthly anomalies.

For the winter as a whole, the mean CET was 2.39 and the anomaly -2.1

It was the eighth coldest winter since 1900, the top ten being:

1 1963 -0.32 (ie Dec 1962 to January 1963)
2 1947 1.23
3 1940 1.43
4 1917 1.49
5 1929 1.74
6 1979 1.82
7 1942 2.27
8 2010 2.39
9 1941 2.57
10 1982 2.71

Those values probably ought to be rounded to one decimal place prior to
1974 and perhaps also for 2010, but doing so would not affect the
ranking.

The CET applies to a region roughly coinciding with the English Midlands.
The comparison might work out differently for other regions. For example,
the winter seems to have been more severe in Scotland than in most of
England when compared to other years.

Of other relatively recent years, 1985 is 11th, 1996 15th, 1991 16th,
1986 20th. 2008-9 was 35th out of 111. The three mildest winters, by a
widish margin, were 1989 and 2007, both with a mean of 6.52, and 1975,
with a mean of 6.51.
--
John Hall
"Acting is merely the art of keeping a large group of people
from coughing."
Sir Ralph Richardson (1902-83)

Interesting to note that 6 of the 10 coldest winters
took place when bombs were being chucked around
on an industrial scale:
1947(nuclear testing)
1940
1917
1942
2010 (Iraq/Afghanistan)
1941.

Coincidence or support for Lorenz?

In article ,
Graham P Davis writes:
On 01/03/10 20:49, John Hall wrote:
1 1963 -0.32 (ie Dec 1962 to January 1963)

February 1963, not January?


Yes. Sorry.
--
John Hall
"Acting is merely the art of keeping a large group of people
from coughing."
Sir Ralph Richardson (1902-83)

In article ,
Alan Murphy writes:
Interesting to note that 6 of the 10 coldest winters
took place when bombs were being chucked around
on an industrial scale:
1947(nuclear testing)
1940
1917
1942
2010 (Iraq/Afghanistan)
1941.

Coincidence or support for Lorenz?

Co-incidence, I think. It's known that dust from volcano eruptions can
get into the stratosphere and be carried round the world, and influence
the weather for a year or two, but AIUI extra pollution in the
troposphere gets rained out fairly quickly. January, 1940 was a sub-zero
month when WW2 was only a few months old and most of the fiercest
fighting was still to come. And if nuclear testing was a factor in 1947,
why were the winters that followed that one unremarkable, when testing
was still going on?

I think that the 1940s winters are more reflective of the fact that many
of our cold winters seem to come in clusters. The period from about 1977
to 1987 is another example.
--
John Hall
"Acting is merely the art of keeping a large group of people
from coughing."
Sir Ralph Richardson (1902-83)