I'm a little shocked by that CET value. It was one of the warmest Decembers
I've ever recorded.

Shaun Pudwell
Warden Bay, Nr. Leysdown-on-Sea, Isle of Sheeppey, Kent.
2M ASL.

"Philip Eden" philipATweatherHYPHENukDOTcom wrote in message
.. .
The mean monthly sea-level pressure chart for December 2003
is quite unusual. The Icelandic low is barely discernible and very
weak at 1005 mbar, but the main low centre lies in the eastern
Barents Sea, near Novaya Zemlya, at 990 mbar. The Azores
high is displaced east to Morocco at 1022 mbar, and there is
another prominent high at 1023 mbar centred over Romania.
Thus the usual SW to W-ly flow over the Atlantic and the
British Isles is very weak, whereas there is an enhanced
W-ly flow over Scandinavia, the Baltic and European Russia.
The usual ridge over northeast Greenland is somehwat more
intense than usual.

The main anomaly centres a
-12mbar in the Russian Arctic
+8mbar mid-Atlantic, near 55N 30W
+5mbar central Greenland
+4mbar Romania
-1 mbar Bay of Biscay (small, but it does distort the pattern
over the UK.

The anomalous flow over the British Isles is complex:
NNW'ly over northern Scotland, NE-ly over Ireland,
southern Scotland, northern England and Wales, but
SE-ly over southeast England and East Anglia (around
that Biscay neganom).

Provisional CET: 4.8ºC (0.3 degC below the 71-00 mean)
Prov E&W rain: 103mm (102% of 71-00 mean)
Prov E&W sun: 56 hr (116% of 71-00 mean)

Oddly, most of the regional temperature means were
fractionally positive, ranging from +0.3 in East Anglia to
0.3 in northwest England. Mean maxes were generally
positive, while mean mins were neutral to negative.

Rainfall totals varied between 37mm at Clacton (Essex) and
305mm at Dalmally (Argyll). Other low figures were 39mm
at Dishforth (N.Yorks) and 42mm at Southend (Essex).
Rainfall percentages ranged from 49% at Teignmouth (Devon)
and 49% also at Cork (Irish Rep.) to 186% at Shanklin (IoW)..

Sunshine totals varied between 79h at St Helier (Jersey) and 78h
at Jersey Airport (I've discounted Torquay's 91h as the recorder
appears to be mis-calibrated), and 17h at Kirkwall (Orkney).
Sunshine percentages ranged from 173% at Church Fenton (nr
York) to 77% at Kirkwall.

(c) Philip Eden