.... was 5.2°C, amongst the coldest places across Britain last night.
Not unusual for this site to be cold - for example, these are the
minima for the last few years for August:-
2003: 5.0, 2004: 6.9, 2005: 6.4, 2006: 4.6, 2007: 5.5

Haven't got any long term 'extreme' climatology, so can't put those
into context, but it reminds me that in my early days, I could never
get my mind around why this place called 'Bournemouth' would have such
low minima - often on clear, still nights being the coldest place, in
England at least (if the 'north' was cloudy/breezy). I thought that
the readings were from some municipal gardens near-by the beach: I
then found out that the 'Bournemouth' quoted was in fact Hurn airfield
(about 8 km inland / due north / of the coastline), and about as
representative of the town as Renfrew/Abbotsinch are to Glasgow City
or Rhoose to the centre of Cardiff!

Despite the relentless march of residential development (and the
growth of the industrial units on the airport site), it is still in a
largely rural setting, on the flood plain just upstream of the
confluence of the Stour and the Moors rivers. Chilled air gently
drains from the northwest (off Parley Common), pooling over the
airfield - indeed, though I haven't seen any investigations into such,
I wonder if the urban development to the south and the forestry
plantation to the east form a 'block' to the air flow, allowing
accumulation of cold air?

Here in West Moors, even further inland (~13 km), there used to be
located a significant railway junction: the Salisbury & Dorset
Junction Railway came in from the north, to meet up with the
Southampton & Dorchester Railway, the original 'main line' (before the
through route opened via Sway / Christchurch / Bournemouth / Poole /
Holes Bay curve etc.) Apparently, because of the location of the
junction, it used to be subject to frequent 'frozen points' episodes,
as cold air drained off the moorland, located to the north and east
(before the building of the Army Fuel depot & establishment of the FC
plantations).

The first train of the day (from Salisbury), would regularly have to
wait in winter on the single-line just north of the junction whilst
staff attended to the points/signal wires etc. The village was much
smaller then - on cold, still mornings (circa 5am) the
milk/post/newspaper train would wake the entire village up as the
driver tried to attract the attention of the signalman via leaning on
the whistle! Mind you, driving a rather large 'kettle on wheels' there
was plenty of hot water available to attend to matters.

All long gone now of course: the site of the junction is smothered
with bungalows!

Martin.

--
Martin Rowley
West Moors, East Dorset (UK): 17m (56ft) amsl
Lat: 50.82N Long: 01.88W
NGR: SU 082 023