Summary for February 2007

HEADLINE: COLD SNAP, SOME SNOW 4TH-9TH; ELSE CYCLONIC, MILD & VERY WET

[TEMPERATURE]

Mean of 24hr max & min:... 06.1°C [+1.8C anomaly wrt eLTA 1971-2000]

Rolling 12 month temperature anomaly: +1.8C (was +1.6C end last month)

This is now comfortably (it was marginal last month) the greatest +ve
12-month temperature anomaly since the series start in 1971.

[PRECIPITATION]

(PPN/mm)

Total rainfall/melted snow etc:... 98.5 [224% of eLTA of 1971-2000]

Rolling 12 month rainfall: 121% of eLTA (was 115% end last month)

Rolling 24 month rainfall: 103% of eLTA (was 98% end last month)

This is the wettest February since 1990 (112.3mm / highest in 1971-2007
set), and the second wettest February in that composite local series.

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[SOME WINTER NOTES]

Eden Winter Snow Index (cm days)

(for definition, see the Glossary for this newsgroup)

[November - March]

1998/1999: 0

1999/2000: 11

2000/2001: 10

2001/2002: 0

2002/2003: 18

2003/2004: 5

2004/2005: 9

2005/2006: 0

2006/2007: 7 (so far)

note that *last* year, when the mean winter-time temperature was close
to average, we had little snow cover at all, let alone some at 09Z. This
very mild winter, we have fared much better!

[TEMPERATURE]

MEAN MAX(ANOMALY): 9.1 (+1.9)

MEAN MIN(ANOMALY): 4.2 (+2.2)

24HR MEAN: 6.7 (+2.1)

With this value (for the three months of winter), this is the warmest
such season since 1989/1990 (anomaly +2.3C); this latter was also THE
warmest winter in the dataset which begins 1971.

[PRECIPITATION]

'Standard' winter precipitation:

WINTER: 267.8mm (149%)

This is the wettest winter (DJF) since 2000/2001.

This has been the sixth consecutive month with rainfall %age =10% above
the LTA. Sequences of 6 or more consecutive months with above-average
rainfall are not common within the last 35 years at this location: prior
to this one there were only two viz: 1994 September - 1995 February (6
months) & 2000 September - 2001 April (8 months).

For the period September - February, the rainfall total is 584.6mm, or
151% of the 1971-2000 average of those 6 months (388mm).

Martin.


--
Martin Rowley
Bracknell