An historical perspective of the climate statistics

for Coventry during October 2014

Temperature

With a mean monthly temperature of 12.4ºC, October 2014 has become one of the mildest October months in Coventry since before 1892. Although not as mild as October 2013 (12.5 ºC), only seven October months have been warmer than this year in the past 122 years (1921, 1995, 2001, 2005, 2006, 2011 & 2013).

*It is remarkable that five of the ten warmest October months since before 1892 have been recorded in Coventry since the Millennium.*

Two years ago, September & October 2012 combined gave us the coldest first two months of autumn in Coventry (11.5ºC) since 1993 (10.6ºC). As a contrast, this year the equivalent two monthly mean (14.0ºC) has only been bettered three times since 1892 (2005, 2006 and 2011).

Last year, the mean temperature for the first ten months of the year (10.5ºC) made it the coolest such period in Coventry since 1987 (10.0ºC). By contrast, the January to October mean temperature in 2014 (12.0ºC) is the warmest in the city since 1990, the only such period warmer than this year since before 1892.

After the first ten months of the year, the running mean annual temperature for 2014 is 0.9ºC higher than the city's 30 year average.


Rainfall

Last year, October 2013 was the wettest October (146.4mm) in Coventry since 1903 (161.9mm), the only October month in Coventry to record more rainfall than 2013 since before 1870.

By contrast, October 2014 recorded just 72.2mm of rain, less than half of last year's rainfall total, though otherwise it was still the wettest October in Coventry since 2007.

There were 15 'wet days' in Coventry during October 2014 compared to 18 last year, with double the amount of rain. Conclusion? This year's October rainfall was light on the whole.

We have recorded 700.5mm of rain so far this year (124%), the wettest January to October period since 2007. Only 14 such 10 month periods have been wetter than this year since 1870, 1872 being the wettest with 835.1mm.




Sunshine

The sunshine total of 77.5 hours was higher than last year (71.8hr), but less than every October from 2007 to 2012, with 26% less sunshine than normal in the city.

Remarkably, we recorded almost twice as much sunshine during October 2003 (141.4hr) than this year.