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England & Wales Precipitation Update For Feb 2016

March 5, 2016
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By Paul Homewood 

  

The Met Office has now published the England & Wales rainfall data for February, (though for some reason there are no monthly totals yet for either January of February, only daily totals – surely they’re not afraid somebody might actually want to use them?)

 

Far from the hype and naming every depression that passes by, February only ranks 81st wettest since 1766:

 

 

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Precipitation of 80mm was barely above the average of 65mm. The wettest February on record was in 1833.

 

For the winter as a whole, 2016/16 ranks 8th wettest:

 

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Perhaps more significant though is the October through January period, which is the wettest part of the year on average in the UK. If we are concerned with flooding, this is what we should be focussed on, rather than the arbitrary definition of December to February as “winter”.

 

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This year ranks 17th, with 1929/30 way out in front.

 

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As we often see with rainfall patterns, there is clustering. Although three out of the last four years appear in the top 20, we also find years such as 1872, 1876, 1911, 1914, 1929, 1935, 1938 and 1940 up near the top as well.

 

There is no indication from any of this that rainfall is becoming more extreme at this time of year in England & Wales.

 

  

Source

http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/hadobs/hadukp/data/download.html

from → Climate Change
3 Comments
  1. ristvan permalink
    March 5, 2016 7:31 pm

    One underappreciated statistical fact is that a truly random process always produces clusters of outliers in time or space. That is how the ‘power lines cause cancer’ nonsense began. Just follow enough powerlines to find a few cancer clusters, then write a nonsense best seller. Warmunists doing the equivalent with every version of extreme weather they can dream up.

  2. Carrie Spurgeon permalink
    March 8, 2016 5:15 pm

    Surely not having much snow makes a difference too; if water falls as snow instead of rain that would make for a dryer winter period that year as opposed to a wetter one when we have little snow but more rain…which obviously goes on to melt and causes water logging just as rain would. Is this adjusted for?

    • Paul Homewood permalink*
      March 8, 2016 5:21 pm

      Snow is included in the precipitation figures, though they have to estimate the water content

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