UK Rainfall In 2023
By Paul Homewood
https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/hadobs/hadukp/data/monthly/HadEWP_monthly_totals.txt
Last year was a wet one in England & Wales, the 7th wettest on record. (The UK series has a similar result).
We routinely hear claims that the climate is wetter because a warmer atmosphere can hold more moisture, (while also being told we will get more droughts!). However the fact that we have had similarly wet years in the distant past, such as 1768, 1852, 1872, 1877, 1882, 1903 and 1960, rather demolishes that argument.
The major factor behind last year’s high rainfall was that the number of rain days was also one of the highest on record since 1931, when Met Office daily data begins. In short, annual rainfall was high because of weather, not climate.
.https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/hadobs/hadukp/data/download.html
The daily rainfall data also strongly indicated persistence rather than extreme rainfall. Only day exceeded 20mm, and there are no long term trends. That solitary day was during Storm Babet, when 22.76 fell.
October was the wettest month with 177.6mm, and was the first and only month since 2014 to exceed 170mm. Again, there was nothing unusual at all about this
One particular thing intrigued me, and this was the comparison with 1960, when there were some truly dreadful floods throughout the autumn – certainly much worse than anything we saw in 2023.
On an annual basis, the two years were indistinguishable, 1195mm in 1960 and 1195mm last year.
But a monthly comparison reveals that 1960 was notably drier in March and April. Between August and November, however, 1960 was 14% wetter.
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NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT 
Jim (who never quotes actual real weather statistics) Dale, who was on LBC this morning, blames all the rainfall and flooding on man made climate change. As usual the lazy presenter did not ask for the facts to back it up. Until the media starts to do its job by questioning these clowns we will float further and further down the Net Zero river towards the waterfall at the end.
He does get questioned when he appears on Talk TV/Radio. He doesn’t like that at all and frequently gets angry at the presenter questioning him.
A classic response from ignorant people; shouting at those who have the temerity to question them. They think that excess volume makes up for a lack of knowledge
Dim Dale would be a better name for him; truly a legend in his own lunchtime.
We certainly had no extreme rainfall days here. My river never rose more than a foot or so, whereas in prevous years it has occasionally risen by up to about 8 feet.
I didn’t notice any significant rain last year apart from maybe December. I’m quite unsure about it however I live in a slight rain shadow so maybe I’m being ignorant :/.
Why does no-one ever mention the recent Huga Tonga under sea volcanic eruption that increased the moisture content of the upper atmosphere by 10%.
which inevitably will mean an increase cloud cover and of course rainfall.
Enirely created by nature – blame man for that !
I wonder how much the most significant driver of the climate in the last two years is affecting things . The Hunga Tonga volcano surely has that accolade, I notice that Oz had floods when their weather computer said drought, is that because the big eruption is being ignored.
Last February, weren’t those scientists cited by the BBC predicting a draught for 2023?
Yes I came here to make that point
The media ran lost of stories “drought about set to continue”
and posted back multiple comments and tweets
saying “What are you even talking about ? The UK is a very wet place the general problem is getting rid of water, rather than not having enough”
Thus drainage is a vast part of EA and water companies jobs
and I think they have neglected lots as they concentrate on Climate Change and drought projects.
In April BBC was still pushing drought-porn
.. https://twitter.com/No2BS/status/1648053783488876548
Supplying water and disposal of waste take vastly more resources than flood protection. Not surprising when you think one is an imperative, the other a choice – nice to do but life would go on with less.
I just don’t understand this strange trend that’s been growing on this site lately to label anything short term as weather and not climate. In this instance, rain day frequency. Absolute nonsense. The number of rain days, when, where and why it’s high or low is just as much a valid subject of climate interest as any other quantity derived from weather data.
Yup, the climate zeolots don’t seem to see the contradiction in predicting more rainfall and more droughts simultaneously. But this is handy for Councils not maintaining drains and ditches, and water companies not fixing leaks and having to impose hosepipe bans, who can BOTH blame it all on “climate change”.
Southwest reservoirs are at 87.5% of storage
Unless they screw it up .. that should supply more than a years worth of water, even if it doesn’t rain
… https://www.southwestwater.co.uk/environment/water-resources/reservoir-levels
Needless to say, Ed Hawkins has posted this image, seemingly to show how CO2 is driving “Climate Change”.:
You showed 10 year averages, but I use 30 year because that really is “climate” and not weather:
Best regards,
Charles Duncan
>
Maybe I’m missing something here but the argument that we’re getting more rain because warmer air holds more water vapour surely begs the question: so why does this warmer air lose all its moisture as rain then?
Excellent point!
Uplift.
H2O is part of air to a greater or lesser extent. It is not actually “held” by the rest of the molecules such as O2, N2, and Argon. Max Beran says “Uplift” mostly true.
As the particles rise there is (normally) a drop in temperature. See “lapse rate”. In simple terms, the H2O vapor slows down to a point where when encountering another such molecule they coalesce, rather than bounce away. As this continues, a droplet forms – or if cold enough forms a crystal. These can become heavy enough to fall as rain or snow.
{It is quite complicated; justice to the physics is more than I want to try.}
“The kinetic energy of individual atoms, when they are randomly vibrating about their equilibrium position, is an example of disordered energy. Thermal energy is disordered energy. The temperature is a measure of this internal, disordered energy.” From this link:
http://labman.phys.utk.edu/phys136core/modules/m2/temperature.html
Keep fighting the lies! How do I get an article to Paul H? Such as this: https://rogerpielkejr.substack.com/p/an-egregious-failure-of-scientific?utm_campaign=email-post&r=8swye&utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email
Where has the jet stream been this year? Somebody said, maybe John Ketley, said the recent wet weather was down to this. As to rain, I had 3 inches of rain in the last week and recorded over an inch from 2pm Thursday until Friday morning. It is an uncalibrated glass cone and I am not going out at midnight to empty it so reads across days.
“because warmer air holds more water”. Ok i get that. But is there any actual evidence that the temperature of rain bearing air causing heavy rainfall is any warmer? Isn’t this just another untested hypothesis, pretending to be theory? Answers on a postcard please.
Climate Change, the grift that keeps on giving.