Weather news
Records tumble as desert like conditions prevail
A review of the weather for July 2022
A summary of the weather would be quite simple: hot and dry.
Firstly, we broke our temperature record on 18th July when the peak heat reached 38.8°C, and equalled it again the following day (as reported in our Heatwave Newsflash). The overnight low in between was a new record high for a daily minimum, at 22.9°C; this was our ninth “tropical night”, where the temperature never dips below 20°C. The overall mean temperature was 20.4°C, surprisingly our third warmest after two other hot Julys, 2006 (21.1°C) and 1983 (21.0°C). The lowest daily maximum across the month was another record, at 21.1°C, but our average daily max of 26.9°C was beaten by 2006’s 27.3°C. The average daily minimum was 14.5°C, which was third warmest behind 1983 and 2006 again.
And then there’s the rain – or lack of it. The total for the month was just 1.8mm, a record low for July – the previous driest July in 1984 enjoyed 11.9mm! This rain fell in small amounts on three days, equalling the fewest days on record (there were sprinkles on three other days, but it takes 0.2mm to register in our rain gauge, and these were insufficient to do that). The highest daily rain was 1.2mm on 2nd, again a record low.
Not only was this our driest ever July, but our third driest ever month. And for the gardens, fields and countryside, it comes on top of a run of dry months: six of the seven months this year to date have been below average rainfall; in fact, just taking the period January to July, this year is the driest on record.
The result has been a landscape that looks like Autumn, the harvest already in before the end of July, and gardeners and farmers alike struggling to get a worthwhile yield from their crops.
There’s still no rain in the forecast; will the drought break before the end of August?
| Measure | Unit | Minimum | Average | Maximum | Average min | Average max | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Relative humidity | % | 19 | 65 | 93 | |||
| Temperature | °C | 10.4 | 20.5 | 38.8 | 14.5 | 26.9 | |
| Wind source (most common/highest gust) | Sector | NW | SW | ||||
| Wind speed | mph | 2.4 | 22 | 15.5 | |||
| Rain daily accumulation | mm | 0.1 | 1.2 | 1.8 | |||
| Barometric pressure | hPa | 1007 | 1020.0 | 1032 | |||
| Solar irradiance during daylight | W/m² | 320 | 1090 | 876 | |||
| Sunshine (sunny if irradiance > 120 W/m2) | Hours | 11.5 | 13.0 | 356.5 |