Weather Statistics for January 2006

Headline: Despite a mild spell around mid-month, it was generally cold with temperatures below average. Rather dull and grey at times with snow showers in the final week.

February opened with high pressure dominating the picture. It was cold to begin with and the 2nd saw freezing fog and temperatures remained below freezing all day reaching just -1.3C. Mist and low cloud was generally rather persistent and no sunshine was recorded at Pitsford until at least the 8th. Winds were generally light and from the north or north-west.

A cold front worked southwards across the county on the 7th with winds picking up from the north-west reaching gusts of 34mph at Pitsford. Wintry showers were fairly widespread, these falling mainly as rain at Pitsford giving 2.5mm in the space of 2 hrs. The passage of the front introduced much brighter skies with 6.3hrs of sunshine recorded on the 8th and 6.2hrs on the 9th. The sunshine by day was, however, followed by overnight frosts and some sharp ground frosts were noted between the 9th and 11th falling to -7.5C on the 10th.

From the 11th onwards the weather turned very unsettled as showers and longer spells of rain worked across the county. 6.7mm fell in just under 5 hrs on the 11th followed by a further 4.7mm on the 12th. Once again it became pretty dull with little sunshine recorded until after an active front introduced a fair amount of rain on the 14th (7.5mm in just under 5 hrs). This front brought with it a strong but mild south-westerly wind gusting to 42mph.

Low pressure then developed west of Ireland and tracked south-eastwards towards northern France introducing a colder north-easterly airflow on the 18th. Overnight frosts become commonplace once more and there were some fairly persistent fog, particularly on the 19th when low cloud lingered pretty much all day. There were some wintry showers on the 21st, but no accumulation.

The cold theme continued pretty much uninterrupted for the rest of the month. Further snow showers were recorded on the 23rd and the 24th, the latter seeing a slight accumulation of 1cm. The brisk east or north-easterly wind produced some bitterly cold days especially on the 24th and 25th which recorded respective gusts of 44 and 47mph. Despite the cold the 25th did clock up some reasonable sunshine, up to 6.7hrs at Pitsford.

As the month came to a close a cold front pushed southwards on the 27th introducing a fine and clear morning on the 28th with excellent visibility. The northerly airflow later introduced some slight snow showers but with no accumulation.


Air Temperatures    
The Highest Maximum: 11.7 C on 15th
The Lowest Maximum: -1.3 C on 2nd
The Highest Minimum: 5.6 C on 15th
The Lowest Minimum: -3.3 C on 2nd
The Mean Maximum: 6.6 C  
The Mean Minimum: 0.9 C  
The Overall Mean: 3.8 C  
Difference from the Monthly Mean: -0.9 C  
    
Relative Humidity:    
Highest Relative Humidity (at obs): 100.0 % on 18th & 19th
Lowest Relative Humidity (at obs): 73.6 % on 25th
Mean Relative Humidity (at obs): 90.2 %  
    
Dew Point:    
The Highest Dew Point (at obs): 7.7 C on 13th
The Lowest Dew Point (at obs): -4.5 C on 2nd
The Mean Dew Point (at obs): 1.3 C  
    
Rainfall:    
Total: 33.0 mm  
Difference from the Monthly Mean: 87.5 %  
Duration: 42.6 hrs  
Highest 24 hour fall (obs to obs): 7.5 mm on 14th
Rain Days (>/=0.2mm): 12   
Wet Days (>/=1.0mm): 7   
    
Sunshine:    
Total Duration of Bright Sunshine: 71.3 hrs  
Sunniest day: 7.9 hrs on 28th
Days with sunshine: 12
Cloud cover (mean at obs): 6.4 oktas  (80%)
    

Pressure (reduced to sea level):    
The Highest Pressure: 1033.6 mb on 5th
The Lowest Pressure: 983.8 mb on 17th
Mean Pressure (recorded at obs): 1016.4 mb  
    
Winds    
Run of wind (mean over 24 hrs): 141.5 miles  
Mean daily wind speed: 7.7 mph  
Highest mean daily wind speed: 13.9mph on 24th
Run of wind (to date): 3961.0 miles  
Highest Maximum Gust: 47 mph on 25th
Highest wind strength (at obs): 26.5 mph on 25th
Mean wind strength (at obs): 8.1 mph  
    
Winds from the Following Directions:    

N 8 NE 4 E 1 SE 0 S 2 SW 4 W 1 NW 6 Calm 2
    
Ground Temperatures:     
Lowest Grass Minimum: -7.5 C on 10th
Mean Grass Minimum: -2.0 C  
Lowest Concrete Minimum: -3.4 C on 11th
Mean Concrete Minimum: 0.5 C  
Lowest Bare Earth Minimum: -3.0 C on 11th
Mean Bare Earth Minimum: 0.3 C  
    
Soil/Earth Temperatures:     
Surface mean: 2.7 C  
5cm mean: 2.7 C  
10cm mean: 3.0 C  
20cm mean: 3.5 C  
30cm mean: 3.7 C  
40cm mean: 3.9 C  
50cm mean: 4.3 C  
100cm mean: 4.7 C  
    
    
Days with:    
Thunder: 0   
Hail less than 0.5mm: 0   
Hail greater than/equal to 0.5mm: 0   
Snow or snow & rain: 4   
Snow lying: 2
Fog 4 
Ground frost: 21
Air frost: 11
Duration of air frost: 60.0hrs
Gales: 0
Total Evaporation (tank) 18.94 mm

All data © Pitsford Hall weather station.

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