By Paul Homewood

https://twitter.com/metoffice?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.telegraph.co.uk%2Fnews%2F2018%2F04%2F20%2Fuk-weather-britain-set-sizzle-hottest-april-day-70-years%2F

Excruciatingly close, say the Met Office!

Well, maybe for then, as they would love to be able to declare another record high. But the real story is not the one they would like to portray.

The record April temperature was set as long ago as 1922, and equalled in 1944 and 1949.

https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/public/weather/climate-extremes/#?tab=climateExtremes

These sort of “records” are in any event pretty meaningless, other than for inclusion in the Guinness Book of Records. Weather stations come and go, while others become enveloped in urban heat islands, making long term comparisons misleading.

To get a better idea of what has been happening with the frequency of hot days in April, we need either to look at the records of long running stations, such as Oxford, or the Central England Temperature Series, which has the advantage of representing a wider area.

Yesterday, the CET registered 23.0C, which makes it the 8th hottest day in April, since daily records began in 1878:

https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/hadobs/hadcet/cetmaxdly1878on_urbadj4.dat

There has certainly been a cluster of warm days in the last few years. But this does not appear to be significantly different to other periods in the 1890s and 1940s.

I have no idea why these clusters should occur. But what is clear is these hot days, then as now, are nothing more than weather events.

via NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT

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April 20, 2018 at 05:51AM