Readers may recall how the Met Office botched yet another forecast, calling for drought but instead getting a month of deluge. Here’s the numbers.
By Paul Homewood
The UK Met Office have just released their weather data for April, which confirms just how wet and cold the month has been. With an average of 126.5mm of rain, this has been the wettest April on records which go back to 1910. It was also the coldest since 1989, 0.65C colder than the 1971-2000 average.
This, of course, is in stark contrast to the 3 month outlook the Met Office issued on 23rd March, which told us that :-
SUMMARY – PRECIPITATION: The forecast for average UK rainfall slightly favours drier than average conditions for April-May-June as a whole, and also slightly favours April being the driest of the 3 months.
and
SUMMARY – TEMPERATURE: The UK-average temperature forecast for spring (April-May-June) shows a range of possible outcomes that are warmer than the range observed between 1971 and 2000 (our standard climatological reference period), but quite similar to the last decade. For April the forecast also favours temperatures being warmer than the 1971-2000 reference period.
http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/media/pdf/p/i/A3-layout-precip-AMJ.pdf
http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/media/pdf/q/q/A3-layout-temp-AMJ.pdf
So far (unless I have blinked),the Met Office Chairman, Robert Napier (formerly Chief Exec of WWF-UK), has not been doing the round of TV studios to apologise for getting things so badly wrong. But what about the longer perspective, with parts of England still officially in drought?
Figure 1 shows annual rainfall trends up to the end of 2011. The last 2 years have been dry, but are similar to many earlier years in the record, while the long term trend is remarkably stable.
Figure 1
Further analysis on the 2011 numbers by season and also by region is available here. (Again, this analysis shows that there is not much happening with long term rainfall trends and also that there was nothing particularly unusual about 2011).
Figure 2 shows the cumulative rainfall totals in England & Wales for January – April, both for this year and the 1971-2000 average. In most parts of the country, rainfall has been close to normal. Only the West and Wales have had significantly low levels, but these areas have not been in drought and generally receive much higher amounts of rain than the rest of the country anyway. Figure 3 gives the cumulative amounts for the last 16 months. (The 1971-2000 average is also for 16 months, i.e. January – December PLUS January – April). The areas mainly affected by drought (as the map below indicates) are the Midlands, East Anglia and South East, and rainfall levels since January 2011 are down by 19%, 18% and 15% respectively, but close to normal this year.
Figure 2
Figure 3
Forecast for May/June/July
The Met Office have also recently issued their 3 month outlook for May to July. For temperatures, they have this to say.
SUMMARY – TEMPERATURE: The balance of probability, both for May and the period May-June-July 2012, favours UK-averaged temperatures above the 1971-2000 climate mean, but in line with those observed over the last ten years. However, predictability for both periods tends to be low, with current forecasts indicating greater-than-average uncertainty in UK weather patterns as early as the beginning of May. May is also a month where there can still be large swings in temperature depending on the prevailing wind direction and so cold spells are still possible despite the most likely scenario being for above-normal temperatures. The probability that the UK-mean temperature for May-June-July will fall into the coldest of our five categories is less than 5%, whilst the probability that it will fall into the warmest of our five categories is around 45% (the 1971-2000 climatological probability for each of these categories is 20%).
http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/media/pdf/3/d/A3-layout-temp-MMJ.pdf
And precipitation.
SUMMARY – PRECIPITATION: For UK-average rainfall, the predicted probabilities slightly favour above normal values during both May and May-June-July. However, confidence in this prediction is not high, and there is still a significant probability of below normal rainfall. Whilst the wet weather of recent weeks will have had a positive effect on soil moisture, with all that that implies for agriculture, it is unlikely to have had a significant impact on groundwater supplies. With the forecast for May and May-June-July not favouring a continuation of the current very wet spell, groundwater resources in southern, eastern and central England are very unlikely to recover during this period. The probability that UK-average rainfall for May-June-July will fall into the driest of our five categories is around 15%, whilst the probability that it will fall into the wettest of our five categories is around 30% (the 1971-2000 climatological probability for each of these categories is 20%).
http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/media/pdf/2/l/A3-layout-precip-MJJ.pdf
In other words, it will probably be hot and wet, but they don’t really know. Maybe, Robert Napier should go back to saving polar bears.
So it is actually too much water abstraction rather than replenishment that is causing the so called drought. Thanks for the stats.
Dr Richard North on his website http://www.eureferendum.com has been looking closely at the politics surrounding the so called drought in the UK and found a a “massive failure in strategic planning, on a par with the failure to ensure adequate energy supplies”.
Caroline Spelman, Secretary of State for the Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, recently decided that there was “no immediate need for (a new reservoir) largely based on the idea that people would respond to her nagging and reduce per capita water consumption”.
http://www.eureferendum.com/blogview.aspx?blogno=82614
Dr North further found that: “To overcome the perennial problem of water shortages, five major new reservoir projects had been thought necessary, plus three large extensions to existing reservoirs. This was not an academic project. Outline plans had been set out in the water companies’ 25-year water resources plans prepared in 2004.”
However as a result of political opposition, “none of the five reservoirs deemed essential in 2004 – all in the south of England – have seen the light of day”. Dr North concludes, “the climate nannies are pursuing instead a policy of reduced water consumption, in line with its more general climate change mitigation strategy”.
http://www.eureferendum.com/blogview.aspx?blogno=82615
Next, in a very interesting article Dr North revealed that the water shortage in the UK, “involves the EU (European Union) and climate change, with the (European) Commission asserting that water scarcity and droughts have now emerged “as a major challenge” – and “climate change is expected to make matters worse”. Using that as its base, the EU has effectively taken over water management policy”.
As a result of European Union meddling “via the Framework Water Directive”, and with the complicity of the UK government Dr North revealed that “price is to be used as the primary tool of water management. No longer is it the function of water companies to provide adequate supplies of clean water at minimum cost. The task is to reduce demand, thereby saving energy and reducing carbon footprints”. The article is well worth reading in full:
http://www.eureferendum.com/blogview.aspx?blogno=82616
Your excellent post when combined with Dr North’s painstaking research show that water shortage and the threat of standpipes together with higher water prices are the result of collusion and political chicanery.
Having given this a bit further thought. It is clear that the politicians and water companies are trying to pin the blame of lack of potable water in the SE of England on the global warming bogey man.
The truth is that the law says a water company must provide water for a development, so when planning is put in then the water company always says yes so as to not fall foul of the law. Result too many houses and not enough water.
But why are we using potable water to flush the bog anyway?
It felt cold here in Nottingham when I walked the dog tonight and looked as if it would rain again.
Evidently the asparagus crop has been devastated so far http://www.telegraph.co.uk/foodanddrink/foodanddrinknews/9245041/British-Asparagus-Festival-cancelled-due-to-lack-of-asparagus.html I was going to give a link to Thames Water (one of the driest areas) reservoir levels but I can’t find the link anymore but they are about 98% full. The water companies say the problem is with groundwater but we shall see.
Phil Ford, the reason is that the rain falls in the wrong places. In the past rain would fall on flood plains or into smaller reservoirs. They built more centrally based large reservoirs, when most of the rainfall isn’t, and filled in the small local reservoirs; then build homes on the flood plains and ex-reservoirs. So now, the UK has drought or flood.
– “the Met Office Chairman, Robert Napier (formerly Chief Exec of WWF-UK),”
excuse me where the hell did that come from ? Have activists infiltrated anything else ?
So if the Met O came out against CAGW would that possibly affect WWF’s £300m/yr donation base ?
– From WikiP : “The Green Fiscal Commission set up to examine the best way of implementing ECO-TAXES .. is chaired by Robert Napier, chairman of the Met Office and former chief executive of the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF).”
OMG ! what an upside down world we live in
Steven Mosher says:
May 5, 2012 at 12:05 pm
One cannot both believe that the weather is chaotic on short time scales AND criticize probablistic estimates that recognize this fact.
=====================================
I give it a 10% chance that it won’t……and a 90% chance that it will
….if it does either one, I’m right
probablistic estimates my arse
Plus ca change as they say in gay Paree. Some 45 years ago I phoned the Met Office after the forecast was said to be “in the north overcast with some rain and in the south some rain and overcast”. My request to know the difference was met with embarrassed laughter. Presumably now with a big computer the same information is produced much faster.
awww come on you lot, can’t you see this is a subliminal plea for more funding for more staff to run bigger and better computer models which will tell us – bigger and better lies and fabricated weather stories. In the interim they probably want snorkles and flippers supplied as part of their salary pagkages, and an annual holiday to ayres rock – oops sorry Uluru…….
question to the mosher….what constites abnormal variation in the daily temperature record of the UK? For the month of May, I think I have come close today. It feels like we are goingm to nhave another snowfall. But Mosher with all his tools will enlighten me.
Jim Cripwell says:
May 5, 2012 at 11:57 am
There is an old saying in the UK, which, I am sure, predates the Met. office.
Oak before ash, we’re in for a splash
Ash before oak, we’re in for a soak.
Anyone from the UK know which came into leaf first; ash or oak?
Here in Somerset the Oak has been slightly ahead of the ash. I’m certainly hoping for a warm dry summer, fed up with being cold and wet.
Stop calling it a drought, it is a water shortage A drought is a substantive natural shortfall of water and this is not what your summary shows..
The UK is suffering a supplier water shortage because EU/UK political influences have prevented them building additional storage capacity to match increases in the customer base. As the rainfall figures above show there is an adequate supply of raw material (ie rainwater) to supply increases in the finished product (ie cleaned tap water) should they wish to capture it..
Phil Ford (May 5, 2012 at 11:13 am) wrote:
“Oh, and by the way 2+2=5.”
…and doesn’t matter whether harassment-enforced ‘logic’s via ignorance &/or deception — viscerally creepy, ugly leadership underminer either way.
–
For those who’ve written Piers Corbyn off, take a sober look here:
Solar-Terrestrial-Climate Weave = http://i49.tinypic.com/219q848.png
Sensible climate conception IS NOT POSSIBLE without sound conceptual understanding of this core pattern.
Sincerely.
Where I live in Wiltshire, Wessex Water take a lot of ground water. They do have reservoirs, but prefer groundwater as it is purer and therefore requires less treatment. In Wessex Water-speak, they talk about less carbon emissions, which just says to me that they use less power taking groundwater than treating reservoir water, but it makes them look good in the eyes of government climate change act reasoning. They reckon reservoirs are pretty much normal hereabouts, but the groundwater levels are low as we have had less than usual rainfall and the aquifer hasn’t been replenished. Having seen the flooded water meadows near Salisbury, it does make you wonder why there hasn’t been adequate planning to siphon off excess river water in times of heavy rainfall, but perhaps the climate change prophesies didn’t take this sort of event into account, a bit like the salinity plant in Oz, built at vast expense because there was never going to be any rain, or allowing their reservoirs to become so full they had to release water when it was already flooding downstream. I’d hate to be a water planner in this day and age, bombarded with climate change projections on the one hand and having to appease the government, while the weather/climate does everything it can to disprove the forecasts, long or short range. The local psychiatric unit close to Wessex Water’s Bath HQ is probably full of jibbering water engineers.
My garden is squelching with mud, my veg are looking very sad. The asparagus, which was all beginning to show after the warm spell during the last week of March, has virtually stopped growing it’s so flipping cold and all the more tender stuff is still in the greenhouse snugly wrapped in fleece. Cloud cover has been 100% today so temperatures have been cold and now that there are clear patches outside tonight, I expect the temperature will drop even further.
There is a Giles cartoon for 1st June with the Giles family on board a sailing boat, in their storm gear, the sky is dark and the rain is lashing down and they are celebrating ‘the 1st of flaming June’. Situation fairly normal, then!
After considerable research (sarc) I have discovered the computational error in respect of the MO’s super computer climate | weather models and offer this gratis advice to the MO, wherever the word “CO2” appears change it to “Solar Energy” and vice versa … there you go models fixed and predictive ability improved by 100%, No? Oh well, 100% x zero = zero!
Judging by the way that most weather forecasts online in the UK don’t show numbers directly anymore but, instead, rely on coloured lookup charts that were once the sole province of paint companies I’m strongly reminded of the script by the late Douglas Adams when he discusses the ‘Wheel Commitee’
After months of wrangling, this group of ‘worthies’ (comprised of a mix of telephone hygienists and PR specialists) had failed to come up with this most basic of machines.
When challenged as to their lack of effectiveness their defence comprised entirely of ‘Easy for you to say but what colour should it be’
Forget those tricky numbers that follow well-understood patterns. Weather is complicated. Climate is very much harder to predict but it proves a much more solid foundation for a long and lucrative career. Climatology is to meteorology as Sport League results are to their respective Fantasy outcomes!
Never mind that the Met Office weather models and climate models share the same algorithms or so they tell us. What matters is that they both follow the True Faith and therefore must be exempted from criticism.
Hint for the IPPC; forget about those silly numbers, so beloved of old-school scientists. They just provide ammunition for those pesky sceptics when they diverge from predictions. Go for colours instead. Who could provide numerical/statistical counter-arguments to a peer-reviewed paper in Nature that utilised colour charts? Even Steve McIntyre would have problems analysing upside down sediments with an R2 of green with a hit of red +/- a bluish tinge!
On the other side of the Atlantic, some significant fruit growing regions have been devastated by late frosts:
http://iceagenow.info/2012/05/hard-freeze-devastates-ne-ohio-wine-grapes/
http://iceagenow.info/2012/05/ontario-%E2%80%9Cworst-disaster-fruit-growers-ever-experienced%E2%80%9D/
Odd that one should have to read obscure websites for this quite significant news, of which the MSM is sterile by political mandate.
Steven Mosher says:
May 5, 2012 at 12:05 pm
Huh?
One cannot both believe that the weather is chaotic on short time scales AND criticize probablistic estimates that recognize this fact.
Actually – you can. You are trying to introduce a false dichotomy, arguing that “if weather / climate is chaotic then there is no possibility and no point in making weather forecasts; and conversely, if we find that in fact weather forecasting is possible with some skill, then we can claim that weather / climate are chaos-free”.
This is oversimplistic and deceptive. Ever heard of the Hopf bifurcation? Systems which tend to chaotic non-equilibrium pattern diverge gradually into a series of bifurcations until eventually an avalanche of bifurcations leads to the transition to chaos. But in the short term there is a “window” within which linear type analysis and prediction are possible.
Climate / weather does include chaotic / non-equilibrium pattern phenomena. However this does not meant that, armed with data on winds, temperatures and pressures in the atmosphere, we cannot make forecasts for several days ahead.
I don’t see what the big deal is. The Met Office forecast was very equivocal, They said it was about twice as likely that it would be dry as at was that it would be wet, but both extremes were low probabilities. Their forecast summary said:
“The forecast for average UK rainfall slightly favours drier than average
conditions for AprilMayJune as a whole, and also slightly favours April being the
driest of the 3 months.
….
The probability that UK precipitation for April-May-June will fall into the driest of our five categories is 20-25% whilst the probability that it will fall into the wettest of our five categories is 10-15%”
It seems that a change in blocking patterns due to a shift in the jet stream is an important factor in the change from the dry March to the wet April.
http://metofficenews.wordpress.com/2012/04/26/sunny-march-wet-april-how-the-jet-stream-is-partly-to-blame/
“In both March and April we have seen what we term a ‘blocking pattern’ in the jet stream, where it meanders north and south instead of making its more usual eastward progress. Despite this, March was the 3rd warmest and 5th driest March in the all-UK record going back to 1910, while April has so far been relatively cool with rainfall already 30% above the average for the whole month across England and Wales. So what is causing the difference?
It comes down to the position of the blocking feature. In March, the meandering of the jet stream caused it to pass to the north of the UK – anchoring high surface pressure over the UK. This suppressed cloud, increased sunshine and temperatures, and prevented the usual rain-bearing Atlantic weather systems coming in from the west from reaching us.
Soon after the start of April, however, the whole pattern moved westwards, so the peak of the northerly meander moved over the North Atlantic Ocean. The UK, in contrast, found itself under the adjacent southerly meander, with the jet stream passing to the south of the UK over France and Spain. This atmospheric set-up brings low surface pressure, cloud and rain. Because the pattern is still blocked, without a west-to-east jet stream to blow the weather system through, the low gets stuck over the UK, resulting in high rainfall totals overall.
Like the weather, we can predict the path of the jet stream with a good deal of accuracy up to about five days ahead but it is more difficult to give detail on longer timescales. Therefore it’s not possible to say exactly what the jet stream will be doing in a month’s time, for example, or exactly how it will impact our weather. ”
It is interesting that due to the warming of the Arctic, the jet stream is becoming weaker, and
meandering more, which sets up these blocking patterns that create more frequent extreme drought and extreme wet conditions.
http://www.wunderground.com/blog/JeffMasters/article.html?entrynum=2065
the forcast for sydney Aust 5/6/12 is for rain at hhe moment not one cloud to be seen ?
Lance May 5, 2012 at 12:28 pm — “I’m sure they(Met Office) will provide themselves a big bonus on their ‘accurate’ forecasts…”
Why not? They pay their own way as a Trading Fund and make enough profit for their owner, the Ministry of Defence, to buy some tanks.
The Met Office is being left behind, it needs to get with the program.
Lengthy, “unprecedented” cold spell hits Morocco; global warming blamed
http://tomnelson.blogspot.com/2012/05/lengthy-cold-spell-hits-morocco-global.html
Betting is legal in the UK, so a little wager on when the MET will tag a long term forcast sounds interesting. I suspect it’s already being done – I hear you folks bet on everything….
As it is in Australia. In practice, most betting on the weather occurs on cricket matches where whether and how long it rains significantly affects the outcome.
I don’t mind admitting (because gambling winnings in Australia aren’t taxed) I make significant sums of money from betting on cricket matches. The key is knowing how to interpret weather forecasts, and I give the forecasts rather more scrutiny than most.
The UK’s Met Office is in a class of its own in the vague, evasive language they use in forecasts. I can make a better assessment of the likely weather by using the model outputs, which are available online if you know where to look.
I love the title of the AP article in today’s paper.
British droughts look different.
It was written by Jill Lawless of AP. I bet Seth Borenson is livid with an AP article poking fun at this.
Eric Adler says:
May 5, 2012 at 5:47 pm
It is interesting that due to the warming of the Arctic, the jet stream is becoming weaker, and
meandering more, which sets up these blocking patterns that create more frequent extreme drought and extreme wet conditions.
=========================
Eric, you might check Arctic temps this year…and ice extent while you’re at it
…..Materbedwetter counts on useful idiots