Month confirmed as among wettest ever

Storms: Met Office statistics show full extent of rainfall

A new Met Office report has revealed that last December was one of the wettest on record, with exceptional rainfall, severe flooding and extreme warmth throughout the month.

The organisation’s State of the UK Climate 2015 report showed that the final month of the year had the most rainfall since 1910, and was the hottest in the UK since 1659.

As a whole, last year was the seventh wettest on record for 116 years.

The weather in December and the extremely high rainfall caused chaos for communities across Britain, and left towns, villages and cities in Scotland severely damaged by floods.

Three named storms – Frank, Desmond and Eva – were behind the worst of the damage and caused hundreds of homes and businesses to be flooded.

Ballater in Deeside was among the communities worst affected by the deluge.

Mark McCarthy, head of the National Climate Information Centre and one of the report’s authors, said: “The weather during 2016 contained many notable features and I’m sure that everyone will have a personal memory of a weather moment during the year.

“Sadly, for some, the extreme rainfall during December has left a legacy of flooding for communities across northern England and Scotland.”

Many regions of the UK had more than double the amount of average rainfall, with Westmorland receiving 320% more rain than usual, Peeblesshire receiving 290% and Dumfriesshire receiving 260%.

And a number of areas of England had some of the hottest Decembers on record, far above the UK average of 7.9C for the month.

Middlesex was the warmest at 11.1C, followed by Hampshire and Dorset, which both recorded average thermometer readings of 10.7C.

Mr McCarthy added: “The UK rainfall map for December 2015 shows that large parts of Wales, northern England, Scotland and Northern Ireland experienced extreme rainfall, brought in large measures by the memorable storms of the month, including storms Desmond, Eva and Frank as they tracked across the UK.

“Although the high rainfall brought by these storms led to significant and repeated flooding in some parts, many areas in southern England received average or even below average rainfall.”

“Extreme rainfall, brought by memorable storms”

DELUGED: Fire crews begin to pump water from a flooded street in the Port Elphinstone during the heavy rains

A section of the A93 collapsed during floods between Ballater and Braemar