Sunshine below normal despite the heatwave
THE UK has had below average sunshine this summer despite a ‘major heatwave’, weather experts said yesterday.
Across all three months of summer, the country only had 89 per cent of average sunshine at 449.3 hours, with Northern Ireland seeing only 73 per cent (313.9 hours).
The Met Office said: ‘Only a handful of counties in the south east of England and north Scotland recorded above average sunshine hours.’
Temperatures rose to 3 .4C (97F) at Heathrow on August 7 – making it the hottest August day since 2003. But the Met Office said more unsettled weather at the start and end of the month balanced the average out.
The UK was 1C warmer than the mean temperature for August at 15.9C ( 0F) but only saw 88 per cent of its average sunshine hours at 142. .
For the summer as a whole, the country had a mean temperature of 14.75C (58F) – just 0.38C above average.
Provisional data also showed that the summer months were wetter than normal with 321mm of rainfall – 134 per cent of the average. It came after hot weather triggered torrential downpours.