Well we’ve ended one chapter by saying goodbye to meteorological summer and opened a new chapter in the 2016 weather book with the beginning of meteorological autumn.

Here was how summer’s final day turned out for the UK.

Autumn has opened beautifully in many places.

As has been the case for much of summer’s second half, autumn’s opening day we see another north-south divide over the UK.

So how did you rate summer 2016? Forecast-wise, it was a good forecast. Official Europe Summer 2016 Forecast

Here are some early stats from the met office.

31 August 2016 – Provisional statistics for Summer 2016 up to 29 August show that whilst there were some very wet days and also hot and sunny periods, the season as a whole was around average.

The UK’s mean temperature for this summer has been 14.9 °C which is around half a degree warmer than average based on data from 1981 to 2010. All four of the home nations have been above average temperature wise, however they also all experienced above average rainfall. With two days left of the season, albeit largely dry ones, the UK has already recorded 269.1mm which is 12% above average.

It hasn’t been an overly sunny summer, and that’s represented in the statistics. The UK has seen 7% less sunshine than average with just 468 hours recorded. As a result many of us will feel we were a little short changed when it comes to summery weather, but it has been nowhere near the dullest summer on record which was in 1954 when only 378 hours of sunshine were recorded.

The early August statistics also show that after a very wet first day of the month when an area of low pressure moved across the south of the UK, it’s still been drier than average for the majority of England, Wales and Northern Ireland. However, frontal systems affected northwestern parts making it wetter than average here.

There were no exceptionally warm days in the first half of the month, with nothing above 28 °C. Then a feed of air from the south gave high temperatures across England and especially the southeast and East Anglia towards the end of the month with 33.9 °C recorded at Gravesend, Kent on 24 August making it the warmest day of the year so far.

Mean temperatures have been above normal by around one degree for most of England, Wales and Northern Ireland, but close to normal for Scotland. Maximum temperatures are also close to or above normal, with parts of East Anglia up by more than two degrees.

Map showing 1-29 August mean maximum temperature anomaly from 1981-2010 average

Rainfall has been generally near or rather below normal. East Anglia and the southeast were driest, with some parts seeing less than 50% of their average. A few areas have had more than average, notably in northern England and the western isles of Scotland. West was not best for the sunshine with duller conditions here but across the UK as a whole sunshine hours were up around 5% on the average so far this month.

As we head into meteorological autumn things are set to turn more unsettled. Some wet and windy weather is likely at times for the weekend and first part of next week, in part due to the remnants of Hurricane Gaston which are likely to track towards the UK, though our weather will be more influenced by other weather systems pushing in from the Atlantic. However, there may well be some further warm weather developing as we go through next week, particularly for the south.

You can keep up to date with the weather using our forecast pages and by following us on Facebook and Twitter, as well as using new mobile app.

Last updated: 31 August 2016

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