South West England: latest pressure

UK last month

February 2010

The month was generally cold with only a few brief milder interludes, mainly in the west and south. There were some sharp frosts and snowfalls, especially over upland areas. High pressure during the second week brought plenty of fine weather, but the remainder of the month was generally unsettled. The last few days brought heavy snowfalls across Highland Scotland. Overall, it was a cold month with mean temperatures 1.0 to 2.0 °C below the 1971-2000 normal over England and Wales, and 2.0 to 2.5 °C below over Scotland and Northern Ireland. Provisionally, it was the coldest February over the UK since 1991.

Rainfall was below normal in most areas, apart from East Anglia, south-east England and some other eastern coastal areas where over twice the normal amount fell. Less than a half of normal fell across much of western Scotland, north-west England and the west of Northern Ireland.

Sunshine totals ranged from below normal across eastern England to well above near many western coasts.

A maximum temperature of 12.3 °C was recorded on 5th at Kew Gardens (Greater London). A minimum temperature of -19.2 °C was recorded on 23rd at Braemar (Aberdeenshire). In the 24 hours ending at 0900 on 26th, 52 mm of rainfall was measured at Benmore, Younger Botanic Garden (Argyll and Bute). 44 cm of lying snow was reported from Aviemore (Highland) at 0900 on 25th.

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