Category Archives: London weather

2025 averages in Wanstead

January 1, 2026 wansteadmeteo Leave a comment

The mean temperature for 2025 finished 12.2C, 0.2C above the most recent 10-year average and just 0.01 warmer than 2024.

The average maximum finished 16.7C, 0.5 above average and 0.6C up on 2024.

The average minimum finished 7.7C, 0.1C below average and 0.8C down on 2024.

There were 42 air frosts, 9 above average and the most for four years.

Annual rainfall totalled 458.4mm, 73% of average. It was the driest for 22 years and 4th driest in a local series going back to 1960.

Average 9am pressure was 1017.1mb, the highest for 10 years.

London weather, Weather

Top 10 wind gusts at Heathrow since 1973

December 6, 2024 wansteadmeteo 1 Comment

Our largest airport is relatively sheltered compared with other exposed locations in the UK.

In terms of London it is far more exposed than areas such as Wanstead; the max gust here on January 2nd was just 50mph.

Data from the Met Office revealed the following list.

Date	Max gust (mph)	Event
25/1/1990	87.5	Burns’ Day Storm
18/1/2007	77.1
15/10/1987	76	The Great Storm
16/3/1995	73.6
26/10/2002	73.6	‘Strong winds’
7/2/1990	70.2
18/2/2022	70.2	Storm Eunice
8/12/1993	69
27/10/2013	69	St Jude Storm
2/1/2024	69	Storm Henk

Christmas Day weather, London weather, Weather

Chance of a surprise white Christmas

November 26, 2024 wansteadmeteo Leave a comment

It’s been an unusual autumn so far. A very notable lack of sun from the end of October into November was followed by an early cold snap before Storm Bert brought flooding chaos to parts of south Wales, the West Country and elsewhere.

Just before the beginning of every winter I have a crack at predicting what winter will be like; the results often being very mixed.

However, on looking at the stats so far there’s virtually no years that have been similar to this autumn; the one year being 1968.

1968, looking back at reanalyis charts, swung from mild to cold with snow on Christmas Day. The Weather Outlook mentions the conditions on the 25th.

Though the odds are very long at this stage the 850mb chart for 1968 is not beyond the realms of possibilities given the recent synoptic patterns. And if not the 25th I would suggest that a cold snap between Christmas and New Year is a better chance than evens this year.

1968 was the year Bing Crosby sung an alternative intro to White Christmas while marooned in a sunny California.

The sun is shining, the grass is green;
the orange and palm trees sway.
There’s never been such a day
in Beverly Hills, LA.
But it’s December 24th ,
and I long to be up north!

Though we think of snow at Christmas in London it is very rare. And has often been rare been since Victorian times.

London weather, Weather

The endless anticyclonic gloom

November 8, 2024 wansteadmeteo 1 Comment

Since October 28th there has been just 1.7 hours of sunshine at Heathrow.

The 12-day spell up to and including November 8th is the dullest at the airport since at least 1960.

If you look further back at other London records, including Kew – a record that includes the years 1912-1940 – there is no other period with as few hours as this year.

A look at the synoptic situation since the end of October shows an anticyclone drifting around the near continent giving us mostly dry, dull and misty weather while also perpetuating the troughs and convergence zones that have brought catastrophic flooding over parts of Iberia and the Balearics.

Note that sunshine data at Kew was missing for the years 1941 and 1943 to 1946.

London weather, Weather

Wanstead weather in December

December 6, 2023 wansteadmeteo Leave a comment

Continuing on from last month this blog focuses on the weather recorded at this station over the last 11 years.

A look at the twelfth month shows some interesting trends…

The 9am air pressure readings were not included in previous climate summaries owing to analogue barometers only giving approximate air pressure readings. The advent of AWS has changed that, particularly for independent amateur observers.

A look at the below graphic shows pressure falling through the first half of the month. A sharp rise is then seen before falling again – there’s often storms around the 23rd until the 27th.

Average daily windrun is how much wind there’s been during a 24 hour period. The 23rd comes out as windiest.

Average rainfall shows precipitation building through the month, to peak on the 23rd before a sharp drop off after the 27th.

Average daily maximum temperatures during December show a stuttering first 10 days before a steady rise through the next fortnight before a steady fall off from the 23rd .

Average daily minima is up and down in the first 10 days before a steady rise from the 11th. Again there’s that falling off a cliff on the 23rd.
This pivotal date, being so close to Christmas Day, is one of the reasons why ‘will it, won’t it be a white Christmas’ is a perennial fascination among the nation.

Wanstead weather: October 2023

November 2, 2023 wansteadmeteo Leave a comment

The mean for this October finished 13.1C, 1.3C above average. That’s 15th warmest locally since 1797 and 0.6C down on last year! Notable given the start was nearly 6C above average.

Rainfall finished 96mm, 144% of average. Which sounds a lot. But considering the last 5 years it would be third wettest – such is that October now seems to be a default wet month. Back to 1797 it would place 47th.

Looking at the average 9am pressure things really went south after the 17th.

Looking at London as a whole rainfall at this Wanstead station was closer to the total at St James’s Park than Redbridge Roundabout!

And further afield check out how much wetter the south coast was.

Maps courtesy of Starlings Roost Weather.

London weather, Weather

Wanstead’s rainfall: swinging from dry to wet

October 25, 2023 wansteadmeteo Leave a comment

Tracking the rolling 12-month daily rainfall total allows a ‘real-time’ look whether an area is experiencing a drought or a deluge.

This week’s figure represents the 8th highest at this date since 1962. So not unusual. Until you look at the jump since last year. Some 303.6mm the past 12-months just pips the same period in 1976-77.

What is perhaps most noticeable is that this year follows last year’s negative fall which was the largest since 1961.

It’s one rainfall station BUT the results suggest a climate that is swinging more violently from one extreme to the other.

London weather

Wanstead weather in October

October 23, 2023 wansteadmeteo Leave a comment

The current site hosting Wanstead’s weather station has been running for 11 years next month; the automatic station uploading data every 10 minutes to the internet.

The 10-year averages from the station are now good enough to be listed on the Climatological Observers Link.

A look at the tenth month shows some interesting trends…

A look at the below graphic shows pressure lowest around the 21st, the stormiest weather of the month. Storm Babet in 2023 is proof of that.

Average daily windrun is how much wind there’s been during a 24 hour period. Again the 21st comes out as windiest.

Average rainfall

Average daily maximum

Average daily minimum

Climate of London, London weather, UK climatology

Rolling 12-month maxima in Wanstead, east London

June 10, 2023 wansteadmeteo Leave a comment

The rolling 12-month average maxima anomaly in Wanstead on June 10th is sitting at 1.6C.

Considering local statistics back to 1959 the figure reached an all-time high of 2.1C last November, a level it stayed until December 11th, when a very remarkable week of snow and frost arrived.

With unremarkable maxima for most of this year the figure has been falling. But with a building El Nino it remains to be seen if the highest anomaly ever of 2.1C will be breached.

Date	12-month rolling anomaly
10/6/2023	1.6
10/6/2022	1.1
10/6/2021	0.4
10/6/2020	1.3
10/6/2019	1.7
10/6/2018	0.5
10/6/2017	1.2
10/6/2016	0.9
10/6/2015	1.0
10/6/2014	1.4
10/6/2013	-1.3

London snowfall, London weather, UK snowfall, Weather

The snowfall of December 11, 2022

December 18, 2022 wansteadmeteo 1 Comment

The morning of December 11, 2022, began cold after an overnight frost that saw temperatures fall to -5.3C. Freezing fog lasted through the day, coating everything in rime to set the stage for what was to be one of the most notable snowfalls in years.

Precipitation started just before 7pm with a mix of rain, ice pellets and wet snow, this soon turning to all snow within 10 minutes and settled fast.

By 9pm there was a good 6cm; Wanstead Park was soon transformed.

By midnight the snow had stopped, leaving a good 13cm out the back

Yesterday's snow sequence shows how concentrated this event was and that Wanstead seems to have been the area that benefitted most. It also seems to have died rapidly over the Chilterns @LondonSnowWatch pic.twitter.com/RYO5RijQXw
— Wanstead weather (@wanstead_meteo) December 12, 2022