Ascension : The Weather Report - Met Office
Submitted by The Islander (Met Office) 05.07.2012 (Article Archived on 19.07.2012)

Statistics for the week ending Monday 2-Jul-12

Statistics for the week ending Monday 2-Jul-12

	Max (Celsius)	Min (Celsius)	Rainfall (mm)
AIRHEAD	28.9	21.3	5.8
TRAVELLERS	28.2	20.6	11.3
RESIDENCY	24.2	17.7	23.0
GEORGETOWN	29.9	21.8	0.9
ST. HELENA	19.4	14.6	17.8
FALKLANDS	7.6	-2.2	7.1
UK (Brize Norton)	26.2	9.7	10.2

Past Week’s Weather

UK

Still no signs of a proper ‘summery’ spell yet? It was generally unsettled with showers or longer spells of rain. Thursday was notable for some exceptional weather (see below for more details)!

Falklands

Some sunshine, especially on Wed, Thu and Sat. Also spells of rain/ sleet, but very little lying snow. Sunday was particularly dull with rain, drizzle and low cloud. Strong west or northerly winds were notable at times, especially Thu pm.

Ascension

Another week of sunshine and scattered showers. Friday morning saw some particularly miserable conditions across the island with some heavier showers.

St. Helena

Apart from Thursday, which was cool, very windy and showery, it was a fairly good week with a few sunny intervals and some, mainly light, showers. Any heavier showers generally occurred overnight.

Wow – what a summer’s day in the UK!

Thursday 29 June 2012

Wow - what a day! A series of intense thunderstorms brought exceptionally severe weather across parts of the UK – causing flash flooding and disruption.

More than 1000 (one thousand!) lightning strikes were detected over the UK in just a five minute period at the peak of the storm activity! Giant, golf ball size, hail stones caused damage in the Midlands.

The storms were borne out of hot, humid air which had pushed up from the Azores region. This air mass tracked up on southerly winds, moving up over Spain, before reaching the UK.

Much of the country was very warm and humid before the storms arrived with temperatures reaching 28 C in London. The really intense storms were formed when an Atlantic (cold) front moved in from the west. Then the heat and moisture combined/collided, and the air rose rapidly to create towering cumulonimbus storm clouds, which were laden with water, and perfect for developing heavy hail, thunder and lightning. This led to several distinct (convergence) lines of thunderstorms developing along the boundary, where the two opposing air masses met. These are often referred to as ‘thunderstorm alleys’, especially in the U.S!

compiled by Norman Spoint

Crown Copyright 2012. Met Office.

Met Office  Ascension Island Base