ASCENSION:  Very windy to start but settling down to become a lovely week with plenty of warm sunshine across the island.

ST. HELENA: A changeable, showery picture with an inch and a half of rain but also 24 hours of winter sunshine in-between.

UK:  A quiet start to the week, and warm too, though with some overnight mist and fog in places. Becoming much more unsettled later with some heavy downpours and even a few thunderstorms – well it is Wimbledon!

FALKLANDS:  A much colder feel with some snow showers and strong cross-winds delaying Thursday’s southbound Airbridge.

The gusty southeast trade winds affecting the seas around Ascension at the beginning of last week reminded me of back home in Cornwall. “Whitehorses”, the wind blown, choppy waves with accompanying spray streaming across the ocean surface are a familiar sight there on a windy day.

However, the Rollers that can impact upon pier head operations here in Georgetown more usually seem to have their origin in higher latitudes thousands of miles away.

Big swells generated by strong northwest surface winds in the North Atlantic Ocean, often associated with areas of intense low pressure there, can hit the island through the northern hemisphere winter.

At this time of year, though, it is the turn of the South Atlantic and Southern Oceans where it is now most windy. Coincidentally, when the Falklands region is affected by extensive strong to gale force south-westerly winds and accompanying snow showers, as it was last week, we might expect these same winds to generate large waves in the surrounding seas that travel back northeast to reach our shores as Rollers several days later  ………………………..

Issued by Rory N Fortis at 291620 Z

Met Office Ascension

Contact Met Office Tel 00247 3317      

Email: ascensionstaff@metoffice.gov.uk

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