The Winter Cold Spell - A Glancing Blow...

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Nicholas Gardner
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Joined: Sat Dec 12, 2015 8:11 pm
Location: Rural riverside valley location near the village of Newton Poppleford and 2 km from the sea.
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The Winter Cold Spell - A Glancing Blow...

Post by Nicholas Gardner » Sun Jan 15, 2017 8:16 pm

There were dozens of Met office warnings aimed at this area of Devon for Thursday (12th January); everyone got excited at the prospect of snow. There was an awful lot of staring out of the office windows willing the rain to turn to snow despite a temperature stuck at 7°C with a dew point at 6°C - no chance.

The rain was quite extensive on Thursday with a rainfall total of nearly 20 mm for the whole event. The temperature only really started to drop away in the evening after the rain had stopped. Then the stars and moon shined through the clearest of skies into Friday with a minimum of +1.5°C and a bitter wind ensued. The maximum even with 7 hours of sunshine was 6.9°C, making it one of the coldest day maximums of the winter so far, so yes - a taste of 'winter'.

Then Saturday arrived with a very sharp frost (for here) of -2.6°C. But it didn't take long for the wind to soften and the temperature to rise smartly in the sunshine with the maximum eventually reaching a balmy(ish) 10.4°C and the wind mellowed by a dew point of 6°C.

The "cold blast" lasted all of 24 hours and apart from a few hours of a rather unpleasantly bitter wind, no snow/sleet fell.

Today (Sunday), all back to normal.....

15th January (mid-winter's day?)
Minimum = 5.2°C
Maximum = 10.4°C
Rain = 0.0 mm
Sunshine = 0.1 hours (unfortunately it was a cloudy ol' day with just brief spells of brightness).
Otter Valley Weather
Near Newton Poppleford, Sidmouth - Devon
50:41N 3:17 W; 20 metres AMSL; Station Grade B-BAAA37
http://www.ottervalleyweather.me.uk

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