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This year has
been very different from the preceding one.
2000 saw periods of heavy snow, gale force winds and, most significantly,
enough rain to make it the wettest in the last 250 years.
This year has
also been much ‘quieter’ - not as wet, not as windy, and with a
much better summer.
A fairly benign
January gave way to above-average rainfall in February, March and
April. But strong winds and snow were noticeable by their absence.
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| Richard
Angwin enjoys the Bristol Balloon Fiesta |
Although the
early months were relatively mild, it was still good to feel some
warm sunshine on our backs in May with temperatures as high as 26
Celsius (79F) on the 12th.
The early and late May Bank Holidays were also dry, bright and reasonably
warm.
This
summer was undoubtedly better than the previous one.
But although we did enjoy some very fine days (with 30 Celsius (86F)
being reached in late July) the weather was rather mixed.
Heavy thunderstorms on 4th July caused flooding problems around
the Bristol area.
Foot-and-mouth
disease hit the Bristol International Balloon Fiesta hard but the
weather certainly did not do us any favours.
Whilst weather conditions were good on the Friday, they deteriorated
thereafter causing all weekend flying to be cancelled.
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| Storm
clouds hover over the half marathon course |
Thankfully,
the autumn flooding of last year was not repeated.
Although October was exceptionally wet, both September and November
were relatively dry.
For those who
took part in the Bristol Half Marathon on 7th October it must have
seemed as though most of the month’s rainfall fell in the space
of a few hours, starting half an hour before the race began.
The largely
dry weather continued through much of December as high pressure
remained stationary over the UK.
Although December
turned out to be quite a chilly month, it did not stop the year
as a whole being one of the warmest on record, with mean temperatures
almost one degree above average.
The effects
of global warming are many and varied but across the UK 2001 was
one of the warmest on record and the Bristol area has mirrored this
trend in its own weather records.
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