From NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT

By Paul Homewood

To put last month’s rainfall into perspective, it is worth comparing to one of the wettest months in the past – November 1929.

As we know, the UK as a whole was not exceptionally wet as a whole last month, but the South West most certainly was. Particularly so on the south coast, where rainfall totals topped 250mm.

But in November 1929, rainfall totals exceeded even those amounts in Devon and Cornwall, for instance:

Redruth – 358 mm

Ilfracombe – 262 mm

Newton Abbott – 308 mm

Plymouth – 310 mm

Sidmouth – 273 mm

Tavistock – 455 mm

Teignmouth – 294 mm

Falmouth – 339 mm

Gulval – 321 mm

But what made November 1929 really remarkable was these incredible amounts of rainfall spread across large swathes of the country, particularly Wales, the Midlands and North West:

Rainfall in Wales was if anything greater than Devon and Cornwall, and not just over the hills – 374 mm at Swansea, 332 mm at Newport, 318 mm in Haverfordwest and 283 mm in Cardiff, for instance.

The Midlands were also badly affected, with many sites registering more than 200 mm. Lancashire was the same, including 270mm at Darwen.

Total rainfall for the UK amounted to 185mm in November 1929, but even more rain fell the following month, more widely distributed.

Both months dwarfed the 142 mm last month.

In the 4 months from October to January, a total of 691.3 mm fell in 1929/30, compared to the 554.8 mm in the last four months:

NOTES

The charts and the data shown for 1929 are available from the Met Office Archives:

Monthly Weather Report – Full Report | Met Office UA