Weather or Not?

The English weather can usually be described in one of two words – Mild or Changeable. Yet despite having such a tepid weather system (mostly) we do like to talk about it, that’s certainly one ‘myth’ about the English that’s actually true. The topic came up today because of the rather mild weather we’ve been having lately. This time last year we had the tabloid named ‘Beast from the East’ which was a blast of cold weather all across Europe originating in Siberia. It caused quite a bit of chaos here (including an enforced day out of the office – but still working due to having a work laptop) as well as more snow than I’d seen for a while. This year was something quite different – blue skies, light winds and (in several places) record breaking HIGH temperatures.

The largest record breaker was in Scotland where a previous high temperature recorded on 22nd February 1897 fell on 21st February this year. That’s quite an achievement! Records were also broken – although of nowhere near the same magnitude – in both Wales and England. After last year’s long hot summer I can’t help wondering if we’re in for another heat blast or quite the opposite: months of overcast and light drizzle. With the UK’s weather system it’s anyone’s guess! Of course that makes forecasting so much more interesting in this country. With some of the most powerful supercomputers in the world (it always makes me laugh that the Meteorological Office has the second largest concentration of high-end computers after the spy agency in GCHQ) we can still only predict the weather about 5 days ahead with reasonable accuracy. At 3 days ahead it’s normally pretty spot on – although there are inevitable local variations – but after the 5 day limit things can get very problematic.

Naturally that’s one of the fascinating aspects of the weather – it’s INCREDIBLY complex. I’ve read a little about the early forecasters who really had no idea just how complicated the whole thing was. I’m guessing that if they did realise the complexity of the system they were struggling with many would have thrown up their hands in horror and have given up the quest. Luckily their ignorance protected them from the big picture and they inched their way forward. But like with so much else in the modern world weather forecasting only came into its own with the advent of increasingly powerful computers. Without them we’d be lost in a sea of seemingly inexplicable data. As computers become faster and as software becomes more adept we might be able to push accurate forecasts beyond the 5 day limit – although that’ll probably be exponentially more difficult as we push for a 10 day forecast.

I check the weather every morning to know what to wear that day and that’s essentially the difference between climate and weather. When we have a cold snap – even for days or weeks in the winter – it doesn’t mean the global warming or global climate change is a myth (or just wrong). Climate is often described as the 30 year average. Weather decides if you’re going to wear a coat that day or bother to carry an umbrella. They are VASTLY different areas of endeavour not unlike the difference between a day in the life of any individual and the story of a dynasty. It’s all a matter of scale – both breadth and depth. Personally I’m hoping for another hot summer. Although I’m not a huge fan of oppressive heat – and I really struggle in high humidity – I do so hate being cold. If I had a choice I’d pick a hot day over a cold day pretty much every time. Not forgetting that warm weather is always a great excuse for ice cream and short summer dresses….