By Roger Brugge
Reluctant as I am to do long-range predictions, analysis of Reading data for the period 1961-2010 suggests the following:
Rainfall – 2014 has given us a dry September and (already) a wet October. Let’s assume that overall autumn rainfall is close to normal. After an autumn with normal rainfall the likelihood of winter being
- Wet/very wet is 17%
- Normal: 50%
- Dry or very dry: 33%
October has been a dull month so far after near-normal September sunshine. Overall the autumn may well have close to normal sunshine. After a ‘normal’ autumn we find that winter sunshine was as follows:
- Sunny or very sunny is 23%
- Normal : 57%
- Dull or very dull: 20%
Finally, autumn has so far been a warm season with a mild October after a warm September. Warm or very warm autumns are followed by winters that were
- Mild or very mild is 56%
- Normal: 12%
- Cold or very cold: 32%
So, a tongue-in-cheek forecast at this mid-way point in October would be for a winter in Reading that is close to normal in terms of rainfall and sunshine, but probably milder than average.
17 October 2014