Feeling a bit glum? Maybe it’s because we just had the gloomiest November in 86 years
November might not have been especially cold, but it was certainly very gloomy.
According to the Met Office, we have just emerged from the “dullest” November in since 1929, and the dullest month overall since January 2013.
They put this down to a “humid, cloudy south-westerly airflow”, which resulted in very low levels of sunshine, particularly in the South and West of the UK.
As an average across Britain, there were 36.6 hours of sunshine over the course of the month. Broken down, Wales was unsurprisingly one of the least sunny, recording just 32.5 hours of sunshine.
England was marginally better with 38 hours, while Scotland experienced 35.1 hours and Northern Ireland had 38.4 hours.
On top of this, it was a very rainy month: “Rainfall has been above average across most areas, but most notably across upland areas of north-west Wales, north-west England and southern Scotland where totals are almost twice the amount expected for November,” the Met said.
However, the wind also brought with it warmer than average temperatures and an absence of frosts. The mean UK temperature was 8.2 °C – 2.0 °C above the November average.
In fact, it was actually the third warmest November on record in England, the second warmest In Wales and the fourth warmest in Northern Ireland.