Weather on north coast in 2020 was anything but average
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Jim A Johnston looks at local records to see the impact of a changing global climate on conditions in the far north
Last year was an exceptional year in all sorts of ways, ranging from the bizarre machinations of Donald Trump as he clings desperately to power to the unprecedented effects of the coronavirus on public health, which continue to stretch governments of all shades towards breaking point.
In the midst of this maelstrom it might be possible to forget about the climate crisis stalking the entire world – were it not for drought and wildfires in Australia and California, a record number of named storms and hurricanes in the North Atlantic and winds of 196mph striking the Phillipines, while the extent of sea ice in the Arctic is the second lowest on record.
But how did our little corner fare against this disconcerting background?
Let’s start with temperatures which, at Strathy in January, averaged 5°C. This was the mildest January since 1989 and in line with the national figure of 5.6°C. The warmest day that month was the 7th with 12.3°C at both Strathy and Altnaharra, which we would normally regard as pretty good this far north were it not for the fact that Achfary notched up 15.5°C on the same day – the highest temperature recorded in the entire UK that month.
Later on, in June, Altnaharra had the unusual distinction of being both the warmest and coldest place in Britain on the same day with maximum and minimum records of 22.2°C and 7.6°C respectively. The summer months of June, July and August averaged 12.7°C, 12.9°C and 12.8°C at Strathy, a remarkably uniform result and the only time since 1979 when no summer month averaged above 13°C.
There was even a little frost in early June with Kinbrace registering minus 0.6°C on the 8th. If you count that as the last frost of the previous winter then Altnaharra, with minus 6°C on September 24, produced the first frost of the winter to come, though we were spared the heavy hail showers which fell on Yorkshire that day and caused flash flooding in some places.
The annual temperature at Strathy was 8.3°C which is in line with what has become normal in the early 21st century and a continuing slight increase over the last three decades of the 20th century.
Annual rainfall of 958mm at Strathy and 1069mm at Croick on the Halladale was very close to the long-term average in both cases, but that did not mean it was a uniform year.
February 2020 was the second wettest in Scotland in a series going back to 1862 with 213 per cent of the of the average nationwide. At 157mm in Strathy and 159mm at Croick we didn’t quite reach that level but still came close to double the normal downfall in each case.
London and the south-east enjoyed twice as much rain as usual in October and so did we, with 182.7mm at Strathy, a figure exceeded only once on the coast within the last 40 years when 236.6mm was recorded in 2006.
Equally remarkable were this year’s droughts in April and August when 29.1mm and 24.3mm were notched up respectively – each well under half the norm.
Global warming modelling predicts both increased rainfall and increased rainfall intensity and, while it is evident that both of these are manifesting themselves in the UK, there is little evidence of either locally though increased gullying on steep slopes and mud slides in peaty areas may testify to this in ways which statistics do not. Time will tell.
Lockdown and furlough meant that more people than ever before, other than those incarcerated in high-rise flats, had the opportunity to be out and about in the vicinity of their homes for months on end. Fortunately, it was a pretty good year where sunshine was concerned with 1355.4 hours of burning sun recorded at Strathy.
In the 38 years of sunshine records locally only two, in 2018 and 2009, have exceeded that figure – by a little over 40 hours in each case. There were lots of remarkably sunny days and some equally amazing sunny spells, together with high daily temperatures on several occasions.
Apart from the 3rd, when lying snow was reported at Strathy, April – nationally the fifth warmest in the last century-and-a-half – was a lovely month with 16 entirely dry days, 12 of which boasted in excess of 10 hours' sunshine with temperatures rising to the mid teens.
The pessimists among us assured one another that summer was over when frost returned by the end of the month. However, hope triumphed over experience when May arrived with 12 dry days, each of which produced temperatures of over 10°C and culminated with three exceptional days at the end of the month and a record maximum of 23°C.
June and July were not record breaking months but collectively delivered six days with over 10 hours' sunshine and a warm spell towards the end of June with 10 days averaging over 20°C despite not being nearly as sunny as May. Nor was this the end as September’s 10 dry days also included six with more than seven hours of sunshine and a remarkable maximum temperature of 20.7°C on the 17th.
Even 11 of December’s short days were dry, sunshine was at 136 per cent of normal and, for one day at least, the maximum year-end temperature crawled to over 10°C.
Wind speeds, both for run of wind and gust speed are, given the proliferation of wind farming, probably now the most studied aspect of the local environment. Unfortunately I don’t have access to that material but rely for comparison’s sake on a 10-year dataset for Torrisdale, Skerray compiled by the late Major LCS Spray in the 1980s.
The year 2020 started off fairly breezily with average speeds of 12.2 and 12.8mph in Bettyhill, both in excess of the 10-year averages of 11.1 and 9.9mph respectively, but eased off as the year went on with June, August, October and December all significantly below the index figures.
However, as with all things, averages can conceal a multitude of sins and there were gusts of over 70mph in both January and February as well as 60mph-plus ones in April, October and November, with the record for the year probably the 79mph blast recorded at Altnaharra on October 31. So, where wind was concerned, it was definitely on the calm side and completely without the tree-toppling storms to which we are accustomed.
Given all this information, how did north coast weather perform in 2020? Well, no two years are ever the same and this one was no exception. While the changes we know are happening worldwide did not appear to impinge on us very greatly, we have all observed differences in the environment round about us – the lengthening of the growing season especially towards the end of the year, the failure of burns, rivers and lochs to freeze in winter as they often used to do, the unreliability of the snowpack on the mountains, the near disappearance of persistent snowfall on low ground, the subtle increase in night-time temperatures.
Other changes which may be related to the changing climate include the numbers and distribution of wild animals, especially birds, and what this may imply about creatures further down the food chain.
Politics and world health may consume all attention for the moment, but weather and climate are even bigger things which also need to be urgently addressed.
- Acknowledgements: The local information on which this article is based is derived from records kept by Robert Mackay at Strathy, Brian Hart at Halladale and George Macintosh in Bettyhill. Historic comparisons are drawn from the Torrisdale Weather Station run by the late Major Leslie Spray and from the rainfall record kept by the late Ack Campbell at Bowside, Strathy. UK and Scotland information is based on the Met Office monthly summaries.
