Weather Watch: Winds of change in the air during mild winter month
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Weather Watch by Keith Banks
The air is almost always in motion, and this is felt as wind. In Caithness, the wind is ubiquitous, and a defining facet of the weather, and indeed contributes fundamentally in terms of creating the unique personality of the climate that characterises our remote northern lands.
From a meteorologist's perspective, two factors are necessary to specify wind – its direction and its speed, or force.
Direction is expressed in terms of the point of the compass from which the wind blows, while speed can be indicated in miles per hour, knots, kilometres per hour or metres per second.
In weather lore, winds from various directions, have their own particular qualities. In the case of the British Isles, examples are the old rhymes – "The north wind doth blow and we will have snow..." and "When the wind is in the east, 'tis fit for neither man nor beast".
Over the British Isles, the prevailing wind is west to south-westerly. The wind that is experienced in Caithness, and other parts of the far north, is rarely steady – typically it blows in a series of gusts and lulls. Gusts last for only a few seconds, and though they give rise to the highest wind speeds, a more accurate measure of wind speed is the average or mean speed recorded over a longer window of time.
Official weather stations are equipped with instruments for measuring wind speed and direction. However, the Beaufort scale of wind force enables the speed to be estimated without instrumental aid, by employing the effects of the wind on the sea, trees, buildings and other common environmental features such as smoke.
January 2022 was Wick's mildest since that of 2020. Closer scrutiny of the town's historic record for mean air temperature for January showed that it is currently the third most mild in a series commencing 1910.
Wick's precipitation record for January 2022 confirmed that it was the least wet since that of 2020, and that it is presently the 28th driest in a series stretching back to 1910.
Wick's mean air temperature for January 2022 was 5.62C (42.12F). The long-term average in terms of the updated 30-year averaging period from 1991-2020 is 4.01C (39.22F).
Wick's mildest January since 1910 is currently that of 1989. The mean air temperature for that month was 6.57C (43.83F).
Wick's average maximum daytime air temperature for January 2022 was 7.56C (45.61F). The long-term average for the current 30-year averaging period 1991-2020 is 6.40C (43.52F). An unseasonably mild 10.0C (50.0F), was reached or exceeded on no fewer than eight dates. The highest ambient temperature was an outstandingly mild 12.8C (55.0C), witnessed during the 24-hour recording period commencing 9am (GMT) on January 28.
The lowest maximum for any 12-hour daytime recording period ending 6pm (GMT), was 3.2C (37.8F), on January 3.
The burgh's average overnight minimum air temperature for January 2022 was 3.67C (38.61F). The long-term average for January is currently 1.62C (34.92F). Highest overnight minimum air temperature was an exceptionally mild 10.5C (50.9F), recorded on January 29.
There were three air frosts. The lowest air temperature was minus 0.9C (30.4F), logged on January 6.
The temperature fell to 0.0C (32F), or lower at 5cm over the grass on 12 dates. Lowest temperature recorded over the grass was minus 6.9C (19.6F), on January 10.
Precipitation was recorded on 26 dates. The total for the month was 49.4mm (1.94 inches), or 68.2 per cent of the long-term average for January. The wettest day was January 4, the quantity for the 24 hours commencing 9am (GMT) being 8.2mm (0.32 of an inch).
Wind velocities reached or surpassed gale force 8 (39.0mph/33.9knots) on 18 dates. "Days of gale" occurred on January 4, 26, 27, 29 and 31.
The strongest wind velocity was observed during the hour ending 11pm (GMT) on January 26, when a severe gale force 9 westerly wind gusted up to 74.8mph/65.0knots, hurricane force 12 on the Beaufort scale.
A gust of 74.8mph was also noted on 29 January 29. This gust was associated with storm Malik when it was centred over the Norwegian Sea.
