In spite of being a warm month August was undoubtedly very disappointing. That 'warmth' was actually masked by night-time minima being particularly high which was mainly the consequence of cloudy skies; August finished with the highest mean minimum for the month in my records. And the day-time did not fare any better! Decent sunny days were at a premium and there certainly wasn't any sustained warmth with only the 1st - 3rd and then the 24-25th briefly bringing both warmth and sun - whilst the only saving grace was that the Bank Holiday weekend was a good one, the 'poorness' of the month was most definitely determined by the rain!

  It has been the wettest August in my records and unlike July rainfall was evenly distributed throughout the month, the 15 days of 8th - 22nd all recording at least 1.0 mm (a 'wet spell') and which coincided with a run of cool days (but high night-time minima!). The fact that rain was recorded on 26 days during the month gives some indication of the evenness of its distribution and also frequency.

  August also brought to a close a somewhat underwhelming summer, details of which are given below.

  MSLP of 1010.5 Mb was -3.6 Mb below the local average for the month and overall a mean minimum of 11.81°c and a mean maximum of 18.95°c saw the temperature 1.13°c above the ten year average for this site.

  Yet despite a run of really rather cool day-time maximum temperatures (17 days in the month failed to reach an average maximum of 18.2°c) it somehow managed to finish as the warmest August of the eleven now recorded at this site! The highest maximum temperature recorded was 29.0°c (25th), the lowest minimum 5.8°c (13th).

  Rainfall of 162.7 mm (Crosby Ravensworth School 176.2 mm - Castlehowe Scar ???mm) was 153.6% of average for 2007-18 -- during the month thunder was heard on two days (4th and 9th).

  At the Met' Office site at Newton Rigg, rainfall of 159.4 mm (227.4%) was the wettest since 2004 and in a series back to 1900 (records missing in one year) August has been wetter in 6 years and drier in 112.

  A mean temperature of 15.66°c is 1.05°c above average for the month and in a record back to 1951 August has been warmer in 10 years and colder in 58.

  Locally, rainfall percentages were well above average across the board, especially within the Lake District National Park where Seathwaite Farm had a whopping 244% of its average and is the 5th wettest in a record that commenced in 1845. Brothers Water was also above 200%, but outside the national park averages were still broadly above 150% although Haresceugh Castle was as 'low' as 134%.

  Figures from the Environment Agency’s rainfall sites were, (figure in brackets being the monthly average for 1961-90)   ‘Data kindly provided by the Hydrometry and Telemetry team of the Environment Agency (Penrith)’:

  Kirkby Thore 119.0 mm (68.5 mm)

  Haresceugh Castle (Kirkoswald) 133.05 mm (99.2 mm)

  Brothers Water 411.85 mm (198 mm) and

  Orton (Shallowford) 210.0 mm (114.6 mm [average for 1967-2018])

  587.2 mm at Seathwaite Farm (Borrowdale - 240 mm [average for 1981-2010]).

    SUMMER

  Here at Maulds Meaburn the consensus would be that despite having recorded the warmest day in my records, summer has been fairly poor! It has been the second wettest in my records and like 2012 (the wettest) every month saw well over 100 mm of rain with August being especially wet with rain on virtually every day!

  As for the temperature it has been third warmest, but the mean minimum temperature (10.68°c) was well above average and the warmest in my records - not ideal for a good night's sleep! (Those records now comprise of 13 for rainfall and 11 for temperature).

  Summer 2019 at Maulds Meaburn has seen 396.6 mm of rain (Crosby Ravensworth 414.4 mm) and is the second wettest of the thirteen now recorded. That total represents 137.5% of the rainfall for those previous twelve summers.

  A mean temperature of 14.79°c is the coldest since 2017 and of the eleven summers now recorded two have been warmer and eight colder with the summer of 2019 being 0.6°c warmer than the average of those previous ten.

  For the first time in my records 30°c has been surpassed (31.7°c on 25th July), but despite the number of days attaining 20°c (32) being eight above average, there was no sustained warm spell and by contrast the 13th June failed to reach 10°c, the first time in June to do so in my records.

  It would be easy to forget that the first 19 days of July hardly saw a drop of rain (and which continued the cool weather experienced in June) with just how wet August became and which was evenly spread throughout the month.

  Thunder was recorded on six days and there was one ground frost in June.

  At Newton Rigg rainfall totalled 383.2 mm and had a mean temperature of 14.97°c. In comparison to the 1981-2010 averages this represents 192.7% of summer rainfall and is 0.8°c warmer than average.

  In a series back to 1900 (3 years of incomplete data) this makes 2019 the second wettest to that of 1930 (440 mm) - in a complete series back to 1952 this makes 2019 the equal 9th warmest.

  Rainfall at Seathwaite Farm this summer was 974.0 mm (156.8%) and since records began there in 1845 it is now the 14th wettest. To give a 'like for like' comparison with Newton Rigg, just using the period from 1900, it would have been Seathwaite's 7th wettest summer.

  General Synoptic Report for the Month

   The month did start reasonably well as low pressure (LP) weakened and moved east allowing high pressure (HP) to ridge into the Eire Sea. This brought some sunshine and quite reasonable temperatures, 23.6°c on the 3rd, before LP to the west of Eire shunted the HP east with changeable conditions following.

  The 3rd-4th were quite humid with thunder on the 4th, the 5-6th then being that bit cooler and back below 19°c. The 5th escaped with the odd shower and did have some sunny intervals before heavy rain arrived in the early hours of the 6th. After this stopped late morning the rest of day would see frequent showers in between sunny intervals.

  The LP of the 6th slowly tracked NE, but Cumbria managed to stay clear of any associated fronts 7-8th and with variable amounts of cloud we did have a little watery sunshine.

  A deep area of LP tracking north from the mid Atlantic would then bring the wettest period of the month - the rain arrived in the early hours of the 9th and by 1000 Hrs 24.9 mm had fallen (credited back to the 8th and even though no rain actually fell on that day it was the month's wettest day!). There was then a brief lull into the afternoon before separate spells of thunder, afternoon and evening, which were accompanied by showers.

  Yet more rain overnight into the 10th would see the 9th credited with 19.7 mm and constant rain during the 10th would add another 9.8 mm to the total. Even though the LP was well north of the UK come the 11th, fronts trailing of the system brought more rain, 10.9 mm, and another miserable day and at just 14.6°c this would also be the coldest day-time temperature of the month.

  Still those associated fronts lingered overnight into the 12th before finally clearing to give sunny intervals.

  And it remained unsettled with LP in the ascendency and bringing further spells of rain. Whilst there was the occasional brighter moment and some of the rain was only in the form of showers, it erred to the side of miserable. During the period of the 10th to 22nd every day saw the maximum temperature fall well short of the average with the highest being just 17.5°c.

  LP that arrived on the 16th would become slow moving before finally moving away on the 19th. In the mean-time the 16th was a wet and miserable day and after a day of sunny spells on the 17th the next few days were quite mixed.

  Still LP systems would remain or near to the UK until the 23rd during which time it remained a mix of sunny intervals and showers or longer periods of rain, the 21st racking up another 15.0 mm.

  But then a change - HP over Europe started to build over the UK from the 23rd and this brought warmer, sunnier and settled conditions. With a feed of southerly air the 24th saw the temperature rise to 24.6°c and then much higher on the 25th, reaching 29.0°c (84.2°f).

  From the 26th LP in the Atlantic tried to moved east but was initially held back by the HP before finally gaining the upper hand. The month then finished much cooler by day, the last four days of the month all stuck at 16°c, but still with double digit night-time minima and further spells of rain, the 30th with 10.4 mm being the wettest day of the period.

 . Somewhat curiously, in my eleven years of records none of the last four days of August has ever recorded 20°c.