Is it colder than average this time of year?

quarryman

Maybe I'm getting old but has the average temperature over this winter (and now Spring?) has been colder than previous years.

We seem to have a high of about 6-7 over the last couple of months. According to wiki the average for Feb is 9c and 11c in March in Dublin.

Riskymove

According to accuweather

the avergae in feb is a Low of 1 to a high of 8

and in March changes to a range of Low of 2 to a high of 9-11 as the month goes on

Larbre34

I wouldn't be looking too closely at wiki or (in)accuweather for Irish data

Met Éireann has some good recent years data simply presented for temperature and rainfall against a 30 year mean.

To answer your question, nationally, the winter temperature (Meterological winter of Dec, Jan and Feb) is roughly between 0.5 and 1.5C below average.

As a comparison, the winter of 2009/10 returned average temperatures up to 2.5C below average in inland stations.

lolo62

I'm glad someone started a thread about it because I've been grumbling to myself the last few days. Winter is just feeling never ending and with the days getting longer it feels like it should be a bit warmer by now, but I'm starting to think my expectations are just to high.

I did just get rid of my car a while ago though so braving the elements far more this winter!

Speak Now

quarryman wrote: »

Maybe I'm getting old but has the average temperature over this winter (and now Spring?) has been colder than previous years.

We seem to have a high of about 6-7 over the last couple of months. According to wiki the average for Feb is 9c and 11c in March in Dublin.

Currently Yes very much so! Here's a link showing the data for the last 7 days.
Early Feb would have been a bit above average though, this spell will bring us below for the month though.

http://www.met.ie/latest/agricultural.asp

Means are 3/4 degrees below average, on the positive side we've had very little precip.

mike65

This is probably nearer to what it should be - in my own mind Feb is the coldest month. Then Spring really springs and everything blooms!

dirtyghettokid

hopefully spring warmth will come soon. can't get the heat into my bones! i work with the public and nearly everyone who comes into me says "it's cold isn't it? jaysis!" i must hear that about 50 times a day haha...........then our little space heater shuts off at 3pm

Mothman

In Ashford Wicklow, February ended up 0.5C below long term mean. This was due to lack of warmth rather than the cold. The minima was above average. The max temps was 1.1C below average.

February 2010 was very much colder!

Supercell

My mean of 5.2C for February was a full 1C below the average for the area calculated from Met Eireann figures so yes its been cold. Certainly my garden is behind where it was at this time last year in terms of growth.

Mothman

Supercell wrote: »

My mean of 5.2C for February was a full 1C below the average for the area calculated from Met Eireann figures so yes its been cold. Certainly my garden is behind where it was at this time last year in terms of growth.

But Feb 2012 was the warmest (and was warmest winter) in my records. (since 1999)
So certainly last year was way ahead of this year, but last year was arguably more of an exception than this year.

quarryman

gah. Almost April and we're still getting snow.

opinion guy

Surely this must be the coldest March for quite some time ?

secman

According to Met Eireann the temps should around 10 to 12 degrees but are currently hovering around 3 to 5 tops. Probably coldest March for a while.

Secman

gurramok

Speculation in the UK that it is the coldest March for 50 years, UK.weather.com claim it
http://uk.weather.com/story/news/032113_uk_outlook_record_cold

http://unchartedterritory.wordpress.com/2013/03/22/march-2013-coldest-uk-winter-in-51-44-or-just-43-years/

Certainly it has not been this cold for March in many years, I can't even think back far of when it was this consistently cold and i'm under 50

Speak Now

It's the longevity of the spell that’s unique as well. Well below average since the middle of February.

Strangegravy

Once this cold spell does finally end and if we get some warm southerly winds up over us the difference in temperatures will be massive.

By that I mean we'll have skipped a lot of the gradually getting warmer that normally happens at this time of year. We'll could go from freezing cold to glorious warmth and sunshine over night.

Ok, wishful thinking but you get what I mean.

opinion guy

Strangegravy wrote: »

Once this cold spell does finally end and if we get some warm southerly winds up over us the difference in temperatures will be massive.

By that I mean we'll have skipped a lot of the gradually getting warmer that normally happens at this time of year. We'll could go from freezing cold to glorious warmth and sunshine over night.

Ok, wishful thinking but you get what I mean.

Delusional thinking more like!!!! :pac:

Strangegravy

opinion guy wrote: »

Delusional thinking more like!!!! :pac:

Ha, ha.. maybe.

But think about it, if this was an average year, the temps in Feb and April would be very different.

This year we've skipped March basically, so when (if!!) the weather springs back to normal, and we (maybe) get a typical sunny April day, it'll be t-shirts, shorts and BBQ's all the way!!

opinion guy

Strangegravy wrote: »

Ha, ha.. maybe.

But think about it, if this was an average year, the temps in Feb and April would be very different.

This year we've skipped March basically, so when (if!!) the weather springs back to normal, and we (maybe) get a typical sunny April day, it'll be t-shirts, shorts and BBQ's all the way!!

This is no average year!!!
And also - typical sunny April day ?!?!?!?!:eek:
Expect rain