Hot, but not a Long Hot Summer

The Heat is On, sang the singe Glenn Frey, and it would be an apt song for this summer.

While July and August may not have felt that warm, failing to make it Keith Urban’s Long Hot Summer, the climate change driven heat in June tipped summer into being the 10^th warmest summer on record at Invergowrie, jointly with 2018 and 1997.

June saw, in fact, saw the hottest daily air temperature mean ever recorded for that month at the site. August was also warm, sitting at the 17^th warmest August on record. So while July was just below average for air temperature, the heat was on and it’s a trend that’s expected to continue.

We were also Walking on Sunshine this summer, with 526 sun hours recorded over the three months June, July and August, which was above average for the time of year – again, mostly due to a sunny June, with an above average August and an average July.

Rainfall, at 321.9 mm over the summer months, was average, despite a very dry June, which sparked multiple water scarcity alerts across Scotland, and a dry August, due to a July fit for Walking in the Rain.

• August

Looking to August, at an average 15.5 ºC through the month, the air temperature was just 0.5 ºC above the long-term average. The warmest day was on August 10, at 22.8 ºC, while the coldest day was August 31, at chilly 7.5ºC.

We had 73.1% of the long-term average rainfall, with 54.3 mm of rain.

Conversely, there was more sunshine than normal, at 178.3 hours, compared with 166.1 hours in an average August over the last 30 years.

That also meant August 2023 was fairly dry; it was the 29^th driest August since our records began in 1954, recording the lowest amount rainfall in an August since 2018, which had only 48.8mm of rain fall recorded.  

August’s daily air mean was the 17^th highest (held jointly with 1990).

Sunshine recorded for August was above average and the 21^st sunniest August on our records. 

• June

June 2023 has had the warmest daily air mean since our records began in 1954.  Previously 1992 with 15ºC daily air mean had been the record breaker (the 10 hottest June daily air means are in the table below).

June was dry and sunny with 20 days of no rain at all and just above the 30-year long-term average sun for a June month.

• July

The sun hour total for July was just the same as the 30-year average and the daily air mean temperature for July was just below the 30-year long term average.

July 2023 has the 16^th highest rain fall recorded for a July month; the 15^th wettest was 92.9mm recorded in 2020.

* Note: LTA = Long Term Average (30 YEAR LONG TERM AVERAGE 1991-2020)

Please account for the fact this 30-year average is missing maximum air temperature readings between September-December 2017 due to The Met office removal of all mercury thermometers.

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this blog post are the views of the author(s), and not an official position of the institute or funder.