August 2016 circulation

[xmetman]

Lower than average pressure across the central Atlantic (-3 hPa) and higher than average pressure across central Europe (+5 hPa); with even higher anomalies over Asia (+8 hPa); meant that there was a W’SW flow across the central Atlantic and the British Isles in the mean pressure chart for August, this flow extended across the North Sea and into northern Germany, Poland and north and west Russia. You would have thought with that kind of pattern that there would have been more rain across the British Isles than there was, but mean pressures of around 1019 hPa across the south must have warded off most of that.