Autumn has arrived with a shock as temperatures have dived and there is even the prospect of frost early on Friday in some sheltered places. As the American author Ann Rinaldi wrote in her novel Time Enough for Drums: “There comes a day each September when you wake up and know the summer is over and fall has arrived. The slant of the sun looks different and something is in the air — a coolness, a hint of frosty mornings to follow.”
The latest cold spell in the UK feels even worse after what was a mild start to the month, even reaching 30C at Wiggonholt in West Sussex on September 1, although southern parts of the country suffered drenching rains last weekend and some places have already exceeded their entire average rainfall for September.
The blame for the outburst of cold is a vast block of high pressure sitting over Asia that is sending the jet stream spinning off into a great loop, leaving the UK exposed to a flood of cold air streaming straight down from the Arctic.
Some people may ask how it can be this cold in early autumn when climate change is making the world warmer. The simple answer is that when Arctic winds make a direct hit on the UK it will always feel cold, no matter what time of year it is. In fact, far worse happened in 1919 when September began in a heatwave and suddenly flipped in mid-month into a freeze that brought snow to Scotland and northern England as well as to high ground in Wales, the Midlands and the West Country. It remained cold for the rest of the month.
The good news is that our present cold spell will not last long before temperatures begin to rise at the weekend, and the jet stream unwinds and runs around the northwest of the UK bringing rain but leaving much of the UK in milder, dry air under high pressure. By next week the high pressure may cover the entire UK, with the prospect of dry conditions everywhere and possibly decent sunny spells as well.
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