Most memorable Weather event (climate, tornado, snowfall, hottest)

[Weatherfan7]

Originally Posted by ben86

What first got me interested in weather was the hot and dry summer/cold and snowy winter combination we had in 1995/96. That summer it was 30C and sunny every day with absolutely no rain, and then we had three feet of snow on the ground the whole time for month after month (at least that's how I like to remember it - any statistics proving otherwise will be completely disregarded).

As for other memorable weather events, the autumn 2000 floods come high up there, likewise seeing England get a month with a sub-freezing average in December 2010 when I never thought I would live to see that happen, and also an inversion fog episode from 2005 when I was living in Germany: the fog level was about four feet above my hillside balcony floor, meaning that at eye level I was in completely clear air, but crouch down a little and the fog was so thick I couldn't see a thing - a stunningly beautiful sight, one which unfortunately I didn't have a camera to capture.

Also, do any other of the northern English people on here remember the gales we had on Christmas Eve 1997? I remember staying up that night listening to things getting blown around outside and thinking the windows were going to be blown in, only to find out the next day that one of those damaging-sounding things I heard was probably one of the houses not far from me getting its roof blown off.

I remember a violent gale in December 1999, not 1997 in south east England. It blew over our tree.

[ben86]

Originally Posted by nei

I'd be amused to see how hot that summer was; likely I'd find it a cool summer. Maybe similarly mild for the winter.

Go on then, laugh at and destroy my rose-tinted childhood memories why don't you...

This is the nearest weather station to where I was living, though it's a little higher up so you might want to add a degree or so for what I will have experienced:

June 1995: 16.2C/7.9C (the first half was really cold, which often gets forgotten about when people think of that summer)
July: 1995: 21.5C/12.4C
August 1995: 22.3/11.3C

* December 1995: 2.6C/-0.8C (Including a high of -5.9C!)
January 1996: 4C/1C
February 1996: 3.8C/-1.2C

* 4 days of data missing

Nothing compared to where you live, of course, but still probably the most continental year that part of the world has seen in most people's lifetimes.

[B87]

London in summer 1995. June was actually pretty poor, but July and August were good.

June
Max: 20.7C
Min: 10.8C
Highest max: 32.3C
Rainfall: 11 mm
Sunshine: 188 hours

July
Max: 26.3C
Min: 15.2C
Highest max: 32.6C
Rainfall: 20 mm
Sunshine: 247 hours

August
Max: 27.0C
Min: 15.6C
Highest max: 34.3C
Rainfall: 0 mm
Sunshine: 295 hrs

August 1995 was the warmest and driest August on record.

ben86's summer 1995 would probably be one of the coldest on record if it was at Heathrow, June certainly would be the coldest on record and those minima in July and August would be pretty exceptional (cool summer months with highs of 20-22C usually have average or above average minima due to cloud cover, 13-15C). It doesn't look any different to an ordinary above average summer in the north.

[kronan123]

has to be the snowstorm in november 1995. 50-75cm fell over 24h, with snowdrifts of up to 3 meters. pretty much all schools in the gothenburg area was closed down for the rest of the week.

[Dean York]

Originally Posted by ben86

Go on then, laugh at and destroy my rose-tinted childhood memories why don't you...

This is the nearest weather station to where I was living, though it's a little higher up so you might want to add a degree or so for what I will have experienced:

June 1995: 16.2C/7.9C (the first half was really cold, which often gets forgotten about when people think of that summer)
July: 1995: 21.5C/12.4C
August 1995: 22.3/11.3C

* December 1995: 2.6C/-0.8C (Including a high of -5.9C!)
January 1996: 4C/1C
February 1996: 3.8C/-1.2C

* 4 days of data missing

Nothing compared to where you live, of course, but still probably the most continental year that part of the world has seen in most people's lifetimes.

The July and August you have there would only be about average in York and below average down here in the West Country. Certainly nothing special, just dry and sunny I imagine.

[Dean York]

Apart from 2003 and 2006, every time I try and remember hot weather all I can remember is being on holiday abroad or working abroad!

[Ariete]

Can't really give any details, don't even remember the year. We were stranded at our summer cottage when a hefty storm came, and our cottage is on an island. Luckily we got contact with some other residents, and they had a big boat which could handle the storm, so we got back on the continent. I was something like 5 and really scared.

Otherwise perhaps the storms in summer/autumn 2010.

[ben86]

Originally Posted by dean york

The July and August you have there would only be about average in York and below average down here in the West Country. Certainly nothing special, just dry and sunny I imagine.

Meh. I certainly do remember long stretches of sunny weather, and being able to play football on what's usually a reservoir because it was that dry, so I suppose it gave the impression of being warmer than the temperatures suggest. Bingley is a particularly cold weather station compared to what most people living nearby really experience because it's some way above the actual town for some reason - the warmest month in summer 2003 there was only 20.1/12.1 (July), though July 2006 was 24.1/12.4.

[wavehunter007]

Originally Posted by dean york

What's the most memorable event to happen in your lifetime? Be it something you have personally experienced or perhaps an event you've seen on the news.

I was born in 1987, so from what I can remember it would be Hurricane Katrina and also the 2003 European heatwave.

Katrina was terrible and the weeks after weren't much better. I never thought I would see something as bad as that in terms of how it was dealt with, in the US.

The 2003 heatwave was pretty crazy. It wasn't too bad here, but in France it was insane. So many people died from the unrelenting heat.

Also the November 2000 floods in York were big news, a lot of homes flooded that year. It was a wet year though so the ground was pretty saturated and couldn't cope with any more rain. It was more of a culmination of weather events throughout that year.

I would say Hurricane Katrina was the worst (in terms of property damage) physical disaster in the last 25 years in the world. Here in the USA - If you took all the tornadoes that hit the Midwest….all the blizzards that hit Boston or Chicago….all the heat waves of the last 25 years….they didn’t have the total economic devastation of Hurricane Katrina.

I was on I-10 (highway that runs along the Gulf Coast) five months after Hurricane Katrina….and mile after mile after mile looked like this….

[animalcrazy]

My earliest memory was the blizzard of 67 when I was a young child. The next one was in 79 and it was my ex-husbands first winter here from California. We had another blizzard on New Years Eve one year and we were on vacation for it. We were snowed in for two days and a bunch of the neighbors got together and hand shoveled the ally because the village never got around to it. There was no food in the house and we walked a few blocks to the nearest restaurant every day. It was really fun. The last blizzard we had I was stuck at work for two days working like a slave with a bad cold. Not so much fun. I remember a really bad heat wave in the 90's and not having air in my car at the time. Miserable. Last years heat wave was spent at the beach every chance we had. Fun. In the early 90's I remember an F5 tornado hitting a town about 50 miles from my job and kid after kid coming into our ER along with a stab wound. It was up for grabs that day. Just recently half of my town was under water for days. I've never seen anything like it. I had to drive over a flooded bridge that was only one lane for each direction. Some of our neighbors had flooded basements and major roads were closed for days. A friend of mine has a key to our house and works the night shift. She tried for nearly an hour to get home and finally found her way to our house to sleep. She was trying to be quiet because she thought I'd still be asleep. I work afternoons, but the puppy had other ideas. I was in the kitchen when she came in and I heard the pocket doors creep open. It scared the crap out of me and even though I knew it was her standing there I let out a little scream. It was really funny. I dread the heat and hope it's not a repeat of last year.