02/04/2017 Weather for the Week Ahead

Hello there. We are off and running into April with some fairly

typical April weather, but I thought we'd start with

a quick look back at what happened in March.

We've got some Met Office statistics

which show that, in terms of

rainfall, it was drier than average in the south-eastern corner of the

UK and drier than average, too, in the western side of Scotland.

That comes off the back of several dry months through much of winter.

In terms of sunshine through March,

it was still a little bit less than average in the south-west of the

UK, but for the vast majority we saw more sunshine than you might expect.

The western side of Scotland, where it was quite dry, was also sunny.

Now, to start April we saw some fairly typical April weather,

as I said. We saw some sunshine but also some showers.

This picture was taken in East Lothian by a Weather Watcher.

So, sunshine and showers to start the weekend.

The second part of the weekend looks much quieter.

We've got a big ridge of high pressure building in.

It'll be a chilly start to the day

but a bright start, with some sunshine and some light winds.

Into the afternoon, you'll notice cloud amounts increasing,

but just about everywhere stays dry.

Looks like a decent afternoon across most of Scotland,

patchy cloud and some sunshine, 12 degrees in Glasgow,

12 or 13 in Northern Ireland.

We might just see the odd shower for some eastern parts of England,

but generally there's a lot of dry and bright weather,

good spells of sunshine for Wales, the south-west of England,

light winds, too, 12 or 13 degrees, not so bad.

The top temperatures will be in the south-east, about 16 or 17 degrees,

so it looks pretty good for the Boat Racers on the river.

Not particularly windy, so the water should be not particularly

choppy, and the sky should be quite bright,

and we've got some pretty reasonable temperatures.

Monday may start a bit grey for some with a few patches of mist and fog.

That won't last long, then for most of England and Wales it looks like

a lovely day with some sunshine, the winds coming in from the south.

It'll feel pleasantly warm.

Further west, though, more cloud,

a bit more of a breeze and some outbreaks of rain pushing

into Northern Ireland, Western Scotland and later on into

the western fringes of Wales and the far south-west of England.

Then that weather front Monday night into Tuesday does cross the rest of

England and Wales but weakens off in the process,

so not much rain in the south-east, but there will be some.

It's fairly light and patchy to take us on into Tuesday morning.

Following along behind that area of cloud and patchy rain comes

something a bit brighter,

although in the north-west more of a breeze, and that

may well bring with it a bit more cloud and a scattering of showers.

We've got ten degrees in Glasgow through Tuesday,

round about 15 or 16 in the south-eastern corner,

so temperatures just creeping down by a notch or two.

But the weather looks set fair for the most part, with this area

of high pressure taking us on into the middle part of the week.

Weather fronts going around the top of that,

so most places will be fine and dry,

but there's always the risk of a little bit of rain

on that breeze into the north-west of the UK,

but for most other places it's another decent day.

Temperatures continue to slip back a bit,

top temperatures midweek around about 14 or 15 degrees.

Now, on into Thursday, it's a similar sort of day, really,

a bit breezy in the north and west with thicker cloud and some

outbreaks of rain, 11 degrees in Glasgow,

where it should be dry, 12 in Belfast and around

about 14 or 15 in the south-eastern corner, where it should stay dry

and quite bright.

High pressure is still with us towards the end of the week,

keeping it settled for the most part.

Weather fronts go around the top of that high,

so again on the western side of Scotland we might see

thicker cloud and a little bit of rain.

On into next weekend and probably beyond that, we've still got

high pressure as the dominant force, driving our weather,

keeping it fine and settled for the most part.

It might just drift a little bit out towards the near Continent,

but the winds are coming in from the south across western

areas, so that's going to keep those temperatures up,

but always the risk of weather fronts just drifting

into the far north and west,

maybe freshening up the breeze and bringing a little bit of rain.