The Weather in Germany in May 2013 Second Wettest May Since
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
The weather in Germany in May 2013 Second wettest May since 1881 was also very dull Offenbach, 29 May 2013 – Rarely has May in Germany seen so much rain. At the same time, the country was divided in terms of weather: a colder western half with very little sunshine and a quite warm eastern half with more sunshine. Deutscher Wetterdienst (DWD) press officer Uwe Kirsche took stock of the last four weeks: “It was definitely not the Merry Month of May as re- gards the weather, neither in terms of measured temperatures nor people’s perception,” as shown by the initial analysis by the Deutscher Wetterdienst (DWD) of the data from around 2,000 weather stations." Mainly warm in the east but very cold across the west In May, the average temperature in Germany was 11.7 degrees Celsius (°C). It was 0.4 degrees below the average temperature for the international reference period 1961 to 1990 and 1.3 degrees below the figure for 1981 to 2010. Germany experienced significant temperature contrasts for almost the whole of the month. The east of the country frequently enjoyed flows of warmer air, whereas, under the influence of low pressure systems, the areas in the west were often among the coldest in Europe. Lahr to the north of Freiburg saw maximum temperatures on 19 and 20 May of 14°C and 12°C respectively, making Whitsun colder than Christmas Eve and Christmas Day 2012, when temperatures of 16°C were recorded. On 24 May, a thin blanket of snow could even be found on the summits of some low mountain ranges. Extremes that stood out were -4.5°C on 1 May in Steinau near Cuxhaven and 28.8°C on 17 May in Berlin-Tegel. Numerous regional rainfall records May 2013 was extremely wet. With around 127 litres per square metre (l/m2), precipitation was 178 per cent of the long-term average, making it the second wettest May since measurements first began in 1881. Initially, precipitation was primarily concentrated in western Germany: up to 63 l/m² fell in the Black Forest on 6 May, up to 62 l/m² in Schleswig-Holstein, Hamburg and Lower Saxony on 21 May and up to 55 l/m² in Saarland and Rhineland-Palatinate on 19 May. In contrast to this, Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, Berlin and Brandenburg, in particular, saw very dry weather at the start of the month. Up to 24 May, Berlin-Buch reported total precipitation of just 8.3 l/m². These areas did not see the substantial rainfall they wanted until they came under the influence of the low pressure trough “Christoffer” on 25 and 26 May, when rainfall of 41.5 l/m² was recorded in Berlin-Buch, for example. Numerous places and regions now set new monthly records, including Hamburg with 157 l/m2 (previously 112 l/m2) and Thuringia with 180 l/m (previously 122 l/m2). The highest daily rainfall was reported on 26 May at St. Englmar in the Bavarian Forest, with a total of 97.3 l/m2. Sunshine one third below average – the fourth dullest May on record Following on from January and February 2013, which were extremely dull months, May also saw very little sunshine. With 131 hours of sunshine, the month was 33 per cent below the long- term average of 196 hours. Since the series of measurements were started in 1951, less sun- shine in May has only been recorded in 1983, 1984 and 2010. Whereas several stations in the 1/2 east came close to reaching their long-term averages, some sites in the west did not even attain 50 per cent of average sunshine or they set new negative records. 2/2 .