tnweather.net

Over the past few days, the UK has seen a great contrast in the weather with the south seeing heavy and persistent rain, whilst the north has experienced much drier, sunnier weather.

Heavy and persistent rain on Monday morning across southern counties of England gave rise to flash flooding in some places. Parts of the south have received more than 25mm (1 inch) of rain this morning and forecasters are warning of more heavy rain to come. Flooding in Southampton caused chaos as dozens of roads in the city had to be closed.

Low pressure has been sitting to the south of the UK across the Bay of Biscay for the past few days. This has allowed a succession of active fronts from the near continent to spread north and westwards across the southern half of England and Wales. In contrast, the north of the UK has been under the influence of high pressure which has given much of Scotland, northern England and Northern Ireland fine, dry and settled weather with long spells of sunshine and brisk easterly winds.

Scotland and Northern Ireland have been particularly dry this month with many areas only receiving 10 to 25% of the expected monthly May rainfall. Meanwhile across the south, parts of Devon and Cornwall had seen more than three quarters of their average monthly rainfall, even before the downpours of the last couple of days.

With more heavy and thundery rain expected to fall, parts of the south already affected by heavy rainfall could well see more than twice the May average before the end of the month.