Weather Weirding

 You can observe a lot by watching - Yogi Berra

November has been a strange month weatherwise. Katherine Hayhoe, the climate scientist, popularised  the term Global Weirding to emphasise the increase in extreme weather events (e.g. floods & droughts) that would arise from global warming. She made a number of videos on this topic which you can find here.

Photo 1: The Main Street through Ewyas Harold, Herefordshire (14th November 2025)

Storm Claudia, named by the Spanish Meteorological Agency, caused a lot of damage, including fatalities, when it hit the Canary Islands, Spain and Portugal in mid-November. It hit the UK on Friday 14th November bringing heavy rain and floods. Figure 1 shows the daily precipitation recorded on my back garden Davis Weather Station. November had already seen plenty of rain before the 22 mm that fell on the 14th.

Figure 1: Daily Rainfall (Hereford) - November 2025

Although it rained all day on the 14th, it was never torrential. Other weather stations in the locality recorded one to four times as much rain as my Davis Weather Station.

Monmouthshire suffered some of the worst flooding with the county town, Monmouth, particularly affected (Photo 2).

Photo 2: Monmouth High Street flooded by Storm Claudia (Nov 2025)

Closer to home, this is one of the sites where I test as a citizen scientist before Storm Claudia ...

Photo 3: Yazor Brook at Three Elms (before Storm Claudia)

... and after Storm Claudia ...

Photo 4: Yazor Brook at Three Elms after Storm Claudia

Figure 2 shows the water level measured by the Environmental Agency at the Three Elms gauging station. The flow rate of the brook increased by a factor of 50 and, as Photo 4 illustrates, it washed a lot of soil (agricultural run-off) downstream towards the River Wye. The coffee colour of the brook is due to the characteristic fertile red soils of Herefordshire.

Figure 2: Water Level, Yazor Brook (23/10/25 to 20/1125)

Floods resulting from Storm Claudia is not the only example of weird weather in November. This month has been atypically warm. Not warm in a sunny pleasant way but overcast, dull and damp which has kept the nighttime temperatures high. As Figure 3 illustrates, there have been quite a few nights where the temperature did not drop below 10 ℃. Bear in mind that the average daily temperature for Central England in November is 6 - 7 ℃.

Figure 3: Min/Max Daily Temperatures (1/11/25 to 20/11/25)

I took this snapshot of the Central England Temperature (CET) on 12th November 2025. The anomalies are based on the 1961-1990 average for CET. At this point in time, the mean November temperatures were nearly 6 ℃ higher than normal. 

Figure 4: Monthy Central England Temperatures for 2025

As Figure 3 shows, we have seen some cooler temperatures and overnight frosts since then but we are still about 4 ℃ higher than normal as of the 19th November. There is a good chance 2025 will be the hottest year for the CET since records began in 1669!