An historical perspective of the climate statistics
for Coventry during June 2024
Temperature
Climate records for Coventry suggest that June was cooler by the end of the twentieth century than was the case earlier in the century. “Flaming June" was certainly more appropriate in the period from 1930 to 1949 than it was in the 1980s and 1990s.
Early years of the 21st Century however seem to suggest that ‘Global Warming’ was belatedly having an impact on June, finally coming into line with most other months of the year. The 2001 to 2010 mean June temperature (15.9C) suggests that this was the warmest decade at this time of year on record, but with cooling evident again in the most recent decade 2011-2020 with a mean of 15.4C.
Although last month was the warmest May in Coventry in over 132 years, June 2024 has been disappointingly cool by comparison, 2.7C cooler than last year, which was the warmest June month on record in the city.
With a monthly mean temperature of 14.8C, 1.5C below average, this was the coolest May in Coventry since 2019 (14.7C).
Only five June months have been cooler than 2024 since the Millennium (2011, 2012, 2013, 2015 and 2019).
There were two ground frosts in the month, the first in June since 2011, when there were four.
Rainfall
There are signs that June is now a much wetter month in Coventry, than was the case in the middle years of the 20th century.
The 1980's was the wettest decade for June (61.0 mm) last century, with an 80% increase on the 1920's; however, it has been even wetter than that so far this century (2001-2010 = 64.9 mm, 2011-2020 =74.3 mm).
June 2024 has, by contrast been relatively dry with 23.0mm of rain at Bablake, just 37% of average. This has been our driest June since 2018 (7.8mm). Only four June months have been drier than this year since 1976 (1983, 1994, 1995 and 2018.
Sunshine
Looking back through the archives, we find that there was little change in average June sunshine totals during the 20th century, averaging 181.2hr of sunshine 1901-2000. As we passed the Millennium, there was an increase in sunshine duration to 204.7hr from 2001 to 2010, with a 19% increase in a century of sunshine records.
Although average June sunshine duration fell back to 178.7 hours from 2011 to 2020, there has been a resurgence over the last four years, with a mean sunshine of 213.4 hours from 2021-2024 at the start of this decade.
We recorded 207.0 hours of sunshine during June 2024, the lowest June total in Coventry since 2021 (198.4hr), though still highly respectable!