High Heaton Weather and Air Quality – August 2026

Weather

August was another very warm month, with the second week being exceptionally hot. The month’s maximum temperature was 33.2°C at 2.15pm on Thursday 13th. This is the hottest August day I have ever recorded and exceeded the previous record, set in 2022, by an astonishing 3.7°C. We met the criteria for a heatwave (three consecutive days above 25°C) over the period August 12th - 14th.  The average temperature for the month was 16.4°C compared to the 30-year average of 15.7°C, and it was the seventh month in succession with a well-above-average temperature. On the night of 12th/13th the minimum temperature was 18.3°, the warmest night of the year so far. The month’s minimum temperature was 8.2°C at 3.30am on Sunday 23rd. The rainfall total was 39mm, which is 60% of the average for August. The wettest day was Tuesday 4th when 12mm of rain fell, all of it overnight or during the early morning. There was a brief thunderstorm in the late afternoon of Sunday 30th.

We have now reached the end of meteorological summer. It has been an extraordinary summer, and so next week I will look at the season in some detail, and we will find out whether any records were broken in High Heaton.

Air Quality 

The average PM2.5 particle concentration was 5.1 µg/m3, so we were well within the WHO target of 10 µg. This target was exceeded on two days, but only by a small amount. On those two days the Air Quality Index was at level 2, and it was at level 1 on the other 29 days. Levels 1, 2 & 3 are classed as ‘good’.

John Telfer