Great Britain has bathed in abundance of sunshine and temperatures above average this week, leading to a record maximum on Thursday, beating the previous record in 1990. However, a public bathroom may have downloaded the hopes that a London park would have been home to a record reading.
The unusually hot and sunny conditions were driven by a high pressure system located on the country and the temperatures have constantly climbed throughout the week. Monday, St. James's Park in central London, hidden between Buckingham Palace and Westminster Abbey, has recorded its maximum temperature so far this year, just to be passed every following day, culminating on another record day on Thursday.
But not so quickly, custodians of records.
The observations from a meteorological station in the park had to be disqualified, due to a “contamination” on the site. The culprit? The public toilets, barriers and generators who had been temporarily installed near the meteorological station in preparation for the next celebrations of the Ven Day anniversary, cutting the crucial air flow necessary for accurate readings.
“We picked up the observations from this meteorological station until the site was returned to an acceptable standard,” said a Met Office spokesman, the British weather service.
The Met Office manages a national network of over 200 automated weather stations, each of which monitors a range of meteorological variables including air temperature, atmospheric pressure, rainfall, wind and direction, humidity, height and visibility of clouds.
Guaranteeing consistency and accuracy through these measurements is essential both for real -time forecasts and for the maintenance of long -term meteorological and climatic records of the nation. Meteorological stations must therefore satisfy rigorous criteria in line with international standards. It is not uncommon to have withdrawn readings or magazines.
Air temperatures are measured at 1.25 meters above ground inside a Stevenson screen, a ventilated white box designed to protect the tools from direct solar radiation. According to the Met Office, the ideal sites for these equipment are at the level and without obstacles nearby such as buildings or trees, which could influence the readings.
So, although St. James's Park station recorded a maximum of 83 degrees Fahrenheit (28.1 Celsius) Thursday, the reading was not considered valid for the official registers. However, another Met Office site in Kew Gardens, a few kilometers away and apparently free from nearby toilets, recorded the same maximum temperature on Thursday afternoon, officially marking the hottest May 1 of Great Britain ever recorded. The temperatures continued to rise later during the day, with a temporary reading of 84.7 degrees Fahrenheit (29.3 Celsius) to the Kew Gardens.
St. James's Park is a long -date office station dating back to 1883 around 1883 and is often among the hottest places in Great Britain. In July 2024, the station recorded a maximum of 89 degrees Fahrenheit (31.7 Celsius) during a heat wave that pushed sanitary notices spread throughout England.
Even the temperature records were broken elsewhere this week. Wednesday, Met Eireann, the National Meteorological Service of Ireland, reported a temporary maximum of 79 degrees Fahrenheit (25.9 Celsius) to Athenry, in the County of Galway, exceeding the previous April record of the country of 78.6 (25.6).
The current hot climate spell will end this weekend, since the coldest air in the North moves and the temperatures return to seasonal averages.