Huncoat is a small historic village situated on the western slopes of the Pennines below the 1,340 feet high Great Hameldon. Being some 30 miles inland near Accrington and Burnley it tends to receive quite high annual rainfall which fortunately has been recorded ever since 1875.

The earliest known record of rainfall in Britain was kept by Richard Towneley (1629-1707) of Towneley Hall in Burnley, which is just 5 miles east of Huncoat. He placed a funnel on the roof connected to a tube leading down to his bedroom window and measured and recorded the rainfall between 1677 and 1703. His bedroom was in the east wing of the quadrangle which was removed early in the 18th Century so is no longer in existence.

Comprehensive records began to be kept around 1726 but it was not until 1860 that they were collected systematically. George James Symons (1838-1900) took an interest in rainfall after the drought years of 1857-59. He took up a post with the Royal Meteorological Society and began to publish a series of annual books entitled "British Rainfall". These books were published for 132 years from 1860 to 1991. My library contains 97 of these volumes but I understand that the Meteorological Office Library and Archive in Exeter has a complete set.

The first book was really only a pamphlet giving the data from 168 “English” stations for 1860 but the enterprise quickly grew and within a quarter of a century there were over 2000 “British” rainfall recording stations and by the Centenary these exceeded 6000. Symons died in March 1990 aged 61 but the venture was continued by his assistant Herbert Sowerby Wallis and subsequently Hugh Robert Mill and Carle S. Salter until after the First World War it was absorbed into the Meteorological Office Air Ministry.

In the 1860 publication the nearest station to Huncoat was Stonyhurst which returned 50.60 inches in that year. Huncoat first appeared in the "British Rainfall" books in 1875 with readings taken at Burnley Road Reservoirs. Unfortunately, that station disappeared in 1982 but from 1961 readings had also been reported from the nearby Mitchell's House Reservoir at the head of Warmden Clough and those continue to this day. Rainfall was also recorded in Oak Hill Park, Accrington from 1939 until 1961, at Burnley Road Cemetery, Accrington from 1985 until 1997, at Coppy Clough Sewage works Church from 1947 to 1973 and at Jackhouse Reservoir Oswaldtwistle from 1870 to 1881 and 1966 to 1982.

Sadly, the Meteorological Office discontinued the publication of Rainfall Books after 1991 on economic grounds but the local water authorities still continue to measure and report rainfall amounts to the Environment Agency and Meteorological Office and the data eventually gets into the National Library and Archive at Exeter. The 150th Anniversary of the British Rainfall Organisation was marked in 2010 by a meeting held in London on 17th April. See the pink box below for my report of this event.

The modern rainfall recording network is governed by the Met Office who inspect the sites once every three years to make sure each site conforms to the required standards and is producing good data. The Environment Agency maintains a network of tipping bucket rainguages to supply information of relevance to flood defences and bathing water quality.

The rim diameter of a standard rain gauge is 12.7cm (5 inches) and the height of the mouth should be 30cm above ground level but anything between 15 and 50cm would result in very little error. The standard rain gauge is called a “Snowdon” pattern because it became approved after Captain Mathew used it for an extensive series of observations on the lower slopes of Snowdon in 1865. In fact the design was first employed by Col. M.F. Ward at Calne in 1862 having been made by a local chemist named Rowdon.

The first “tipping bucket” rain gauge was made in 1662 by Sir Christopher Wren!

In the early 1970's John, David, Martin and Roy began measuring rainfall in Accrington and from 1992 Roy has done so at Sutton Crescent in Huncoat. In 2003 Jim joined the club taking readings in Oswaldtwistle and in 2005 David’s station moved to Oswaldtwistle. Mitchell's House Reservoir is 980 feet above sea level just south west of Great Hameldon and less than 2 miles away from Huncoat village. The "Huncoat Data" therefore all comes from within a small radius.

Most of the readings taken over the years at all the above sites compare quite well with each other so we can be pretty sure that we have an accurate picture of local rainfall patterns and extremes. Moreover, rainfall was recorded at Stonyhurst College (7 miles to the NW) for 100 years and that data also collaborates the Huncoat figures.

The 126 year average for Huncoat is 47.19 inches (1,199 millimetres). Since 1875 this does not seem to have changed by much so gives no indication that our climate is getting any wetter.
The wettest ten year average was 53.39 inches (1,356 millimetres) between 1922 and 1931.
The driest ten year average was 40.42 inches (1,027 millimetres) between 1892 and 1901.
Huncoat’s wettest years have been 1981 with 67.05 inches (1,703 millimetres) at Mitchell's House Reservoir and 2000 with 67.54 inches (1,716 millimetres) at Sutton Crescent.
Huncoat’s driest years have been 1887 with 28.62 inches (727 millimetres) at Burnley Road Reservoir, 1933 with 31.37 inches (797 millimetres) at Burnley Road Reservoir and 1995 with 33.66 inches (855 millimetres) at Sutton Crescent.

The wettest place in Britain is generally recognised as Sprinkling Tarn in Cumbria because falls were recorded there of 257.00 inches (6,528 millimetres) in 1954 and 247.00 inches (6,274 millimetres) in 2000.

However, the highest average yearly fall is on Crib Goch mountain in Snowdonia, Wales which gets 171.68 inches (4,361 millimetres) compared to Cumbria's average of 170.22 (4,324 millimetres). The highest annual total in Wales was 237.00 inches (6,020 millimetres) in 1908 at Llyn Lydaw, Snowdonia.

In Scotland the highest annual totals have been 240.00 inches (6,096 millimetres) at Ben Nevis Observatory in 1898 and 213.00 inches (5,410 millimetres) at Loch Quoich Knoydart in 1938. The highest annual average for Scotland is 145.71 (3,701 millimetres) inches at Beinn Ime mountain, Loch Sloy near Loch Lomond.

The most notoriously wet place in Britain is the crag of Black Waugh above Seathwaite in Borrowdale barely a mile north of Sprinkling Tarn mentioned above. The legend began in 1845 when Dr. J. Fletcher Miller of Whitehaven established the first rain gauge at Seathwaite in the garden of Mr. John Dixon. Miller also placed rain gauges higher in the mountains because he suspected greater falls occurred there. This proved to be the case at the location known as “The Stye,” a shelf on Black Waugh which seemed to suffer converging rain bearing clouds coming over Styhead Pass. Sadly, most of the mountain gauges were abandoned in 1853 frequently proving inaccessible due to ice and snow and Miller died in 1856.

However, Mr Dixon continued to record at the Seathwaite site and measurements of rainfall there have continued unbroken to the present day. The 150 year average is 131 inches (3327 millimetres). Until 1857 Mr. Dixon also managed to record the readings from The Stye but then there was a gap until Mr. Isaac Fletcher a relative of Dr. Miller tried to re-establish the mountain network in 1864 but after 1869 they were again neglected. They were revived in 1877 by a Mr. Maitland of Hyde Park with the assistance of Mr. Wilson of Wasdale and since then have continued with short interruptions until the present day. In 1929 after one of these short interruptions through lack of an observer the name was changed to Stye Head which is rather confusing with the better known Sty Head being a mile to the SW. Nevertheless, this is still the same location as established by Dr. Miller in 1845. It is at a height of 1,077 feet about 100 yards off the Stockley Bridge to Styhead Tarn path. The intermittent 150 year average at this station is 169 inches (4293 millmetres).

Heavy rain and consequent flooding can occur anywhere in the country but are often exacerbated by blocked drains, dammed water courses or compromised flood plains. The worst examples are intense localised thunderstorms and prolonged cyclonic rainfall over converging valley heads. For instance the Cockermouth and Workington disaster in November 2009 followed 12.40 inches (314.4 millimetres) in 24 hours at Seathwaite. Before the Boscastle flood on 17th August 2004, 7.89 inches (200 millimetres) fell in 24 hours on the Cornish uplands. Carlisle was submerged on 8th January 2005 because of 8.85 inches (225 millimetres) in 72 hours over the Shap Mountains and 4.53 inches (115 millimetres) in 24 hours at Keswick.

The wettest days ever recorded in England were –
12.40 inches (314 millimetres) at Seathwaite in Cumbria on 19th November 2009.
11.00 inches (279 millimetres) at Martinstown in Dorset on 18th July 1955.
9.56 inches (243 millimetres) at Bruton, Somerset on 28th June 1917.
9.50 inches (241 millimetres) at Upwey, Dorset on 18th July 1955.

The wettest days ever recorded in the Huncoat area were -
4.10 inches (104mm) at Jackhouse Reservoir on 20th September 1968.
3.31 inches (84mm) at Burnley Road Reservoir on 20th September 1968.
3.07 inches (78mm) at Mitchell's House Reservoir on 18th July 1964,
(which caused disastrous floods throughout Hyndburn during the local holidays).
2.59 inches (66mm) at Huncoat on 1st October 1999.

Droughts

A shortage of rainfall leading to low reservoir levels is often described as a drought. However, an “Absolute Drought” is when there is a period of 15 consecutive days without measurable rainfall (less than 0.01 inches per day) although if there are 29 consecutive days where the average daily rainfall does not exceed 0.01 inches then that is a “Partial Drought.” If there are 15 consecutive days on each of which there is less than 0.04 inches then that is defined as a “Dry Spell.”

The longest local drought in living memory was an Absolute Drought of 33 days in February and March 1953. July and August of the same year also had a Dry spell of 17 days.
More recent droughts have been-
March and April 1974 – Dry spells of 22 and 19 days broken by 1 wet day
August 1976 - Absolute of 20 days
May and June 1977 - Absolute of 20 days
April and May 1995 - Absolute of 18 days
September 1996 – Dry spell of 16 days
May and June 1997 – Absolute of 15 days
March 2003 – Dry spell of 19 days
April 2003 - Absolute of 18 days
April 2007 – Dry spell of 21 days
April 2010 - Absolute of 15 days