'Heightened potential' for wet, windy, stormy weather and flooding this autumn, Met Office warns

Enjoy your favourite LBC shows with ad-free Catch Up, weekly competition entries and an exclusive newsletter. Subscribe to LBC Catch Up Plus from £4.99 a month

With a third of people at risk of flooding not aware of the threat, the Environment Agency (EA) is urging households to check their flood risk, sign up to alerts and make a flood plan to prepare for any emergencies.

While UK autumns generally tend to bring wetter and stormier weather, the Met Office’s long-range outlook for the next three months shows higher-than-normal chances of rain, wind and mild conditions.

There is double the normal chance of the period October to December being wet overall while windy and mild weather is also more likely than usual – although the Met Office says there could still be cold spells, particularly later in the season.

Dr Will Lang, chief forecaster at the Met Office, said it was a “subtle shift in the odds” rather than saying it would be definitely would be wetter, milder and windier.

He said: “We are going in with a heightened potential for wet weather, heightened potential for potentially stormy conditions, and that leads through to a heightened potential for flooding.”

There are also early indications that late winter could see an increased chance of drier, colder and calmer conditions.

The Met Office says the likely conditions are consistent with the impacts of El Nino on UK autumn and winter weather, though experts said the effects on the UK can be “quite subtle”.

El Nino is a naturally-occurring climate phenomenon that develops in the Pacific Ocean when sea surface temperatures across the central and eastern equatorial Pacific become significantly warmer than average, changing atmospheric circulation patterns and affecting weather worldwide.

A record-breaking “Godzilla” El Nino has developed in recent months.

The latest outlook comes after a drier than average September for much of the UK – which follows a record hot summer with widespread drought in England and Wales that brought hosepipe bans, impacts on crops and wildlife, and fires.

Overall, the UK saw 77% of the average summer rainfall, with all areas except for north-west Scotland experiencing a dry summer, and parts of southern and eastern England seeing particularly parched conditions, including a run of 62 consecutive days without rain at Wisley, Surrey.

The Environment Agency says the drought will continue until reservoirs and aquifers are recharged – and above average rainfall is needed to restore conditions to where they should be.

Richard Thompson, of the Environment Agency, said: “We anticipate that above average rainfall will recover the situation over winter, but anything less than average we could still see some drought conditions persist into next year.”

Dr Lang added that it was “perfectly possible” to have periods of wet weather and flood risk at the same time as drought.

In a briefing ahead of national flood week in October, the EA said more than six million properties in England were at risk of flooding from rivers, the sea or surface water, rising to about eight million by 2050 as a result of climate change impacts and sea level rises.

The agency’s executive director of flood and coastal risk management Caroline Douglass said that going into this winter, the EA was armed with a new national forecasting and warning service, with improved flood forecasting and warnings for people at risk.

A new national operations centre with a 24/7 response, along with kit including more than 270 national pumps, six incident command vehicles, 25km (16 miles) of temporary flood barriers and 270,000 sandbags, was helping make the country more resilient to flooding, she said.

The Government is investing £4.2 billion over three years in hard defences, nature-based schemes and house-level measures, and so far in the first year of the programme more than 3,000 properties have been better-protected, with a target to benefit 70,000 by March 2027, she said.

She said that with a third of people who are at risk thinking they are not at risk, the public should check their flood risk and sign up to warnings which they could now get in a range of ways.

“It’s really important that they know what that risk is, and to get the flood warnings when they need to, and if they are at risk to prepare a flood plan,” she said.

A Government spokesperson said: “Our climate is changing and as we head into winter we’re making sure communities have the protection they need from flooding.

“We have put a record amount of money into flood protection and in the last two years alone this has helped protected more than 62,000 properties.

“Looking forward, this year we are investing £1.4 billion to help fund more than 600 flood defence projects and better-protect more communities across the country.”