Severe thunderstorms occurred over eastern Scotland on 14 August 2025, leading to impacts from flash flooding, lightning strikes and notable damage from hail up to 5cm in diameter. Hail of this size is rare in Scotland, especially north of the Central Belt. Given the marginally favourable pre-convective environment, it is hypothesised that a cell merger event, combined with locally enhanced ascent around complex terrain, contributed towards the very large hail observed. This article examines the environment and evolution on the day, summarises the reported impacts, and provides some historical context.

Anticyclonic gloom, defined by the Met Office Meteorological Glossary as 'conditions of poor illumination occurring with an overcast sky of stratus or stratocumulus beneath an inversion in an anticyclone', became a hot topic of conversation (and tabloid media stories) during the first third of November, as seemingly endless sunless days began to take their toll across the UK. Whilst protracted spells of overcast weather are not so unusual during the winter months, this most recent spell was remarkable both in terms of its duration and its occurrence in late October and early November. As an example, Wittering recorded 12 consecutive sunless days to 10 November, its joint 2nd longest 'dull spell' on record (dating back to 1957), equalling similarly gloomy periods in December 2021, December 1976 and February 1959. It was, however, by far and away the longest such spell recorded in November, beating the previous record of 6 days set in both 1959 and 1965. Meanwhile, the moist southerly wind and low inversion trapping the cloud meant that parts of north Scotland, particularly around the Moray coast, basked in unusually sunny weather; during the same timeframe Kinloss reported 39.3h of sunshine, significantly above average for the time of year. (Sources: Met Office, Starlings Roost Weather.) Following a roughly 2 year commissioning phase since its launch in December 2022, EUMETSAT declared the satellite formerly known as Meteosat Third Generation Imager 1 (MTG-I1) fully operational. An unexpected hardware anomaly, which was successfully corrected whilst the satellite was already in its geostationary orbit 36 000km above the surface of the Earth, had led to a delay of around 1 year in getting to this stage; it shall hereafter be known as Meteosat-12. As well as providing full disc imagery at spatial and temporal resolutions across Europe not previously available, Meteosat-12 carries a lightning imager, modules to enable the transfer of data between ground stations, and even a search and rescue capability known as GEOSAR. It will now undergo a phase of parallel operations alongside the Second Generation satellite Meteosat-11, whilst the project to launch, commission and operationalise the full constellation of Third Generation Satellites continues apace. A subset of the imagery is currently available to view on https://view.eumetsat.int. (Source: EUMETSAT.) Representatives from 198 countries met in Baku (Azerbaijan), between 11 and 24 November 2024 under the auspices of the United Nations 29th Climate Change 'Conference of the Parties' (COP29). In contrast to COP28, where focus of discussions was primarily concerned with countries' plans and progress towards reducing dependency on fossil fuels, COP29 was described as a 'technical' COP, where financial decisions took precedence. Following a period of intense negotiations which overran by 2 days, and which required all parties to agree on every aspect of key declarations, a number of significant outcomes were reached. Perhaps most notable was the agreement of a new financial target known as the 'new collective quantified goal' (NCQG), which tripled the annual financial commitment from developed countries to developing countries to 300 billion USD, and a total of 1.3 trillion USD annually from all sources, by 2035. Whilst on the face of it an eye-watering sum, for some of the parties it was still not enough; the Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS) walked out of the negotiations, criticising the target as too small to compensate for the current and future damage to their economies caused by climate change. COP29 also saw agreements reached regarding technical rules for carbon markets and transparency in climate reporting. Amid all of this, the UK announced a new, increased target to cut carbon emissions by 81% by 2035, as part of the requirement on all countries to submit new 'nationally determined contributions' by the end of 2025. The next conference, COP30, will take place in Brazil from 10 to 21 November 2025. (Sources: House of Commons Library, UNFCCC.) Whilst tropical cyclones can and do form 'out of season', the 'official' North Atlantic and Northeast/Central Pacific 2024 hurricane seasons, which started between 15 May and 1 June all came to an end on 30 November. Beginning with Tropical Storm Alberto in mid-June, and finishing with Tropical Storm Sara in mid-November, the 2024 season in the Atlantic was notable for a number of reasons. Beryl was the earliest Category 5 hurricane on record in the Atlantic basin, whilst Helene was the strongest hurricane to make landfall in the Big Bend region of Florida on record, and the deadliest US hurricane since Katrina in 2005. Milton underwent some of the fastest intensification ever recorded for an Atlantic tropical cyclone and its minimum pressure of 897hPa was the lowest since Wilma in 2005. Tiny Oscar in mid-October contained the smallest hurricane-force wind field ever observed. With 18 named storms, 11 hurricanes and 5 major hurricanes, it was an 'extremely active' season with a total Accumulated Cyclone Energy (ACE) of 161.6 units, or approximately 167% of the 1951–2020 median ACE. This despite an unprecedented break in activity around the climatological 'peak' of the season between 20 August and 9 September, for which exceptionally strong West African Monsoon winds are suspected to have been responsible. It was a different story in the Pacific basins, however. After getting off to the slowest start to a season in the satellite era (since 1966) with the first system, Aletta, not forming until July 4, the Pacific was not able to catch up with climatology and ended up with below-normal activity, and an ACE count of 82.0 units, or 62% of the 1991–2020 average. Only one hurricane, Hone, formed in the Central Pacific (although this was the first here in 5 years), and the rest of the 13 named storms, including another 4 hurricanes, and 3 major hurricanes, formed in the Northeast Pacific between 4 July and 3 November. Despite the inhibited activity, it still ended up as one of the costliest seasons on record, primarily due to the impact of John, which caused devastating flooding across southern Mexico, multiple fatalities and an estimated 1 billion USD in damages. Meanwhile, the Philippines bore the brunt of no fewer than 6 typhoons in just 3 weeks during November, leading to at least 160 deaths. At one point, there were 4 storms churning at the same time in the western North Pacific basin, the first time this has happened in November since 1951. (Sources: NOAA, NCEP, CSU, Phil Klotzbach, Gallagher Insurance, CNN.) Torrential rain and high winds brought widespread disruption to the Pacific northwest of the USA for several days from 20 November. More than 500mm of rain fell over a 3 day stretch in northern California as the region fell under the influence of the strongest atmospheric river of the season so far. The parent low pressure (Figure 1) underwent explosive cyclogenesis as the central pressure fell by over 70hPa in just over 24h, bottoming out at around 945hPa as the storm approached the coast. (Source: NWS Seattle.) Storm Caetano, named by Metéo France, along with a cold air convective feature to its north, brought early season snowfall to parts of southwest England and northern France in mid-November. For this part of England at least, it was the most significant snowfall in November since 2010. In total, 15–20cm of snow fell across the high ground of Bodmin Moor and Dartmoor (Figure 2), with a notable amount of tree damage occurring as heavy wet snow blanketed trees, some still in full leaf. A combination of strong winds and heavy snow led to the loss of power to more than 250 000 homes in France, and Paris recorded its heaviest November snowfall in 56 years. (Sources: Met Office, Guillaume Jauseau on X.) A deep Atlantic depression, named Bert by Met Éireann on 21 November, brought an abrupt end to a quiet and, at times, cold spell, which had so far dominated the UK's weather during November. This was a classic 'multi-hazard' event, with impacts from heavy snow, strong winds and particularly heavy rain. The UK recorded its collectively wettest ever November day on 23 November, and the wettest day nationally since 3 October 2020. More than 150mm of rain fell over upland parts of south Wales and southwest England, with widespread flooding inundating properties and leading to transport disruption. Significant flooding also occurred in parts of the south Midlands for the second time this autumn. Prior to Storm Bert, the UK had provisionally recorded its lowest November temperature since 2010 (−12.4°C at Kinbrace on the 23rd). Marked warm advection (the temperature at Kinbrace rose by around 12°C in the hour following that minimum) resulted in 18.7°C being recorded at Santon Downham just 36h later! Two weeks later and Storm Darragh brought another multi-hazard event to the UK and Ireland. This time, whilst further heavy rain and snow also brought some disruption, the biggest hazard came from damaging winds, to which a rare red National Severe Weather Warning Service (NSWWS) warning was issued for west and south Wales and parts of southwest England. The first UK Government emergency alert as a response to a weather warning was issued to residents within the red warning area and beyond, backing up the messaging and advice from the Met Office and its partners. The highest recorded gust was 83kn (96mph) at Berry Head in Devon, a new record for this site. It is estimated that 1.5 million customers lost power at some point during the storm, some for several days. Heavy rain also brought further flooding, especially to parts of mid-Wales and western England, with the River Wye bursting its banks in Builth Wells and Hereford. (Source: Met Office, National Grid.) Finally, we mark the passing of Craig Rich, who passed away peacefully on 1 December. He was the BBC's first ever regional weather presenter, joining the BBC Spotlight team in Plymouth in 1978. Here, he remained in position for 25 years, having worked in the Merchant Navy beforehand. Through his presenting career, he provided insight on notable events such as the Fastnet Race tragedy of 1979, the 1981 Penlee lifeboat disaster and the total eclipse of 1999. (Sources: BBC News, Cornish Times.)