AUGUST recovered somewhat after its disastrous start to be quite a reasonable month. It was warm, particularly at night, though disappointingly cloudy, as in the other summer months this year. If the first day of the month could be ignored, then rainfall would have been on the dry side.

Arguably, the highlight, or "low-light", of the month, was the first. A large swathe of thundery rain had developed over central Europe the previous day. This spiralled north-west over the North Sea, then west, heading our way. The day dawned overcast, very misty, but with only drizzle in the air. During the afternoon, increasingly frequent and heavy rain broke out and this became persistent, sometimes torrential, during the evening and through the night.

Most of our region from Pickering to Bishop Auckland was drenched by more than 50mm (2.0ins) of rain. This is around the quota for the whole month. For some it was the wettest day in any August and for a few, the wettest day ever.

Highest accumulations measured by my colleagues were 82mm (3.2ins) by John Goulding at Normanby, Middlesbrough, and 107mm (4.2ins) by Trevor Smith at Carlton in Coverdale, near Leyburn, who was featured in the flood reports in the D&S Times on the 9th. There was also 91mm (3.6ins) at Leeming, but topping them all was the 115mm (4.5ins) at Fylingdales on the North York Moors. This is approaching the all-time high for North Yorkshire of 145mm (5.7ins) at Kildale, near Great Ayton, on September 11, 1976. No wonder there was widespread flooding - an extraordinary happening in summer.

Here at Carlton in Cleveland, near Stokesley, I recorded a "measly" 58.5mm (2.3ins). I might have expected more with my station being about 1.5km (a mile) north of Carlton Bank, as, in situations like this, the lifting of moist air over the hills enhances the rainfall dramatically.

The probable reason why we didn't receive more was that the band of weather came in from the east, so here, it wasn't pushed up against the hills as it would have been had it come from a more northerly direction. Also, we were slightly sheltered by that part of the Cleveland Hills that juts out northwards to the east of Great Ayton.

Nevertheless, it was my second wettest August day in my 20 years of data, after the 4th in 1993 when we were soaked with 62mm (2.45ins). We were also deluged with 68mm (2.7ins) in 24 hours by the remnants of Hurricane Charley as it crossed the North of England in August 1986, but this was split between two "official" days.

The total for the month ended up just about 50pc above the average, but it still made it the wettest August since 1993.

The complex, thundery low, which caused the breakdown of the near heatwave towards the end of July, continued to mill around over the continent or the North Sea close to South-East England well into August. This produced more north to north-easterly winds, unusually persistent for the time of year, and further showers.

At the end of the second week another depression moved east near the Channel to join the mle. This gave two, miserable, wet, sunless days on the Friday and Saturday that wouldn't have been welcome in November, let alone August. The low centres migrated east into Central, then Eastern Europe giving some extremely disturbed weather and causing the widely reported, record-breaking floods there.

Twenty-four hour rainfall totals of up to 400mm (16ins) made our earlier aggregates look trifling - not, of course, if you had to suffer the consequences.

Meanwhile, back in Britain, over the next week, and for the final one too, we reverted to our more normal south-westerly type. Both spells were largely dry. Temperatures varied according to the origin of the airstream. For example, later on Thursday the 15th, a weak, cold front brought fresher conditions from the north-west temporarily. That night, minimum temperatures were no less than 10C (18F) lower than the previous two nights. Over the following weekend, quite a deep depression ran north-east to the north-west of Scotland. This sucked up hot air from Spain towards us via France, to bring the warmest day for two years on the Saturday. The moderate breeze made it quite tolerable.

The summer really wasn't that bad. It was slightly milder than usual - the warmest for five years. Due to August 1, it was wetter than the norm, but only a little over. However, it was dull.

AUGUST TEMPERATURES & RAINFALL at CARLTON in CLEVELAND

Mean max 20.5C, 69F (+0.4C, +0.75F)

Mean min 12.5C, 54.5F (+1.1C, +2F)

Highest max 28.2C, 83F, 17th

Lowest min 6.9C, 44F, 16th

Total rainfall 92mm, 3.6ins (+28mm, +1.1ins)

Wettest day 58.5mm, 2.3ins, 1st

No of rain days, with 0.2mm (0.01ins) or more: 12 (-1)

(Figures in brackets show the difference from the 18-year mean, 1984-2001