It is relatively easy to be lulled into a false sense of security during April. The sun is high in the sky, we have moved onto 'British Summer Time' ; surely, we reason to ourselves, summer is just around the corner? However there are a few factors that can temper this optimism meterologically. The seas temperatures around the coasts are still very chilly, hardly having recovered from the winter time minima, there is often still a large pool of cold air left, sitting over snow cover, to the north across Northern Scandinavia and the nights are still long enough to produce notably cold temperatures.

Such was the situation in April 2008. It was in fact a warm start to the month in many places that perhaps lulled people into the false sense of optimism. For instance, the 2nd saw the south warm and sunny with Lee on Solent reaching as high as 18.4C. The 3rd saw the warmth move northwards, with Inverbervie in Scotland reaching 18.9C, certainly very warm in Scotland for early April, though nowhere near any records. The 4th saw the warmth back in the south again with Charlwood (near Gatwick Airport in Surrey) reaching 18.3C. It all felt very pleasant in the fast lengthening Spring sunshine.

However by the 6th there was an abrupt change, as high pressure developed across Iceland and this induced a rather strong northerly flow, which as the high pridged southwards developed across all parts and pulled a very cold arctic based air mass covered the UK, giving a cold night with widespread frost initially (see the synoptic chart for the 6th just here http://www.wetterzentrale.de/archive/2008/brack/bracka20080406.gif).

As a slow moving occluded front pushed slowly south in the flow though later in the night, over the cold ground, snow fell from it widely and it was eventually one of the snowiest April days on record, at least in recent memory. Parts of the south and Midlands saw up to 10-12cm fall early in the morning and even central London and the far south saw lying snow right along the coasts from Swanage- Kent with as much as 7cm in places. Snow fell right onto the beaches here and lay, something that hadn't happened for over a decade and certainly not in April (though things were soon to change in relation to that score). Although it melted in strong Spring sunshine during the day it was enough to give a very unseasonal and wintry day for many as children (and not a few Dads too) built snowmen on the beaches. The afternoon maximum temperatures were no higher than 1.9°C at East Malling (Kent) and 2.0°C at Kenley (Surrey), so making this probably the coldest April day in these counties for nearly half a century since 1966.

In fact it stayed cold too with wintry showers continuing in the period up to the 20th in places as a generally cold northerl or north easterly flow persisted. The lowest temperatures of the month occurred overnight 13th/14th and 15th/16th with minima of -6.8°C and -6.6°C respectively, both at Braemar (Aberdeenshire). Eskdalemuir in southern Scotland saw 12 days with temperatures falling below 0C in this period.

Temperatures were nearly a degree below average in the first third of the month (but overall the months temperatures tempered by the warm start and a mild end). However in the mainly N-NE' ly flow it was at least very sunny in the south west with 150% of the average but parts of Eastern Scotland saw twice the average rainfall expected, in contrast to just 50% across East Anglia.