Climbing temperatures in both cities

Signs of summer have returned to Sydney again over the past few days. The past five days have all recorded high levels of sunshine and a maximum above 25C. Thursday and Friday rose to 27.6C and 28.1C respectively, before temperatures dropped slightly to 25.4C on Saturday. Sunday saw the warmest day in three weeks. It reached 30.9C. Today was also hot. Very strong northwesterly winds took temperatures up to 33.2C at Sydney Airport.

The strong winds reached gale force this afternoon. A steady coastal breeze turned to a northwesterly around 2:45pm at the Airport and average wind speeds were quickly above 50km/h. A peak gust of 83km/h was recorded at 3:03pm. So far this year there have been 11 days with a maximum gust at or above 80km/h at the Airport. Today's gust ranked as the equal sixth strongest of those. 2013 had recorded 11 such days by this time of the year also. Mount Boyce, in the Blue Mountains, had the strongest recorded gust today within the Bureau's defined area of Sydney. A westerly at 120km/h was measured there at 1:52pm.

Minimums have been more like those seen in summer too. It hasn't been below 15C since last Wednesday with morning temperatures hovering around 18C. This morning didn't go lower than 19.2C. If not for a southerly change late this evening, this would have been the first minimum above 19C since April 11, more than six months ago. Of the past six years, only 2013 had seen a minimum that warm by October 27, following winter.

A few showers were seen around Sydney on Friday and over the weekend. The Airport, however, only recorded a measly 1.0mm over the three days. A small but dangerous storm struck Sydney's west on Thursday afternoon. A total of 16.2mm fell in a very short space of time at Penrith. However, no other Sydney weather stations recorded significant falls.

Despite it being the opposite season, temperatures in Jyväskylä have also been steadily climbing. The sun hasn't made an appearance though. Since last Thursday's very cold October minimum of -13.6C, it has continuously climbed more than 20C to just over 10C today. A very large low pressure system, remnants of the Atlantic storm Hurricane Gonzalo that struck the UK last week, currently sits in the Norwegian Sea. It is generating strong winds as well as sending warm and moist air across the Nordic region.

I said last week that, despite the forecast, there was a decent chance that there wouldn't be any more days in excess of 10C for the rest of the year in Jyväskylä, but extended forecasts at the time have stayed true to their predictions. Today's maximum is the warmest seen in more than two weeks, and well above the daily maximums of -3.4C and -3.0C from October 22 and 23.

Skies starting to clear just after 4pm on October 27

First break in the clouds seen in Jyväskylä for several days

In addition to the warmer temperatures, incessant light rain and showers have affected Jyväskylä since early Saturday morning. A daily total of 6.1mm was recorded on the 25th. Yesterday followed that up with 3.4mm, pushing the monthly total above the long term average in the process. Today has also seen falls. As the sky started to clear around 4pm, 6.0mm had been recorded at Tikkakoski, taking the total to 78.4mm with four days of the month remaining.