Hail on December 27 was last month's weather highlight - Met Office

Last month’s weather highlight was the amount of hail registered in some places, such as Valletta on December 27, the Meteorological Office said this morning.

It said in a statement that a thunderstorm at around 7 a.m. lasted two hours hitting Valletta and Birkirkara the worst. This hail was attributed to sub-zero temperatures at lower atmospheric altitudes which did not allow the rapid melting of the ice.

The office said that last month, there were four days with thunderstorms and 14 with precipitation. However, the total number of days with thunderstorms was below the December norm since 1951.

The total rainfall registered at Luqa Airport amounted to 102.8 mm, slightly less than the 30-year mean for December. The highest rainfall recorded in December in the past 85 years was in 1970, when a total of 302.6 mm of rain fell over the Maltese islands.

The Met Office said that the mean air temperature last month was 14.6 degrees C . This was 0.4 degrees C warmer than the typical 30-year December average.

Whereas the mean minimum temperature was higher by 0.9 degrees C, the mean maximum temperature was lower than the 30-year December average by 0.2 degrees C.