Last month was the fifth driest December since 1922, the Met Office at MIA said today.

A total of 31.2 mm of rain fell last month at Luqa Airport, which was much less than the December climatological norm of 112.2 mm.

The wettest day was December 16th with a total of 16.2 mm. The highest December record was that of 1970 with 302.

While northern parts of Europe experienced very cold weather last month, the mean air temperature at Luqa airport was 14.5°C which made it 0.6°C warmer than the local climate norm for December.

But as to temperature extremes, the highest maximum temperature of 23.5 °C, recorded on the 9th and 23rd , was 0.8oC lower than the maximum for the past 61 years. The warmest December day on record was December 5th 1963, when a maximum temperature of 24.3°C was reached.

The lowest minimum temperature last month was 4.6oC, recorded on the 17th. This makes it 1oC higher than the minimum ever recorded during the past 61 years. The coldest December night occurred on the 22nd of 1967 when a minimum temperature of 3.6°C was reached.

The warmth was also reflected in the lowest grass minimum temperature which was warmer by 6.2oC than the minimum registered during the past 61 years.

The mean sea temperature was 18.7oC which is warmer than the norm of 17oC for the past 32 years.

The monthly mean humidity reached 73%, which is 7 percentage points less than the climatological norm.

On December 16th hail was registered at Luqa. Two days with thunderstorms were registered on December 16th and 17th which is less than the norm for the past 57 years. The stormiest December was that of 1983 with 14 thundery days followed by that of 1986 with 11 days.

The wind at Malta International Airport last month had a mean speed of 8 knots and with 76% of the time within the light wind speed bracket (1 to 10 knots) bracket. The most frequent direction was the Northwest by West. The strongest gust was 49 knots from the South as registered at Luqa Airport on December 23rd.

Last month we had a total of 160.7 hrs of bright sunshine, which is more than the norm for the past 14 years. The sunniest day last month was the 7th with 9.1 hours of sunshine, while the dullest days were the 1st, 3rd, and 23rd with no sunshine.