NI records warmest Easter Sunday temperatures

It's warmer and drier here at the moment, than many parts of mainland Europe

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Author: Naomi HollandPublished 21st Apr 2019

It's been the warmest Easter Sunday on record in Northern Ireland.

The Met office says the mercury reached 20.7 degrees celsius by 2pm at Helen's Bay in County Down.

That beats the previous high of 19.4C in Armagh, all the way back in 1924.

Eleswhere temperatures reached 23C in Trawsgoed, Wales and 22.8C in Edinburgh, Scotland.

Wiggonholt in West Sussex, recorded the highest temperature in England on Easter Sunday with a figure of 24.3C.

But that's still below the top Easter Sunday temperature from 2011 when the mercury reached 25.3C in the Solent.

Met Office forecaster Marco Petagna said: "We have got high pressure moving at the moment giving most of the UK a lot of fine weather, this combined with the fact that the high pressure has dominated for the past few days is allowing the temperatures to heat and build.

"It is allowing some record breaking temperatures to be set today and potentially tomorrow as we are looking at a high of 25C or 26C.''

He also suggested that the temperatures may also be helped by the fact that Easter has fallen a little later in the calendar this year.

He said: "The later in the year that Easter falls, the higher the sun is in the sky and the stronger it is.''

It comes after Easter Saturday became the warmest day of the year so far when the temperature hit 25.5C in Gosport, Hampshire.

The UK's warmest Easter temperature was the 29.4C recorded at Camden Square in London on Easter Saturday in 1949.

The other warmest Easter weekend days include the 26.9C recorded at London's St James's Park on Good Friday in 2011 - when the mercury also reached 25.3C on Easter Sunday and 24C on Easter Monday, both in the Solent.

Mr Hall said that in "stark contrast'' to the dry and sunny conditions in the UK, Spain and the Mediterranean are seeing showers and heavy downpours.

He added: "Spain is very unsettled as we go into Easter Monday. There are temperatures of 17C to 16C in Barcelona. There are certainly cooler conditions there compared to the UK."