SCORCHIO: Sheffield records its hottest day on record

Alistair McLean, curator of Natural Science at Museums Sheffield has been monitoring the weather carefully all week just in case the records were broken.

And he said that at 4.17pm the temperature was recorded at 35.1C.

Alistair said: “We’ve beaten the all-time record – we’re on 35.1 degrees!”

The weather reached 33.6C by 2pm in Sheffield, which broke the record for maximum temperature in July.

Then the mercury continued to rise to 34.3C at 4pm – equalling the previous highest maximum temperature for July on record is 32.7C on July 1, 2015.

The previous hottest ever temperature recorded by the weather station was 34.3 degrees – in August 1990.

The hot weather is good for the ecology of Sheffield in terms of insects and birds but may have adverse effects on the human population.

Alistair said: “It’s really hot, which means it will be really difficult to work in.

“Were not used to it – not like in countries like Spain and France where air conditioning is fitted in most buildings.

“It’s pretty good news for flying insects but not good news for us.”

Hundreds of people made the most of the hot weather and took advantage of the Peace Gardens’ water fountains to cool off.

Alistair said the high temperatures this week has led a lot of willdlife activity.

He said: “We spotted a few Red-eyed Damselflies, as well as plenty of Brown Hawkers and Emperor Dragonflies.”

Monday’s maximum temperature was 26.9 degrees, Tuesday’s was 29.9 degrees and Wednesday’s was 27.4 degrees.

The Western Park weather station takes local temperatures and can be influenced by localised effects, the expert said..

Alistair said: “The data we take at Western Park is showing an incline in temperature which is inline with global trends.

However ,rainfall cannot be influenced by local trends.

He said: “The rainfall pattern has changed over the last 50 years.

“We used to see cloud bursts - an event where 50mm falls in a day - maybe once in a decade.

“But now it’s happening a lot more - we are seeing a lot more extreme weather.”

The hot weather lead to massive thunderstorm overnight on Monday, which Alistair said led to 10mm of rainfall in just an hour being recorded at the Weston Park weather station.

He said: “We saw 10mm of rainfall in an hour in Sheffield.”

“It’s normal for us to get high air pressure when we get temperatures like this but we haven’t had anything particularly high.

“This is causing more thunderstorms and cumulonimbus clouds.”

Climate campaigners voiced their concerns about the extreme weather as records were smashed across Europe.