Around two inches of rain is expected to fall across parts of England and Wales today, including in Somerset, which is likely to cause flooding and travel disruption
The Met Office has delivered a bleak verdict on when this period of heavy rain will finally stop.
A forecaster with the agency conceded “there’s no end in sight” to the run of wet weather, for which two warnings are in place for today alone. The Met Office says around two inches (50mm) of rain is expected to lash across parts of the Southwest of England and Wales today, and potentially greater levels across Northern Ireland.
But the long-range forecast is just as grim with “cyclonic patterns” likely for some time yet. Met Office operational meteorologist Dan Stroud said: “Unfortunately, there’s no end in sight.” He also referred to the storms currently battering Portugal and Spain, which are happening as a result of our weather patterns.
Mr Stroud added: “Very little in the way of change, and the reason for it really is that we’ve got a big area of high pressure way out to the far north and east of the country and that’s stopping areas of low pressure from moving through.
“Until that area of high pressure sort of shifts out of the way, we’re not really going to see see much of a change in the forecast. At the same time, we’ve got the jet stream way to the south, bringing exceptional wet weather to Spain and Portugal.”
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Rain has fallen every day of 2026 in southwest England and South Wales. These regions experienced a far wetter than average January, with 50% more rainfall than usual. Aberdeen, meanwhile, has seen no sunshine for two weeks — the longest period for the area since records began in 1957.
Katesbridge, which is in County Down, Northern Ireland, has already experienced heavy rainfall this week. Around 1.5 inches of rain fell there on Wednesday and, with further downpours expected across Northern Ireland today, flooding is feared. Some surface water flooding and damages to homes and businesses are also likely across parts of Wales, southwest and southeast England and the West Midlands this weekend.
The band of rain in the southwest will travel northwards on Friday with heavy bursts, Mr Stroud said. Heavy showers will continue in the south on Saturday morning before they gradually push up into Wales and the Midlands.
At the same time, persistent cloud and rain will continue to beleaguer eastern Scotland including Aberdeen. Some brightness will break through on Saturday for parts of East Anglia, the south-east and possible west Scotland. Sunday should be a slightly drier day for those that are not in the southern and western parts of the UK, who will see yet another band of rain arrive.
Journey times and transport services will likely be affected and power supplies may also briefly be interrupted throughout the weekend, forecasters say.
