Met. Office tracing of the 1968 storm
Scanned image of the Met. Office tracing of the 1968 storm
Although relatively mild in the winter and cool in the summer, Tiree experiences extremes in other weather conditions. Since records began, the sunniest day occurred on 9th July 1936 with the island basking in 16.8 hours of sunshine.
The wettest day was 15th September 1944 with 74.6 mm of rainfall and the driest month was August 1947 with only 4.1 mm of rain. The previous record for the windiest day – 118 mph on 15th January 1968 – was exceeded on 11th January 2005 when the anemometer at the Met. Station broke at a wind speed of 124 mph.
There was considerable damage to a number of coastal roads, some being submerged in several feet of water at the height of the storm, and the passenger walkway at Gott Bay pier was ripped from its mountings.