Climate of Tarn-et-Garonne
The Tarn-et-Garonne is a crossroads where meet the mountain influences of the Massif Central and the softness of the Gascogne; where coexist the rough one and wild beauty of the Causse and the opulence of the plains of the the Garonne. Located between the Atlantic and the Mediterranean, still in the zone of influence of the Pyrenean relief and the Massif Central, the Tarn-et-Garonne has climate of a oceanic type degraded.
The winters generally soft and wet, are intersected there with cold short periods (37 days of freezing on average per annum to Montauban and only four with a temperature lower than -5 degrees Celsius). The very cold winters are exceptional in Tarn-et-Garonne (1956, 1963,1967,1985,1987, with temperatures under shelter clearly going down in lower part from -10° Celsius, records in 1985 with -20°C with Montauban, -22,5°C with Caylus, -21,0°C with Réalville). The snowfalls are rare and the quasi non-existent rains verglaçantes (since the opening of the departmental center in April 1990, of weak and short rains verglaçantes were observed on the department with some recoveries).
The summers are hot and generally dry. The thermometer posts 30 degrees per annum at least 23 days and, with 42,4 degrees Celsius, Caylus holds the departmental record.
The rains, primarily brought by the winds of west do not exceed 646 mm with Monbéqui, the driest sector of the department, but by orographical effect, they reach 836 mm with Montaigu de Quercy in the extreme North-West and even 941 mm in the area of Caylus. They fall especially in winter and in spring, with a point in May. Stormy rains sometimes strong or accompanied by hail occur spring with the autumn. To date the driest year observed with Montauban was 1967 with 425 mm and the most sprinkled was that of 1959 with 1005 mm; that shows the great variability of this parameter.
The dominant winds come from west but the Autan, a regional wind of hot and dry south-east, blows there sometimes violently (reached or exceeded 100 km/h six times in ten years on the department). During the storm of December 27th, 1999, the wind came from the North-West and reached 112 km/h with Montauban (speed records of wind), 108 km/h with Castelsarrasin and 101 km/h with Cayrac. Nevertheless the absolute records measured on the department are of 119 km/h, observed twice with Cayrac by wind of Southerly wind, and once with Castelsarrasin by wind of west in January 1995.
The fogs, frequent as of the end of the autumn and in winter, are formed mainly in the valleys of the Garonne, the Tarn and on the lower course of Aveyron.
| Random links: | Senato della Repubblica | Emperador Daigo | Henri Kietlicz | Celestial marriage | Price Jean de Chaudenay | Jan Poortvliet | Iconographie |