Editorial: Hubert Lamb Centenary Special Issue

Abstract

On 6–7 September 2013 the centenary of the birth of the climatologist Professor Hubert Horace Lamb was commemorated by a meeting held at the University of East Anglia. The event was attended by around 50 delegates – several of whom had worked with Hubert – along with his widow Moira Lamb and two generations of their descendant family. This special issue of Weather contains adapted versions of four of the eight papers presented at the meeting. This special issue is not without precedent: following Hubert Lamb's death in 1997, the July 1998 issue of Weather commemorated Hubert's achievements with a series of papers related to various subjects covered in his work. The papers focused on the ongoing research in climatology inspired by Hubert's pioneering studies. Over the last 16 years, the science has developed rapidly, and this special edition will review a selection of the many advances that have been made in the intervening years. The papers present the ‘state of the art’ of certain key subjects that guided his research. The frequency of very severe storms (G > 50 based on the UK Jenkinson Gale Index) across the UK in each winter season (DJF) since 1900 constructed from reanalysis-derived surface pressure data. For details on the construction of the time series see http://www.cru.uea.ac.uk/cru/data/lwt, and for background information see the papers by Richard Cornes and Phil Jones et al. in this issue. Throughout his career, Hubert showed a high interest in climate-sensitive data from historical documentary sources, as well as in the impact of past climate variability – short-term and long-term – on human livelihood. In the third paper in this issue, Kathleen Pribyl highlights the significant advances that have been made in recent years in the field of historical climatology, with a focus on the climate of medieval England. The symposium last September brought together a variety of scientists who were influenced directly or indirectly by the work of Hubert Lamb. On behalf of the Climatic Research Unit I would like to offer my thanks to the Royal Meteorological Society and the Society's History of Meteorology and Physical Oceanography Group for co-organising the meeting with the University of East Anglia, and to the Lamb family for their support of the event.