VER is the Latin name for Spring. And at 1.55 p.m. today in this Spring of 1997, the sun will have reached a point directly over the equator on its annual journey northwards to facilitate our northern summer. Today, therefore, marks the vernal equinox.
The equinoxes, over the centuries, have acquired an unsavoury reputation for very violent storms. The blustery nature of the autumnal equinoctal period, for example, was acknowledged by Julius Caesar, when he had trouble with the elements shortly after his invasion of Britain in 55 BC. Writing in De Bello Gallico, he tells us: "Doubling the number of hostages he had previously demanded from the Britons, Caesar ordered them delivered on the Continent, for the equinox was near, and as his ships were shaken, Caesar did not think it wise to risk a winter crossing."
And in the first Act of Macbeth, Shakespeare refers to the vernal equinox when he reminds us that at this time of year...
Shipwrecking storms and direful thunders break,
So from that spring, whence comfort seemed to come.
Discomfort swells.
Meteorologists, however have no particular affection for the theory of equinoctial gales. On the contrary, their statistics tell them that the windiest conditions tend to occur around the middle of winter, when depressions are deeper and more vigorous than at other times of the year. But one of our number many years ago had an interesting theory about the predictive power of the wind at this time.
Richard Kirwan is best remembered for the long series of weather observation he made in the garden of his home in Cavendish Row in Dublin from 1787 to 1808. But, he also tried his hand at long range forecasting, using climatological information to predict the coming season the story goes that his forecasts were so popular and well respected that farmers delayed their sowing until they knew the details of his latest prognostications.
About the winds at the vernal equinox Kirwan had this to say: "When there has been no particular storm about the time of the spring equinox, if a storm arise from the east on or before that day, or if a storm from any point of the compass arise near a week after the equinox, then in either of these cases, the succeeding summer is generally dry, but if a storm arise from the southwest or west southwest on or just before the spring equinox, then the summer following is generally wet, five times in sixf."