Has this summer finished? Late July had such a promising run of hot weather, just in time for the start of the school holidays, but hopes for a hot August have been cruelly dashed. There is no easy way to say it, but this summer is something of a damp squib. Weather forecast models show no hint of any decent weather for at least the next week or two.

How could this happen? After all, summers are supposed to be growing hotter as the UK’s climate changes. Instead, it looks like the highest temperature of the year will be 30.9C (87.6F), recorded in London on July 27. This is all looking terribly similar to last year’s atrocious summer – cool, cloudy and wet, but without the truly huge floods.

In both summers the path of the jet stream tracked farther south than usual and dragged Atlantic depressions across the UK.

The jet stream is a river of winds that sweep around the world at high altitude, and is thought to be sensitive to conditions over the Pacific Ocean. For the past year or so the tropical Pacific seas have been cooler than usual, a phenomenon known as La Niña. That upset the normal track of the jet stream, and the knock-on effect has been wet summers for the UK.

This was what the Met Office forecast in its summer outlook. But the good news is that La Niña is dying out and September’s weather is expected to improve markedly.

As for climate change, that carries on regardless. The world’s average land and sea temperature for this spring was the seventh highest on record.