It might be flaming June but it isn't because the sun is cracking the pavements. The grim weather is the main topic of conversation - after the World Cup. Reporter Jim Greenhalf looks at how wet June has been.

In Manningham Lane an electrical appliances store has an A-board outside advertising fans for sale - the air-cooling variety, not mercenary World Cup enthusiasts.

The store would be better off selling umbrellas, plastic macs and rubber footwear, because ever since the first month of summer started with 48 hours of non-stop rain Bradford has been among the wettest places in Yorkshire and the North-East.

Far from busting out all over, June has been sheltering in doorways or getting soaked between bus stops. Eleven days into the month our area has had about 60 millimetres of rain; the monthly average is only 53mm.

Temperatures have been well below the expected monthly average: 41 degrees Fahrenheit as against an average minimum of 50. Wednesday was reportedly the coldest night of the year in Scotland. Well, they had just lost 2-1 to the sunny Brazilians.

June has been more like a Scottish pop group (wet, wet, wet) in the rest of the country too. The last day of the First Test in Birmingham was washed out, and the Stella Artois tennis at Queen's Club in London has a backlog of water-logged fixtures.

But why have we had rainfall that reads like a South African Test Match batting average?

The forecaster at the Press Association's Weather Centre was reluctant to attribute the wettest June start in ten years to a particular cause, not even to El Nino.

El Nino is not a South American striker (perhaps with Chile), but the inexplicable natural phenomenon which has reversed the Pacific Ocean's current. That in turn has played havoc with the world's weather, battering the eastern coast of the United States and this week killing hundreds in a cyclone in western India.

On Easter Monday the Midlands were deluged with snow and rain of such quantity and force that it killed five people and caused damage estimated at £1 billion. Nothing like it had been seen since the big winds of 1987.

Perhaps we should put our weird weather down to the man-made phenomenon of global warming.

While our winters have been getting milder (February was temperate and sunny), summers have tended to be erratic. Take last June - it began with sunny breezes, became warm, then very humid on the tenth followed by two days of torrential downpours.

What about the next few days? Well, you'd be advised to keep the barbecue equipment in the garage. More rain is forecast for tomorrow and Tuesday. Sunday may be an improvement, but Monday is uncertain.

But it's a right shower that does nobody any good. While you may be glumly waiting for an opportunity to bang on the sun block, they're singin' in the rain at Yorkshire Water.

The moorland reservoirs which supply Bradford are at 97 per cent capacity - 5.5 per cent more than they were this time last week, and excluding the rainfall since Monday morning when water levels were last measured.

A spokesman said YW would have no trouble supplying customers this summer. That's a mercy.

Meanwhile spare a thought for tomorrow's fun day at...Whetley First School in Girlington, scheduled from 12.30pm to 4pm. What's going to happen to the five-a-side competition and the bouncy castle if the heavens open?

"We've got contingency plan b - we move inside," said co-ordinator Sue Holmes. "This will be our third fun day and we have always had absolutely beautiful weather. We expect it to rain - at 4.30pm."

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.