Strong winds and thunderstorms kick off the bank holiday weekend

ByMatt Taylor

Lead Weather Presenter

After weeks of scorching heat and drought the summer's swan song is set to be one of frequent downpours as well as gales for some.

Areas of heavy rain and showers are expected to sweep across parts of the UK on each day of the weekend, which is a bank holiday for many.

This could make for some soggy moments at many of the festivals taking place over the coming days.

Strong winds and gales may also cause problems for travellers and holidaymakers in southern parts of the UK.

Let us start with the good news - for many of us it won't be a complete washout of a weekend. It is certainly worth looking deeper into your weather app forecasts to see the hourly breakdown as showers can sometimes be tricky to forecast.

Most areas will still see some drier and sunnier moments through the three days, with parts of north and west Scotland perhaps seeing very little rainfall at all. During the sunnier spells the late August sunshine still has enough strength to make it feels reasonably warm too.

However, on Saturday the forecast shows several zones of heavy showers sweeping across England and Wales especially. Like recent days some of these could be torrential and thundery, especially in the southern half of England and Wales. For northern parts of England the showers are likely to merge into longer spells of rain during the afternoon.

Given the downpours already this week, some parts of the Midlands and northern England are more susceptible to the risk of flash flooding.

A large portion of Scotland and Northern Ireland will stay dry.

Sunday may start dry and bright for many, perhaps with some mist and fog patches in central and northern areas of the UK.

It is northern parts this time where there may be some early showers, but through the afternoon another zone of heavy and thundery showers are expected to sweep across the country from the west. For some in East Anglia and south-east England it may stay dry until late in the day.

South-eastern parts of the UK might get lucky again on bank holiday Monday. Scattered showers in the west during the morning will gradually develop more widely through the day, but these shouldn't be as intense as those on the previous two days.

If bouts of rain wasn't enough, parts of southern England and Wales will be buffeted by strong winds at times too. This may make travel and camping a challenge at times.

The strongest winds of the weekend are expected on Saturday across southern counties of England and Wales as well as the Channel Islands. Some hills and coasts could experience gusts of 40 to 50mph.

Monday will be a blustery day more widely across the UK, but again it will be southern areas seeing the strongest gusts - generally 30-40mph.

This will make for a cooler feeling spell of weather at times. Throughout the weekend temperatures across the UK will be around 15 to 22 Celsius, a shade below the average for the time of year.

With numerous festivals on this weekend, including Reading and Leeds, Creamfields and the Notting Hill Carnival it is worth keeping across the forecast. Should any weather warnings be issued you can find them on your BBC Weather app or on our website.