It may not have felt like it, but last month was not the wettest January ever measured by a Sheppey rain collector.

Last week it was reported nationally that parts of southern England had their wettest start to the year since records began.

In some areas in the South West of England rainfall has reached 222mm – with some villages hit by persistent flooding.

Sheppey appears to have escaped the worst of it, however, as a total of 72.8mm of rainfall was measured by Ken Beal, from his home in Eastchurch.

Although it seemed at times as if the weather would never let up, this was not the wettest January in his records. That accolade goes to the first month of 1995 when 98.5mm of rain hit the Island.

Last month was still a lot worse than January 2013 when 40.3mm was recorded. We had a particularly damp October with a massive 73mm falling in a single day, which helped the total for the month reach 135.8mm.

There were not any days with an exceptionally large amount of the wet stuff last month but rather lots of days of about 5mm.

In fact, the wettest day was the 28th with 9mm. Apart from January 6, 8, 10, 11, 20 and 24, it rained every single day, which could be why it seemed a lot wetter.

Mr Beal, who started measuring rainfall on behalf of the Environment Agency in 1994, said: “January was quite wet and I think there was more rain in Sheerness than we have had at this end of the Island.

“If I lived in Sheerness I probably would have had another 20mm in my gauge.

“It hasn’t been as bad as it seems. I looked back and it was actually a lot wetter in the autumn of 1994 but then of course we had a massive amount of rain and it remained very wet for the rest of winter.”