Wait for summer is almost over

The UK has to weather just a few more days of wind and rain before a long-awaited "more usual" summer pattern arrives, forecasters predict.

Downpours are expected to be largely gone by the end of the week, paving the way for some much-anticipated summer sun.

Widespread flooding, the wettest period of April to June on record and more heavy rain so far this month has been caused by the jet stream settling unusually far south.

But now experts believe it is on its way back north, a move which could herald more traditional summer weather in time for the start of the Olympic Games.

Claire Austin, a forecaster with MeteoGroup, the Press Association's weather division, said there would still be unsettled weather on Wednesday.

She said: "There will be a band of slow-moving heavy rain through central and northern parts of Scotland today, which will sit there most of the day bringing quite a lot of rain.

"England and Wales are going to see a showery band of rain moving eastwards, with sunshine and showers following behind.

"The heaviest of the rainfall and more frequent heavy showers will be across north Wales, the north Midlands and Lincolnshire, where there will be frequent lightning strikes and thunder storms.

"As we go through tonight the general trend across England and Wales will see most of the showers die away. But the band of rain across Scotland will sink south and east through the night."

On Thursday and Friday there will be a mixture of sunshine and showers, with a risk of the odd heavier shower in central and eastern parts of England.

Dry and fine will arrive with the weekend, while the start of next week will be breezy and rain in the north and Scotland, and dry and fine in the rest of the UK, and gradually getting warmer.

The Environment Agency, which has been inundated in dealing with flooding across the UK in recent weeks, has 20 flood alerts currently in place, and no flood warnings.